Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Risking Church
Risking Church is a book by Jim Kallam Jr. It is an interesting book to read in part because he lays himself out for us to see. He talks about his own weakness and his failings, rather than some magic formula. The focus of the book is about community, a place where people feel at home, a safe place, a place to let your guard down so that we can become the people God intended us to be.
One of the chapters specifically addresses this idea of safety and what it is. Jim asks the questsion "What is a safe church?" The possible answers he gives are:
"Many leaders would answer 'Doctinal Purity'".
"For many, predictability is a factor for creating safety."
"Safety is sometimes measured by control."
He tells us that none of these live up to the billing. These do not create a safe place, in fact unless you have the power it is the opposite of a safe place. The real answer to creating a safe place is relationships, relationships that allow others to grow, to become what they never dreamed, what they only wished. Only in true community can we feel safe enough to risk, to try and fail and know that we are not going to be booted out of the "family" or as they say now a days "voted off the island."
One of the chapters specifically addresses this idea of safety and what it is. Jim asks the questsion "What is a safe church?" The possible answers he gives are:
"Many leaders would answer 'Doctinal Purity'".
"For many, predictability is a factor for creating safety."
"Safety is sometimes measured by control."
He tells us that none of these live up to the billing. These do not create a safe place, in fact unless you have the power it is the opposite of a safe place. The real answer to creating a safe place is relationships, relationships that allow others to grow, to become what they never dreamed, what they only wished. Only in true community can we feel safe enough to risk, to try and fail and know that we are not going to be booted out of the "family" or as they say now a days "voted off the island."
// posted by Eric @ 12:15 PM 
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Sort of sounds like a certain vision statement...
Are we looking at this book for Family Camp? Or it might be interesting for a 52 sermon series...
Are we looking at this book for Family Camp? Or it might be interesting for a 52 sermon series...
"voted off the island" - always my continual fear!
They have changed the posting focus here to a minister primarily for the youth and the worship team / dropping the emphasis on the college careers group.
... waiting for the judicial recount before leaving the island.
They have changed the posting focus here to a minister primarily for the youth and the worship team / dropping the emphasis on the college careers group.
... waiting for the judicial recount before leaving the island.
I can agree with this author to a certain extent. Five years ago I and my family came from a church that we had been members of for twenty years. We left because I no longer felt safe. There were of course relational difficulties, some very legitimite and should have not been allowed to enter into the church.
The church we left for, we felt instantly at home and what clinched it for me and made me feel I was in a safe place was the Sunday morning one of the pastors got up and apologized for something he had shared on a previous sunday that had been in error. I was beside myself when a couple of sundays later one of the other pastors got up and repented for an attitude he had been carrying and I knew this was home. I still struggle with feelings of not being safe and accepted but some of these issues are from my baggage and not from those I am family with.
The church we left for, we felt instantly at home and what clinched it for me and made me feel I was in a safe place was the Sunday morning one of the pastors got up and apologized for something he had shared on a previous sunday that had been in error. I was beside myself when a couple of sundays later one of the other pastors got up and repented for an attitude he had been carrying and I knew this was home. I still struggle with feelings of not being safe and accepted but some of these issues are from my baggage and not from those I am family with.
"Voted off the island"? Now, who says that? ;)
Rick3: thanks for the phone call. I'm sorry I havent been good at getting back. We need to get together (and you probably want your bike). Phone back and leave best number and best time to call, pls.
Rick3: thanks for the phone call. I'm sorry I havent been good at getting back. We need to get together (and you probably want your bike). Phone back and leave best number and best time to call, pls.
Safety is a big deal... emotional safety, acceptance, etc...
I just woke up in a very bad mood this morning due to the simple thing of a dream. In my dream everyone else had a big secret that no one would share with me. When I finally found out about the secret - and that everyone else knew about it - it seemed like I was just a big joke to everyone.
The insecurity was increased with the dream being set in a highschool setting - which was a time in my life where I felt the most insecure.
So I woke up feeling very insecure and unsafe...
I would hate to feel that way at church.
And yet, sometimes, I do.
I just woke up in a very bad mood this morning due to the simple thing of a dream. In my dream everyone else had a big secret that no one would share with me. When I finally found out about the secret - and that everyone else knew about it - it seemed like I was just a big joke to everyone.
The insecurity was increased with the dream being set in a highschool setting - which was a time in my life where I felt the most insecure.
So I woke up feeling very insecure and unsafe...
I would hate to feel that way at church.
And yet, sometimes, I do.
I suspect that at times we will all go through phases where we feel threatened, and where we wanted to run. I wonder what makes us able to overcome those and have the general feeling that this is a safe place (if it is). What makes for a safe church?
Seeing someone else stay when you know they want to hide?
or maybe
Honestly admitting that no other grass is truly greener or different?
or maybe
Seeing yourself as one of many huddled desperately around the only source of safety - CHRIST
Of course some probably feel safest far away from me :)
or maybe
Honestly admitting that no other grass is truly greener or different?
or maybe
Seeing yourself as one of many huddled desperately around the only source of safety - CHRIST
Of course some probably feel safest far away from me :)
All human activities break down into fields of play or the field of aversion -- based on the basic physiology of the brain. "Fields of play" are those circumstances wherein the body releases seratonin & dopamine agents into the brain bath. "Field of aversion" is a circumstance wherein the body releases adrenalin & endorphin agents into the brain bath. (Of course, many circumstances contain elements of both fields; but there is an essential link to specifically one or the other.)
