A "difference that makes a difference"

Exploration

How have we learned of Space or the deeps of the sea or Antarctica?  Through those people who have explored them.  How then can we learn of the deep places of God?  Again, an answer is through our exploration.  Words like ‘wonder’, ‘maybe’ or ‘where’ exemplify the activities involved in exploration.  Those of us involved in facilitating discipleship therefore need to act and speak in ways that give space for others to wonder and explore.  We would want to avoid those actions and words that restrict learners to the right answer or the correct meaning of a text.  I am not saying here that there is no best way or correct interpretation merely that telling it as it is will restrict learners from appreciating it, contextualising and enacting it in their own lives.  I suspect that the cell, retreats, contemplation and soul friendship are mechanisms that currently exist to encourage exploration but I think that we can do more. We have all eternity to explore the infinity of God and I think that gives us some time for a few diversions.  Additionally, it should provoke in us a certain humility when we define what God is like or what (s)he requires of us!  However, diversions can become being lost and freedom of definition can become sloppy thinking – here again we see the need for community in learning for, dare I say it, availability and vulnerability.

Exploring who we can be

I suspect that if there is one psychological concept that I abhor more than all others it is the idea that we each have a personality. 

A bit surprised?

From a western point of view and, let's face it, psychology is very strongly influenced by western people, it would seem obvious that we have our own personality. It's a no brainer isn't it?  We take our personality for granted and would never doubt that we have our own personality.

Well, if you opened me up you wouldn't find a personality!  It isn't a thing that it exists.  Personality is a concept that we have developed over the years to make sense of our experience that people are, by and large, fairly consistent in the way they act.  Personality is a  metaphor, an assumption a construct.  It does not exist except in our talk about ourselves.

"OK, Caroline, I see your point (sort of) but why does it get you upset?  It's a pretty harmless idea"

What gets me upset, frustrated and angry is that people find themselves hemmed in by personality.  So, the shy person will behave in a shy way, the inarticulate person will keep quiet and the gregarious person will regret (occasionally) talking too much.  There are subtleties in this of course and there are debates and differences.  Are our personalities caused by our genes or our social context.  But, to a large extent, we are fixed in our personalities.  We can't escape from them.

OK, OK, I'm aware that there are some pretty subtle approaches to personality and our interaction with others and our potential to develop ourselves but nearly all of these ignore a wonderful set of 'tools' for creating new 'us'. 

In my last post about 'exploring' type learning I was writing about contemplative exploration in this post I want to mull over how we can explore physically and how that learning can take place and be encouraged.

A sweeping statement here - that doesn't do justice to the more subtle approaches to personality - but it'll do to help me get on to what I really want to write about.  Personality theories imply that our actions and who we are are generated from within us from a store of attributes that were either born into us or have been worked into us by our experiences.  This implication ignores two important points about Christian belief.

1. that who we are is determined not by our past but by our future. We are going to be perfect and we are gradually being transformed into that perfection (in my case, so slowly that I doubt that my friends can see it :-(
2. that, as Christians, our fullest expression of ourselves is not as individuals but as The Body of Christ, we are not working at our best until we are working as contributions to the ongoing, emerging, ever developing, yet to be completed body of Christ.

Now this is crucial, who I am, who I can be and what I can do is, to some extent created by you.  I do not create my actions on my own, you and I perform them together. That I talked to you about tennis owes as much to the fact that you mentioned Andy Murray (apols to non Brit readers) as to any internal tendency I might have to like talking about tennis.  That I was bold in venturing out owes much to your encouragement, that I thought of that idea is partly down to the way that the three of us were talking about a certain topic in a particular way.  Our actions are not our own, they are the product of ongoing conversations and co-ordinated actions.

So, you see, I can help you explore new possibilities of who you might be if I can only speak and act in ways that encourage or restrict you.  Children do it all the time.  They play act, pretend play... cops and robbers, doctors and nurses, friends, teachers.... from the earliest years they start to experiment with ways of talking, gradually learning the rules of our 'talking games' and so becoming competent talkers.

