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Posted: May 23rd, 2007 at 2:24am By: Rev. Rebecca Schlatter
Several months ago I wrote about my church's efforts to include a registered sex offender in worship. It is now almost June, and we are still talking about it. In that time, the conversation has morphed. At first, it was about inclusion. Now, it seems to be about how to have such a conversation at all.
In such a conversation, the church has an opportunity to rely on tools different from the world's. Where the world takes polls and develops strategies and makes decisions based on power, the church is called to pray and discern and consider "the least of these." (That in itself tends to be open to interpretation: for example, does "the least" mean the ostracized sex offender, or the vulnerable children, or both?)
So what's the difference between "discerning" and "deciding"? Discernment takes place in the gray area. While this contentious issue is complicated and has many "sides," it is often interpreted as just two sides, black and white: for and against inclusion. When I reported this, dismayed, to a friend outside the church, she gave me a great insight: "Well, people may be playing on opposite sides of the field, but it sounds like the same field."
This image of the field helped me understand a group discerning together, in contrast to the decision-making strategies the world teaches. Imagine people all together in a field — a football field, a cornfield, an airfield, whatever. With the world's tools, all you can see is the little corner you have staked out with your opinion. From that place, you fight for a cause, an outcome or a principle. Unless someone else occupies your identical space, they seem to be on a different field entirely.
So, you have to push and pull people over to your corner of the field, cajoling and convincing them, and demonstrating your rightness. If none of that works, people respond very well to fear: You can often convince them that "something really terrible will happen if you don't do it my way." The more contentious the issue, the bigger the field — often you can hardly see the edges of it, and it's hard even to imagine being on the same field as another.
In discernment, you take the leap of faith that it is indeed the same field. You start praying, and in the midst of that prayer, you talk. It's quite simple: You describe what the field looks like from your point of view. And at the same time, you listen to others describe it from their points of view. Since none of you can fly above the field to see the whole thing, you pray to see what God sees, and wait to see what vision emerges.
This kind of discernment has one major drawback: It can require far more time and patience than human beings want to give. But it has many benefits, too:
Empowerment. Each voice is needed, or the vision will be missing a part of the field.
Humility. Each person acknowledges that one can only see from one's own viewpoint, and thus has to pay close attention to others' descriptions.
Harmony. When description takes the place of argument and the need to be right about the whole field, there is less conflict. No one is out to make anyone else wrong.
Freedom. Without the pressure to stake out an argument, push and pull, cajole and convince, discernment is a lot less work than deciding.
Faith. It's hard to see from the middle of the process, but hindsight helps you trust God because the outcome is usually better than any strategy or plan. Holding onto trust may be more difficult than creating fear, but trust is a much better foundation for community.
Our story hasn't turned out yet, but I appreciate the testimony of other congregations who have used such a discernment process together. (For example, Amy Johnson Frykholm's article "Out of Silence: The Practice of Congregational Discernment," in Christian Century, April 3, 2007.
Through their testimony and my experience with individual discernment, I trust that praying our way to an outcome over this long haul will have much better results than any strategy or plan we could come up with more quickly on our own. I trust that it will be less divisive than a vote, which creates two sides and thus winners and losers. And I trust that it will strengthen our faith and our congregation, too.
— — —
Rev. Rebecca Schlatter is an ordained minister in the Lutheran Church (ELCA) in Reno, Nev. You can contact her at {email newhousesfromoldbricks@hotmail.com}newhousesfromoldbricks@hotmail.com{/email}. © copyright 2007 by Rebecca Schlatter
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Several months ago I wrote about my church's efforts to include a registered sex offender in worship. It is now almost June, and we are still talking about it. In that time, the conversation has morphed. At first, it was about inclusion. Now, it seems to be about how to have such a conversation at all.
In such a conversation, the church has an opportunity to rely on tools different from the world's. Where the world takes polls and develops strategies and makes decisions based on power, the church is called to pray and discern and consider "the least of these." (That in itself tends to be open to interpretation: for example, does "the least" mean the ostracized sex offender, or the vulnerable children, or both?)
So what's the difference between "discerning" and "deciding"? Discernment takes place in the gray area. While this contentious issue is complicated and has many "sides," it is often interpreted as just two sides, black and white: for and against inclusion. When I reported this, dismayed, to a friend outside the church, she gave me a great insight: "Well, people may be playing on opposite sides of the field, but it sounds like the same field."
This image of the field helped me understand a group discerning together, in contrast to the decision-making strategies the world teaches. Imagine people all together in a field — a football field, a cornfield, an airfield, whatever. With the world's tools, all you can see is the little corner you have staked out with your opinion. From that place, you fight for a cause, an outcome or a principle. Unless someone else occupies your identical space, they seem to be on a different field entirely.
So, you have to push and pull people over to your corner of the field, cajoling and convincing them, and demonstrating your rightness. If none of that works, people respond very well to fear: You can often convince them that "something really terrible will happen if you don't do it my way." The more contentious the issue, the bigger the field — often you can hardly see the edges of it, and it's hard even to imagine being on the same field as another.
In discernment, you take the leap of faith that it is indeed the same field. You start praying, and in the midst of that prayer, you talk. It's quite simple: You describe what the field looks like from your point of view. And at the same time, you listen to others describe it from their points of view. Since none of you can fly above the field to see the whole thing, you pray to see what God sees, and wait to see what vision emerges.
This kind of discernment has one major drawback: It can require far more time and patience than human beings want to give. But it has many benefits, too:
Empowerment. Each voice is needed, or the vision will be missing a part of the field.
Humility. Each person acknowledges that one can only see from one's own viewpoint, and thus has to pay close attention to others' descriptions.
Harmony. When description takes the place of argument and the need to be right about the whole field, there is less conflict. No one is out to make anyone else wrong.
Freedom. Without the pressure to stake out an argument, push and pull, cajole and convince, discernment is a lot less work than deciding.
Faith. It's hard to see from the middle of the process, but hindsight helps you trust God because the outcome is usually better than any strategy or plan. Holding onto trust may be more difficult than creating fear, but trust is a much better foundation for community.
Our story hasn't turned out yet, but I appreciate the testimony of other congregations who have used such a discernment process together. (For example, Amy Johnson Frykholm's article "Out of Silence: The Practice of Congregational Discernment," in Christian Century, April 3, 2007.
Through their testimony and my experience with individual discernment, I trust that praying our way to an outcome over this long haul will have much better results than any strategy or plan we could come up with more quickly on our own. I trust that it will be less divisive than a vote, which creates two sides and thus winners and losers. And I trust that it will strengthen our faith and our congregation, too.
— — —
Rev. Rebecca Schlatter is an ordained minister in the Lutheran Church (ELCA) in Reno, Nev. You can contact her at {email newhousesfromoldbricks@hotmail.com}newhousesfromoldbricks@hotmail.com{/email}. © copyright 2007 by Rebecca Schlatter
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