My Value System

Last Sunday in Forum our facilitator discussed our values using Scott Jeffrey's Core Values as a resource.  Fun to see where I fit.  I've been surprised that my priorities have changed.

Here are the five I came up with for my own personal life right now.

Integrity - This has always been a core value for me.  I want to be authentic - even when it hurts.  It's scary because I don't want to lose the people I love who see things differently from me.

Spirituality - This week I've been reminded that, even though I love my church, it's my spirituality that is paramount.  And, like integrity, that comes from within.

Order/Structure/Calm - Not a value for everybody, but it's huge for me.

Kindness/Civility - I value this in my one-on-one relationships and our country's international relationships - and everything in between.

Communicator/Creativity - Yes, creatively communicating is at the core of who I am.

But what was really intriguing to me as I looked over the list of 200 plus core values were the ones I used to have but (at age 80) no longer do.

Ambition
Strength
Productivity
Hard Work
Accomplishment
Power

I still value these in others - but, personally,  I think I'm done.


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President's Prayer Breakfast

A friend of ours spoke this morning about he and his wife attending the National President's Prayer Breakfast a couple of weeks ago.  He told a bit about the history of the breakfast, including the fact that Methodists were involved from the get-go.

Did you know that there was an annual breakfast where members of congress and all kinds of folks from all over the world get together to pray for the president and our country?  It's a pretty cool concept.  No fights.  Just kindness and love.

I, myself, attended the Presidential Prayer Breakfast back in 1966, when I was 27 years old.  Well, that statement's not true.  At that time the breakfast was segregated.  The women folk ate with the first lady.  So my husband, Ken, got to have breakfast with President Lyndon Johnson.  I got to have breakfast with Ladybird.  Because at that time the only women associated with congress were called "Congressional Wives."  (We've come a long way, especially in this last election.)

While that breakfast in 1966 was interesting and gave me a better feeling about the ability of congress to come together, Ken and I were both more impressed with getting to spend time with the Reverend Doctor Frederick Brown Harris who had recently retired as chaplain of the Senate.

Ken had met Dr. Harris earlier when he was on a business trip.  He spied the chaplain in a restaurant, introduced himself, and they ended up having dinner and a lengthy conversation.

A couple of years later, when we realized we were going to get to go the the prayer breakfast in Washington, Ken called Dr. Harris to see if we could drop by the see him.  We ended up spending a big chunk of alone time with both he and his wife.  Dr. Harris was pretty amazed that Ken had quit his job and was then a seminary student.  So, that day, we had an insiders tour of the senate, including getting to meet congressmen and senators and getting an up close and personal idea of how government works.

Later on I wrote an article about the experience.  It was published in 1969 but I can't, for the life of me, find a copy of it.

I'm grateful for our speaker, Bill, this morning who started me on today's trip down memory lane.


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Change is Hard

Forum is my favorite group in my church.  We meet every Sunday morning at 9:30 AM.  This group is composed of 50 to 60 extremely intelligent, kind, accommodating, mostly older folks with rich backgrounds who enjoy exchanging a respectful, free flowing wealth of ideas.

  We might see a video of a well known theologian, a power point presentation or a TED TALK prior to our discussion and, over the past couple of years, a handful of folks devised an intricate Rube Goldberg kind of audio/visual system that allows all of us to see TV monitors despite our seating that is in concentric circles so that we can face each other as much as possible.

Since the room is used during the week as a dance studio, one long wall is mirrored.  This too, helps in our communication effort.

And now the "suits" (actually church leaders, some of whom wear liturgical robes) want us to move to another room.

Years ago, when I was a private consultant and long before we had professionals in our denomination to handle such things, I was occasionally called in to help solve a perceived church problem.  Almost always this was in smaller declining churches.  Usually it had to do with groups refusing to ask the real question  (Why Do We Exist?) and absolutely refusing to change.

Groups sometimes tended to take emotional ownership for their space.  They hung pictures all over the walls that pertained only to their group (that met once a week.)  They were very suspect about who was in and who was out in the room (and the group.)  Some of these groups had locks changed on "their" doors and only those with keys could enter.  This sometimes did not include the minister or church leaders.

And they wondered why their group was shrinking.

Today, in healthy, growing churches, as well as businesses, the facilities are ever changing as needs change.  I feel certain that whatever happens with Forum it will be for the greater good.   We know why we exist.


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