This is, I want to say the wondrous freedom that we can have to explore who we might become.  This blog, for example, is my attempt to playact my way into becoming a writer.  I find writing incredibly difficult ("Huh," you mutter under your breath, "we find your writing difficult too, Caroline") so I try to explore ways of writing on this blog... some poems, songs, stories, liturgies and rants....  But there is more... because who we are is performed socially, we can help each other to perform our new selves, we can help each other to try on a 'new us' (of course, this may be a vulnerable position we put ourselves in as we open up to others our aspirations of how we'd long to grow!).

You want to learn how to listen better?  I can help you practice that and give you 'helpful' feedback!  Or maybe you want to increase the frequency of your prayer times with God.. I can ask you how you're getting on, perhaps offer to say morning prayer with you, or come and look after the children whilst you get yourself an hour or so away. In conversations, I can question, doubt or encourage your actions.  I can role play different characters with whom you want to be on better relations.  Just being interested enough to ask after you would probably be a radical difference.  (come on, lets admit it, we're much more likely to ask after each other's health than asking after each other's learning!)

We can explore who we want to become and try out the journey towards that goal and that leads us into the third 'ex' of learning: experimentation.  more of that in a few days.

On being an available community

An interesting conversation has developed from Kathryn's original post and it's made me think a little...

How can we make our church families open and welcoming to the world and community around us?  The implication in Kathryn's post is that weddings and baptisms are a vital way of communicating our welcome. (I'm conscious from other posts - her blog is well worth a regular visit, by the way - that Kathryn wouldn't limit church involvement in the community to services)  But still, I'm not convinced.

I used to be very anxious to get church services right, up to date and easy to follow.  Not because I wanted to be trendy but because I wanted to get our services to be easy to follow. The logic of my thinking was getting people into our church buildings.  I'm not saying anything very original as I suggest that this is not a tenable strategy for Christian engagement with our community.

So how can the church family be noticed as we bring our Lord's love into our communities.  Of course, all of us have the opportunity as individuals during our day-to-day work and lives but that is not enough.  Somehow, we have to engage not only our individual selves but our community self, our body-of-Christness in the lives of our community.

If it is only individuals that serve, love and share then what's to stop people thinking "Oh so-and-so's a really lovely person"? It's as we do things as a body, I think, that the Christlikeness becomes recognisable.

Blowing my own trumpet..

I've been dawdling around this morning, not getting on with things and I've just realised why

I've got to look at my research profile and improve the evidence of esteem for my work, and say where I contribute to research infrastructure..

I have to blow my own trumpet and I hate it

But there's a real problem here in the UK academic life, for in order to have the freedom to do the research and scholarship that I want; I will have to be classed as 'Research Active' and that requires me to 'blow my own trumpet'.  Additionally, in order to get a promotion I will have to write a bid that shows that I'm excellent in teaching, research and management, again, I will have to blow my own trumpet.

I can see the reasons for this but somehow it seems plain wrong and unhealthy to base careers on self celebration.

Exploration.. why explanations sometimes aren't enough

The Whole body

The picture hangs

The sculpture stands

The work of fingers

Eyes and hands

And I respond;

          I see

Perhaps I move around

to see

A brush in hand

          - the tiniest move

make more

          shadow, shape or shade

with the tiniest flick

a light or depth is made

and..

          I see

Perhaps I move around

          To see

And then there’s Pollack

On the ground

          Footsteps long

                   Feet, legs hands, arms

Perhaps a dance:

          Rhythmic flow?

          Angry stomping?

          Elegant sway?

His whole body pouring out his art.

          I see

Perhaps I move around

          To see

Perhaps “I see”

is not enough.

Exploring exploration

A little earlier today I had to come to terms with it...

you see I'd come up with this rather nice idea that there were three exes to learning and

... I really didn't know what on earth might be meant by exploring...

each time I tried to put something down it really came out like experimenting, hmm

so here goes, I'm going to try and explore what what exploratory learning might look like..

... if you're interested, I've just spent a little while looking at this post unable to get started, please be patient, I've got some words that I want to play with; I just can't get them into an order...

ok, I'll tell a few stories...

I think that Samuel was exploring when he heard God's voice in the night and thought that it was Eli calling him.  Notice how (eventually) Eli was able to help him.  Exploring involves seeking what God is saying to ME, NOW, in THIS place.

I suspect that Jonah was exploring when he was sitting in the fish and then, later as he sat sulking outside Nineveh.  Mind you, I don't think that his exploration was his own choice!  I wonder if, sometimes, we have exploration thrust upon us?