You can only have the sensation we call "fun" when one is playing in a "safe field of play", which is a field of play whose safety is guarranteed by a "selfobject" -- a supervisory presense that observes but does not participate in the play. The psychological structure is the young child playing who cries when the parent leaves the room.
In many religious groups, the Selfobject is present through representation (ie: icons, statuary, reliquary) or transference (the intermediary priest-figure).
The C of C, like many Protestant groups, has two barriers to worship as a "safe field of play". One is the rejection of mediated relationships with the Numinous. There is no need for a transferent or representative identity, as the God lives within the worshipper. This requires one's inner sense of the Divine to act as "safeobject"; a complex play structure that is analagous to the writer's use of an imagined future readership as his "safeobject" safeguarding his psychological identity while engaged in the play of fiction. Thus, while this form of worship could be very fulfilling, depending on the participant's investment of psychic energy into the "play", it will not be "fun" for the casual participant. It be dang hard woik.
Anyone who has been critically reading this and has some familiarity with the C of C will by now have realised the other major reason why services aren't "fun". We ain't playin.
The C of C has traditionally, since the days of Stone, et al, been focused not on the "field of play" during Sunday meetings, but rather on the "field of aversion". Like most Protestant groups, the emphasis is on repentance, confession; and the general use of fear of aprobation and damnation as pedagogic strategies precludes the possibility of "play", and thereby the experience of "fun", altogether. You can't have fun if you are thinking about being "voted off the island." When you can, if only momentarily, forget the threat, then you are capable of engaging in "play", and therby having "fun".
The question is: do you need to have fun in worship? The "field of aversion" is a strong pedagogic utility; you learn very quickly how to hold a knife after being cut by one. The problem with using the "field of aversion" as a primary pedagogic device is that lessons learned are primal, and thus not very transferable. We have to learn that heat can burn; we also have to learn, seperately, that cold can do likewise. But if strawberries make a nice pie, we are likely to try and make pies with all sorts of other berries. "Fields of play" engage the imagination, and thereby inherently make themselves transferable.
You may have noted the plural "fields of play" and singular "field of aversion". This is because of another primary apect of "play": it inherently eggs the player on to more complex forms of play, and naturalises the prior fields of play, making them habitual, normative. The "field of aversion" is not so, normally: the brain looks for a template event, and when that template event occurs, it triggers the "adverse" response -- adrenaline, endorphines: "fight or flight". You can see that, while the "field of aversion" would make one reluctant to sit on a pew for two hours, engaging the "fields of play" would actually encourage one to remain attentive and participate.
But, engaging in "play" requires a sense of the presense of a "Selfobject"....
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You can only have the sensation we call "fun" when one is playing in a "safe field of play", which is a field of play whose safety is guarranteed by a "selfobject" -- a supervisory presense that observes but does not participate in the play. The psychological structure is the young child playing who cries when the parent leaves the room.
In many religious groups, the Selfobject is present through representation (ie: icons, statuary, reliquary) or transference (the intermediary priest-figure).
The C of C, like many Protestant groups, has two barriers to worship as a "safe field of play". One is the rejection of mediated relationships with the Numinous. There is no need for a transferent or representative identity, as the God lives within the worshipper. This requires one's inner sense of the Divine to act as "safeobject"; a complex play structure that is analagous to the writer's use of an imagined future readership as his "safeobject" safeguarding his psychological identity while engaged in the play of fiction. Thus, while this form of worship could be very fulfilling, depending on the participant's investment of psychic energy into the "play", it will not be "fun" for the casual participant. It be dang hard woik.
Anyone who has been critically reading this and has some familiarity with the C of C will by now have realised the other major reason why services aren't "fun". We ain't playin.
The C of C has traditionally, since the days of Stone, et al, been focused not on the "field of play" during Sunday meetings, but rather on the "field of aversion". Like most Protestant groups, the emphasis is on repentance, confession; and the general use of fear of aprobation and damnation as pedagogic strategies precludes the possibility of "play", and thereby the experience of "fun", altogether. You can't have fun if you are thinking about being "voted off the island." When you can, if only momentarily, forget the threat, then you are capable of engaging in "play", and therby having "fun".
The question is: do you need to have fun in worship? The "field of aversion" is a strong pedagogic utility; you learn very quickly how to hold a knife after being cut by one. The problem with using the "field of aversion" as a primary pedagogic device is that lessons learned are primal, and thus not very transferable. We have to learn that heat can burn; we also have to learn, seperately, that cold can do likewise. But if strawberries make a nice pie, we are likely to try and make pies with all sorts of other berries. "Fields of play" engage the imagination, and thereby inherently make themselves transferable.
You may have noted the plural "fields of play" and singular "field of aversion". This is because of another primary apect of "play": it inherently eggs the player on to more complex forms of play, and naturalises the prior fields of play, making them habitual, normative. The "field of aversion" is not so, normally: the brain looks for a template event, and when that template event occurs, it triggers the "adverse" response -- adrenaline, endorphines: "fight or flight". You can see that, while the "field of aversion" would make one reluctant to sit on a pew for two hours, engaging the "fields of play" would actually encourage one to remain attentive and participate.
But, engaging in "play" requires a sense of the presense of a "Selfobject"....
# posted by 
: 11:14 AM
: 11:14 AM << Home
