Skip to main content

Two Words to Help You Have Better Conversations in a UU Church

"I Believe...."

"I believe" are two words we need to hear more of in UU churches .... I believe.

First, wouldn't it be great to be having more of the deep conversations about meaning, God, Spirit, purpose, etc? I mean, don't get me wrong, we also need the conversations about politics, the news, and how excited we are about the first woman Doctor Who and Patrick Stewart returning to Star Trek.

But those rich conversations about religious ideas ... isn't church kind of the ideal place for those?

So go deep. Start with "I believe ...." It may feel a little scary, but being willing to share your thoughts opens the door for others to share theirs.

IF you begin with "I Believe."

Sadly, I've seen so many conversations, in person and online, where UUs seem unable to use them. Opinions are stated as fact. Which is a terrific way to shut down a conversation -- unless the other person wholly agrees with you, it's not a great way to encourage someone to share their thoughts.

Hey, some folks love a rousing debate, and they're not going to let a little thing like you stating opinion as fact slow them down.

But I think that the reason why we so often do not have those deep conversations in our churches is because so many people are not interested in debate. They're craving dialogue, where the people involved are not trying to convince each other, or "win," but instead share ideas and explore new thoughts without coercion. It is a vulnerable thing to share our beliefs, knowing they may open us up for ridicule or scorn.

I am sure that I have been guilty of this myself, this stating a belief as Truth. There are some things I just believe in SO STRONGLY, you know? But what I have to realize is this:

 Passion does not turn an opinion into a fact.

So I am trying to learn to speak from my own experience, knowing it is just that -- my experience. No more, and no less. And other people have other experiences that may have led them to a completely different conclusion.

And I'd really like to hear it.







Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Me and My Collar

You may run into me on a Friday, in my neighborhood, so it's time I let you know what you might see. When I was doing my required unit of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE), my supervisor suggested that any of us who came from traditions where a clerical collar was an option, take one "collar week," to see how we were treated, as opposed to wearing regular professional clothes. After a couple of days, I joked to the Catholic priest, "How do you manage the power?" In regular clothes, I would walk into a patient's room, and it would take about 5 or so minutes of introductions and pleasantries before we could really get down to talking about their feelings, their fears, the deep stuff. With most people, as soon as that clerical collar walked in the room, with me attached, they began pouring out all the heavy stuff they were carrying. I was riding the bus back and forth every day, and though not quite so dramatic, the collar effect was alive there, to
10 comments
Read more

Beloved Community: The Now and Not Yet

Rev. Christine Robinson has a great little post up about the phrase "beloved community" and why it's problematic to use that to describe a church. Like her mom, I can get cranky about the whole thing, but my crankiness lies in the misuse of what is, to me, such a breathtaking and profound concept. Martin Luther King, Jr., someone whose words I study in great detail, is the one we often think of as originating the term, but he learned about it through the writings of Josiah Royce. Josiah Royce (right) with close friend William James.  Royce was a philosopher, studying Kant, Hegel. I imagine he would have enjoyed Koestler's theory of the holon , because he saw humanity as being both individuals and part of a greater "organism" that was community. As King's belief about Beloved Community would be rooted in agape , Royce's philosophy stemmed from what he called loyalty, and by that he meant, "the practically devoted love of an individual f
6 comments
Read more

Feral Unitarian Universalists

It is an old joke, in many organizations, and certainly over(used) in Unitarian Universalist churches, that working with a designated group of people is "like herding cats." So ... what if we didn't? What if we encouraged congregation members to run free and wild, like the creative people they are, bent on loving the hell out of the world? I've written before about a collective disdain for members with " pet projects ." There are those feral cats again. Running in a hundred directions, each one on fire for something different. How awesome . I don't want to corral that energy, I want to stoke it. They say if you feed them, you'll never get rid of them. That sounds pretty good, too. Let's figure out how to feed them, so they keep coming back for the sustenance that will keep them going. And let's, all of us, find our own wild side. We can still be good upstanding responsible citizens, paying our taxes, bringing a casserole to th
Post a Comment
Read more