I think that Peter was exploring as he sat with the risen Jesus:  "Do you love me?  ... Do you love me? ... Do you even like me?" 

And Paul was exploring when he disappeared into Arabia.

Exploring involves dwelling with an issue, noticing effects and your response.  Recently, and not entirely to my choosing, I have been exploring success and failure.  I have been taken aback by how hurt, angry and frustrated I am and appalled at just how violently it comes out in my thoughts, thank goodness there usually aren't people to hear just what I want to say to them!  Exploration involves not hurrying by an issue (I don't suppose that it needs to be unpleasant... look at how often I return to the issue of learning in this blog.. oh that it rather unpleasant for you readers, oh.... :-/ but it's stimulating and intriguing to me). 

And that's why explanations (preaching) can be so destructive to discipleship. Sermons will tend to lay things out in a well organised package. Explanations give the answer and so risk us not needing to tarry awhile and find an answer for us.

A little more about Explanations, spiced with something about intentions and belief

Well I've just finished a chapter on discipleship in Dallas Willard's book The Divine Conspiracy. I think that it's taken me a couple of weeks... long old chapters our Dallas writes!  And frankly it was a little disappointing, I'm hoping that the next chapter on a discipleship curriculum is going to be better.

Willard makes great play on the importance of beliefs and intentions on our actions.  Now, I'm in danger here of overstating my case but I'm really not convinced about this.  But, of course, if Willard is correct about the importance of beliefs and intentions then that would make sense of teaching programmes in church being built around explanation and preaching.  For the explanations would lead to belief and linked to exhortations, which changed our intentions to follow and learn from Jesus, that would mean we would all be well on our way...

but does that sound convincing to you?  How many sermons can you remember that changed you around and changed your intentions as well as your beliefs? And having said that, did your actions actually change from there on?  Come on now, be honest!

I trivial example, which I think that I've mentioned before.

I'm overweight, badly overweight. Now, I believe two things (a) that I am unhealthily overweight and (b) that I know what I need to do to lose weight.  Furthermore, I strongly intend to lose weight.  Funnily enough, however, I'm not losing any weight yet. Perhaps I've stopped putting weight on but I'm not losing it yet.  I could go on and on with examples, perhaps I could tell you of how bad I am at getting down to write and how I try and try to improve that.  And I'm sure that you could furnish me with examples, serious and trivial, from your own life where your beliefs, intentions and actions just haven't fitted together.  Now this is serious stuff for, as Willard correctly and powerfully points out, we are apprentices of Jesus and not scholars about him.  Our discipleship is 'measured' in the resemblance of our actions to his not in our head-knowledge about him.  In terms of our discipleship, explanation just doesn't scratch where our lives are itching.

Why is this?

Well one explanation is that there is no direct link between our thoughts and our actions and, furthermore, there is a very doubtful link between our intentions (will) and our thoughts.  This may sound a bit surprising to most of us educated to believe in a rational mind and the value of thinking before acting!  Those sorts of ideas owe much of their origin to Rene Descartes and his famous aphorism "I think therefore I am".  The idea that has taken hold is that there is a dualism, a separation between thought and action.  The real me thinks and in that thinking forms the speech actions and physical actions that our bodies - servants of our thoughts - then perform.  Now if that's true then it would make sense to design a form of learning that affected our thoughts (beliefs) and will (the linking of thoughts and actions).  Explanation (or preaching) would be a perfectly logical way of communicating and supporting learning.  But

It's perfectly arguable to say that our thoughts don't control our actions - e.g. my weight and dieting problems! :-(  An alternative logic suggests that our actions are always socially performed.  You can only understand our actions in the light of the preceding and succeeding comments or actions.  We could say that the authorship of our actions is shared with the people we're with. From this perspective, our actions are like an improvised performance always new, always being performed again for the first time.  Yes we contribute to what happens around us but that is not the whole story; others, conversational partners, social structures, fashions, events ... all these shape and co-create our actions every bit as much as our thoughts and intentions. 

And that, I would suggest, is one of the reasons that explanation and preaching doesn't scratch where we Christians itch, for their logic is based on an assumption that we are individuals, individual followers of Jesus, linked together in groups by geography, taste and theological preferences.  But we are NOT individual followers of Jesus.  We are the body of Christ and I do not think that we have even begun to unpack the wonderful, emancipatory, holy power of that 'truth'.

