- This topic is empty.
-
Posts
-
Hopefully I’m not asking too many questions. But now that we are liberated from the old program’s operational side, I have been wondering what the purpose of the new program is. The old program was to be a “watchman in Israel”, and most of the time, it seemed to be: a) a way of making sure people with temporal or sometimes spiritual needs they couldn’t meet themself (short term) could be looked after – a buffer between the Bpric and the members. Reasonable…most often spiritual needs were for the Bishop and no one else.
b) an activation effort. Most PPI”s focused on whether the person was interested in the church or not.
What do you perceive as the purpose of the new program? I suspect its unchanged, but we were on the box checking program for so long I can’t even really articulate the official purpose any more.
I’m not sure. The way I see other churches do things is that when someone in their flock has a need it is communicated and the whole church pools their resources together to meet the need whereas in our church we create lots of busy work around that simple concept… our whole church is also there to pool their resources but there’s also the grind, lots and lots of mandatory visits taking place when there’s no immediate need. The extra work wears people down.
That said, I’m an extreme introvert, I don’t
needsomeone coming over on Sunday after I’ve already had 4 hours of church but I concede that for many receiving a visit is a true need. I think the goal of the new program is to do things more like other churches do them. Cut down on all the visits that wear people down but have a way to come together when there’s a need. I’m not sure how pairing people off in companionships and making assignments achieves this, if anything it makes it too similar to the old program, making the habits of the old program that much harder to break.
The reason I say that I don’t feel the companionships and assignments work is because of many experiences I had. The home teachers would ask people if they had any needs, they would be in need but answer no, and they’d take their needs to a leader. The assigned companionship process failed to do what was intended, serve as a channel of communication of needs.
Maybe people don’t want half the ward knowing their needs so they go directly to a leader, maybe they feel more comfortable talking to friends (not assigned friends), maybe something else. Bottom line, in most cases (for me) all the visits and grind failed to communicate people’s needs, so why bother with all that?
Why have companionships and assignments, why not leave it at: if you have a need, please contact your EQP, RSP, or BP (like most people end up doing anyway) and let the rest of us be the pool that helps.
The down side is that without assignments, people fall through the cracks… but the assignments are what breaks it for me. And I say that as a person that will slip through the cracks. Maybe that’s because I want to slip through the cracks.
As an introvert it’s hard to build a true friendship when I have even the slightest hint that someone is only approaching me because of an assignment or because they feel obligated to do so. I probably have a problem with the whole assignment approach because I project those feelings onto others.
SilentDawning wrote:
Hopefully I’m not asking too many questions. But now that we are liberated from the old program’s operational side, I have been wondering what the purpose of the new program is. The old program was to be a “watchman in Israel”, and most of the time, it seemed to be:a) a way of making sure people with temporal or sometimes spiritual needs they couldn’t meet themself (short term) could be looked after – a buffer between the Bpric and the members. Reasonable…most often spiritual needs were for the Bishop and no one else.
b) an activation effort. Most PPI”s focused on whether the person was interested in the church or not.
What do you perceive as the purpose of the new program? I suspect its unchanged, but we were on the box checking program for so long I can’t even really articulate the official purpose any more.
I believe (hope) it’s to increase fellowship and camaraderie among the members. I think they realized that when Home Teachers asked, “Is there anything we can do for you?” there just wasn’t the level of trust or friendship required to ask for help when needed. Personally, I HATED being home taught. It felt forced. We had to sit down and smalltalk for an hour, and this listen to one of the guys re-read the same message I already read. But I LOVED the efforts of some members who’ve taken the time to fellowship us.
I think they’re trying to get away from the check-boxing mentality and allowing us to adjust our approach based on the needs of the members. They’ve come to realize you can’t quantify or formulate friendship. They’re trying to steer away from what you must do, to who we must become. It’s just… the Church members are so ingrained into the checkbox mentality, strict obedience, and righteousness competitions, that it’s hard for many to make the transition. Those who don’t struggle are those who were doing HT/VT right from the beginning.
