DanceLessons

Coffee Hour as a Bonding Mechanism

I’m preparing for a workshop this weekend on groups and church transitions.   I went back and reviewed some of the literature about groups.  I discovered in the same body of literature, the physical limit on the number of individuals that can effectively take part in a conversation and the effect of background noise on conversation.   I've described our church coffee hour like a subway station: noisy, crowded with no trafflic flow. Moving from one side of the room to the other is a feat. And yet we invite new folks to join us so we can get to know each other.  Hah! After my review, I would say that Coffee Hour is the worst place to get to know anyone – or to have any conversation.  Conversational groups are limited to a maximum of seven individuals  if they speak in a raised voice, a group of five if they are speaking at normal voice levels. The maximum nose to nose limit for comfortable conversation is about five feet. Therefore the maximum conversation group size would be five, with people in a circle, shoulder to shoulder spacing of 20 inches between adjacent individuals.    We may have room for four or five such groups.  Visualize the Olympic rings.

And to make matters worse is the background noise, Noise levels of cocktail parties (substitute coffee hours) is considerably in excess of noise levels recorded on city streets and are just below the level sufficient to induce impairment. Speech recognition is close to zero, conversation becomes impossible and maximum group size approaches one.  No wonder Annapolis UU’s are so agreeable.  We can’t hear anyone – so we just nod.

Sommer (1961),

It isn't you

How can I reconstruct myself to a positive state again?

I ponder that.  Especially with depression you feel it is not part of you. It isn’t me, it’s the depression.  That is what my minister said last week, when I apologized for always being late, etc.  "It isn’t you, it’s the depression".  But I said it is me.  If I couldn’t walk, would people say, it isn’t you, it’s your broken leg.  If I did have a broken leg, would my adult child say "don’t make it about you" when I couldn’t keep up with her. When my cold and distant mother broke down and sobbed, she said "this isn’t me, it is the stroke."  .

On Friday I’m doing a workshop on church growth with my minister.  We talked about a code word we could use if I start to lose my train of thought.  I don’t know if I will need it. If all goes well, what should he say ‘that was great, it isn’t you or isn’t you. Or things go poorly will he say “you tried, it isn’t you, it’s the depression."

I beginning to think to be whole I have to embrace the light and the shadows.  There is a reason for that but I can’t think of the words.

Saving Message - too much for congregation

I just returned from the Outer Banks. My husband retires next month and we trying to make a decision on relocation. We’ve lived in the Washington,DC, area for 30 years. We understand about location, location, location.  The same is true in North Carolina. 100 miles is equivalent to $100,000 in price of land. This is true whether one starts at Nags Head or Virginia Beach. There is also a ratio to size of property. 1700 sq ft in Nags Head is $500,000. Two hundred miles through the Dismal Swamp one can find a waterfront property for a lot less. (they don't call it the dismal swamp for nothing.  And in all this area there are two UU congregations. The congregation on the Outer Banks (losing their minister and appear to have financial and leadership conflicts if one reads their newsletter). And the old downtown Norfolk church. In the early 1900 there were black congregations is Suffolk and Chesapeake.

A most peculiar "Holy Coversations" dialogue is happening within UUCAnnapolis, a healthy growing congregation. Language has become a sticking point. “Part of the strategic planning is to define the saving message of our congregation. ”The term "Saving Message" was too much for even the strategic planning committee so it was soften to "transforming Message" Even Transforming has been seen as sinister by a number of members. I’m confused, the minister is confused. Since the word "tranforming" has been used a multitude of times from the pulpit, in church pamphlets, it is confusing to me that members are so guarded. Is it in the UU nature to subscribe worse fears to vocabulary? Is it unresolved fear from our religious past? The one which does not get addressed in any grown-up way. If we do have a saving message, is it a saving message from or a saving mesagge to?

In 1996 An evangelical theolgian warned in readers of Trinity Journal "the UUA is now spreading its 'saving message' with a vengeance." .  Maybe we need to start spreading it at home as well.

Nancy