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I thought I’d share some gentle ways I’ve tried to change the culture in our Ward/Stake. I don’t want to get everyone thinking about starting a revolution, but I think it’s of value to discuss ways of effecting change in such a way you don’t sink the ship. Here goes. My wife’s family are what I would call “manual thumpers”. They won’t take two steps without consulting the manual, and don’t seem capable of adapting it or being flexible with it. My wife is somewhat like that, although not as bad.
Well, this Sunday an assortment of Stake Leaders are coming to a meeting she is in charge of, and they want things to be done a certain way — inconsistent with the new CHI. My wife indicated she was going to email them and quote the handbook and explain how it should be done!!!!
How do you think a StayLDS’er would react to that?
We talked about it and I encouraged her not to do it — to just let the Stake explain what they wanted, and that she should gently comply. Perhaps then she’ll find she has more flexibility when she wants to deviate from the Handbook for a good reason in the future, within the bounds of her own calling.
Personally, I see the wide distribution of the entire General Handbook as both a blessing and a non-blessing. One one hand, everyone will know what the guidelines are, which will reduce confusion and misunderstandings like I’ve seen before — with one auxiliary not understanding the role of the peer auxiliaries. On the other hand, it’s a recipe for entrenching mechanistic procedures into our culture more quickly and more firmly than when each auxiliary had only their portion of the handbook. I think my wife’s reaction is a case in point.
Next time someone wants to deviate from the Handbook and gets corrected, if the deviation makes sense, I’m going to speak up.
How do you go about shaping the culture in your Ward/Stake, in your own gentle ways?
I have done a poor job at this, as I tend to be “crippling” honest and have absolutely little tact in my approach. I do speak up quite often, but I don’t see it really doing anything positive to be honest. Occassionally I have had comments from non-members and inactives that they appreciate my common sense and rational approach to the gospel.
cwald wrote:I have done a poor job at this, as I tend to be “crippling” honest and have absolutely little tact in my approach.
I do speak up quite often, but I don’t see it really doing anything positive to be honest. Occassionally I have had comments from non-members and inactives that they appreciate my common sense and rational approach to the gospel.
I think part of what makes it work is the fact that one appears to be a traditional believer — which is my case. Some will say it’s not authentic, but I’ve discussed my philosophy on that elsewhere. I think if you are considered somewhat mainstream, or not too far off center, comments that try to temper our culture and sameness tend to be considered more socially acceptable, and have an impact. I actually changed the mind of a former Bishopric member on a couple things, and also helped him lessen his dependence on the CHI as a source of absolute doctrine…..also taught a TBM group of people in Sunday School that each person is a prophet to their personal affairs, and therefore, has to filter everything through their own inspiration and relationship with God.
Having taught in Relief Society 8 years,Gospel Doctrine 4 years, and then Gospel Essentials 4 years gave me so many opportunties to clarify the gospel to members. It brought much more meaning to their lives I believe. Because of my gay son and writing a book on this issue, I was also able to help many members and leaders understand this issue better and how to treat gays. That made a big differences actually. Leaving the church for two years when I was in the 7th day adventist church at that time gave me alot more perspective, as well as being in the Nazerene church right now. It clarifies to me what parts of the lds church I do like and makes sense of religion, but it also makes me realize what the lds church is missing that these church have in great abundance. The lds church is much more a letter of the law type of church and the other churches have much more of the spirit of the law. Maybe, in the second coming, Jesus can combine the two and we can finally have a perfect church. I did it again today. The lesson was about being reverent at Church. There was a traditional believeing Mormon with a pioneer heritage teaching about reverence, and the conversation diverted into how we shouldn’t be rude in letting noisy children stay in Sacrament meeting, how we should not be distracted, how we should listen, how we should be reverent, how we should sit in places that minimize the disruptions to the meeting in case we had to leave, and that in our Ward, there seems to be a revolving door of people coming and going from the bathroom. He asked what the distractions are, in Sacrament meeting and how we can minimize them.
I explained that as a person with young children, that the biggest trigger of distraction is boredom. Our meetings, while sometimes uplifting and great opportunities to learn to speak and express spiritual feelings publicly, are perceived as boring by our youth and children. I cited the biggest problem I have with getting my kids to Church –the boredom of the meeting. And how when they were young it made Church a nightmare to sit through in Sacrament meeting, which has lessened somewhat but is still an issue. I explained that I feel we normally put the onus on making Sacrament meeting interesting on the members, when there is much we could be doing as an organization to make it inherently interesting. I used the phrase “we put the onus of making the meeting boring on the backs of the children when the comments and experience is rarely targeted at them personally, and they lack maturity to understand the deeper spiritual reasons for being there”. I also commented that suggestions on how to make Church more interesting was something I look forward to in the next iteration of the CHI (whenever that happens). Dead quiet for a second…..people not used to that kind of commentary…..
Guess what — people started nodding their heads in agreement –leaders in the Ward. The teacher was off-base about it, I could tell, because he didn’t expect to be leading a discussion on how to make Sacrament meeting less boring as an organization — but that is what ensued — a couple of people made comments, but only one really good comment about how to reduce boredom — give the kids Sacrament Bingo. The others were “I don’t know what to do about this”.
I then launched into a series of suggestions — one was to ask one speaker to target their comments to children, and make it age appropriate. Each Sunday. Bishopric member nods his head. At the end of the meeting I had wanted to say something but was sort of glossed over by the teacher, so the HPGL asked me for my comment when he stood up to close the meeting. I expressed a few more ideas.
And then, in the hall, two people in the meeting who said nothing also said they thought we should be more proactive in making our meetings more interesting. I feel like I did a good thing, and it has me thinking of a being proactive myself. If there is one thing I feel passionate about, and would be willing to work myself into doing, it would be taking on a special project to try to make our meetings things people are rushing to because they don’t want to miss the content/experience/fulfillment that comes from being there.
I also did something else today that was liberating and rekindled my enthusiasm for teaching, which has become monotonous lately….more on that in a different thread.
I think this is a good story. I wish I still had the collateral to affect change in my branch, but, after my story from today, I’m pretty well sure I’m broke in the influential department.
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