Now we are at the part of the process where we are reading you don't want to know how many pages of notes from the discussion groups. Each group was also supposed to produce some recommendations. We are going to vote on which discussions we think are the important ones to follow up on.
Here's a list of the recommendations that caught my eye. They have not been voted on, and not even I think that these are the most important things to follow up on. They just caught my eye.
Be not attached...things will no doubt change as radically and quickly as the Seattle weather is about to change....
We need to create a space for testifying to the spirit of our faith in our personal lives.
We need to add suffering and failure to our theological understanding
We need to support multi racial and multi-racial adoptive families. There are resources for retreat programs on DRUUUMM website.
Enrich our ministries by having conversations about holy experience/transcendence with colleagues. Allow ourselves to be more vulnerable.
Talk about our holy experiences/sense of God in our congregations and with our congregations. Model this so they can do it too.
Review the Fellowshipping Process top to bottom. Look for unintended consequences of the Fellowshipping process.
Look at Asistant/associate ministers situation. Produce a best practices document. Do more training of ministry teams in teams.
look at the culture among ministers which discourages entreprenurial ministries.
Allow ministerial internships at camps and conference centers.
create more spirituality-based education for youth beyond youth group.
About three dozen recommendations from the three or four groups which discussed the relationship between the theological schools and the UUA. To summarize boldly: Let the past go and get going on the future.
The Enlightenment is over. We don't quite know what is coming next, and it is heartbreaking to watch it die. But if we want to be relevant, we have to move, too.
It's not enough to be a learned ministery, we need to be a learning ministry.
Enough for now! By the next post, we'll have started focusing in.
2 comments:
I would like to add the following recommendation -
Look at the culture among ministers which not only discourages frank and open discussion of the "transgressive behavior" of "less than excellent" U*U ministers but even encourages the censorship and suppression of those people who dare to do so.
And then end it. . .
"About three dozen recommendations from the three or four groups which discussed the relationship between the theological schools and the UUA. To summarize boldly: Let the past go and get going on the future.
The Enlightenment is over. We don't quite know what is coming next, and it is heartbreaking to watch it die. But if we want to be relevant, we have to move, too.
It's not enough to be a learned ministery, we need to be a learning ministry."
All of these are really about moving into the future. I may be a bit naive as a newcomer entering the ministry path, but I am definitely wanting to see us be a learning ministry. And I think that's part of moving forward.
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