FWIW, in the past couple years I’ve turned down all HT assignments. With my less-than-orthodox views, I didn’t want to feel obligated to preach doctrines I disagreed with. But yesterday I told my wife I’m willing to take on ministering assignments. That IS something I feel like I can do. And for someone who turns down most every Church assignment, I think that’s a pretty big step forward.
I think that’s pretty much it, SD. I don’t think it’s significantly changed in scope. I do think the job of the EQP and RSP has changed a bit to take much of the “welfare” load from the bishop, but arguably it should have been that way all along. The Elders Quorum Moving Company did come up in PH yesterday, starting as kind of a joke. But on the serious side there was some good discussion about people who are able to do it themselves (or with the help of family or other friends) or hiring it done not calling on the EQ just because. In other words, the discussion was about only asking the EQ for help if the help was actually needed because they weren’t capable and/or had no other way of doing it without church help. That expanded into other projects (like home repair/improvement) as well. The EQP did say he didn’t mind doing stuff to help people, but that sometimes it seemed like it was every Saturday and the same few people and he indicated that was going to change. He also specifically said the ministering elders assigned to the particular families were going to be taking more of the lead in those things, not involving the bishop at all and having less involvement of the EQP. Paraphrasing, he said if one of your families needed a project you are in charge of organizing it and getting it done, not the EQP or bishop, and if the EQP becomes aware some other way, like ward council, he would assign the family’s ministering elder to head it up.
Our SP said the Seventy got something like 14 hours of training on this before GC and that it’s still trickling down. My SP did a full Saturday with the AAS and has started to share that. Much of it is in the links I posted in the other thread. From what I’ve been getting, it seems the gist of it is more caring and less checking off the box.
DarkJedi wrote:
He also specifically said the ministering elders assigned to the particular families were going to be taking more of the lead in those things, not involving the bishop at all and having less involvement of the EQP. Paraphrasing, he said if one of your families needed a project you are in charge of organizing it and getting it done, not the EQP or bishop, and if the EQP becomes aware some other way, like ward council, he would assign the family’s ministering elder to head it up.
I’ve heard the same line trotted out for home teaching. I’ll be honest here, knowing that this was the expectation beforehand would make me
farless likely to want to participate. I really don’t care for that approach. Everyone passes the buck… until you hit the home teachers, they aren’t allowed to pass the buck. It also creates a person to blame when a need isn’t met. How many times have I heard in frustrated tones, “Who are their home teachers!?!? 👿 ” The home teachers are thrown under the bus and it’s almost always that scenario where the HTers asked if there was anything that they could do and the answer was, “Nope.”Pass. Hard pass on all of that baggage.
Yes, I concede that it does take pressure off the top leadership to fix everyone’s problems but as you pointed out, it’s often the same few people that are always in need. Why not direct communicate needs to leaders and pool the entire ward for help. If it is the same few people then their home teachers… excuse me, ministers then become overburdened.
I’m piecing together that it’s a complex problem and there isn’t a perfect solution that’s going to make everyone happy. Still, I’d like for this to be different in some way.
There is an age-old principle that issues should be handled at the lowest level possible in the organization. So it makes sense to put it on the home teacher. Now, as a home teacher, you can do a few things a) Agree to a reasonable number of families. If they give you 20, give it back and ask for 5 .
b) If what they ask is too much of you (the families) than ask your EQP to help you rally resources that CAN help you. For example, I am not good at fixing things. So I would ask if there is anyone capable of doing it in the Ward to help.
I still think it’s unclear what the objectives are I thought someone would whip out an announcement or bulletin on it, but I am glad to hear it’s still being discussed. It sounds like the prophet wanted to get this out at conference before he had all his ducks lined up. I’m good with that — sooner is better. And it gives everyone time to think about all the issues. This makes training more meaningful.
To serve rather than to visit.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.