The three exes of learning: explanation

As a general rule, I would urge that you never trust any teacher who says that there are three-of-anything, especially if they start with the same letter or syllable.  ...but, of course, I'm different, so I'll say that there are three domains of learning

• Explanation
• Exploration
• Experimentation

Neat, huh?

The trouble is that I reckon that there's a fourth domain, intimacy (and I can't find another ex- word for that! :-(  but never mind.  Intimacy is that process and moment when we draw near to our God, when we hear His voice (or not) but somehow know that He is close by and that somehow, our life will never be quite the same again.  I have not explanation for this, no clever words to teach you how to do it (I doubt that you need them)...

but now on to my three exes!  tada!!

Let's do the most difficult one first.  It's the one that is the most common in the churches that I've been to. although I suspect that it might be less dominating in other traditions.  It is potentially the most dangerous to our learning journey and yet it is championed by almost all clerical errors.  Explanation, usually done by one person, who's spent a long time studying and who knows about whatever he (or she) is explaining.  What's the danger of explanation?  I hear you ask (well I don't actually, 'cos I suspect that you've read the previous post (rant) and so can guess what I think the problem with explanations are.

There are three attendant dangers to explanatory teaching/learning. They do not mean that explanation is unnecessary or that it is bad or that explainers are bad people.  It's just that whatever we do, there are always unintended consequences.  We only ever own half of our actions, the other half is created by those around us and explanations have a way of provoking unhealthy responses from our action-creating-partners.  So the four problems:

1. If you watch any soaps on TV, you may notice that no scene lasts more than about 90 seconds. This is because some clever researcher has found that most of us can't concentrate on one thing for more than about 90 seconds.  So why preachers, oops sorry, explainers think that we can listen for 15 or 20 minutes (or even 5 minutes for the quick preachers, oops sorry explainers) to one voice, often without any visual cues or support, is either folly or arrogance.
2. Explanations have a tendency to provide people with answers and nothing, but nothing kills off learning quite like answers.  If you have an answer that looks suspiciously like the answer then you just don't need to do any more learning do you?  And before any putative explainer says "But I don't preach, sorry, explain like that... sorry but you don't control how you're listened to! You may studiously try to avoid giving answers, but that does not say... in fact I'd almost certainly predict that the majority of your listeners will attribute to you the giving of the answer.  Now of course they may disagree with your answer, but answer they will make it and that'll be the end of the learning.
3. Recently, a friend from church came up to me and asked when I was next preaching.  She told me that she always looked forward to my sermons.  Vain pleasure at this complement was only just covered by my discomfort at the thought of another sermon.  I told her that I didn't enjoy preaching, except that I'm an appalling show off, that I thought it was a waste of time and that I suspected that people wouldn't ever remember the two or three questions with which I always finished my sermons.  "But everyone enjoys your sermons, Caroline they're fun but they're also challenging" "that's just the point," I replied, "They're fun, and folk settle back in their pews for a few minutes stimulating, thoughtful, funny talk and then walk away without considering the questions that they were supposed to take away and ponder of the following week.
4. The final trouble with explanations is that they have been such an ubiquitous form of teaching over the last 100-150 years that most of us have no idea what other ways of learning their might be. Explanations drown out other learning methods.  They squeeze out other learning contexts like bindweed squeezes the life out of plants in the garden... and bind week looks quite nice, just like a sermon. 

Is there nothing good about explanations?

..well, occasionally they can

• open our eyes to see new things
• start new and different conversations
• disturb our comfortable passiveness

but to do so the explanations have to be

• located and shaped by the listener's experience and learning needs, not some formal, top-down teaching programme.
• judged and used according to the difference they make to listeners' actions, not their head knowledge
• followed by inquiry and ongoing engagement at a level that sees the difference that is made, that encourages progress, re-explaining and extending bits that are needed as disciples' contexts change

(that all sounds like a conversation rather than a monologue to me)

and I'm afraid that I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that has happened in my life and I've listened to some of the great preachers of the last 30 years.

I'll get onto some of the more positive forms of learning in the next few days...

Preaching and the making of disciples

I don't like sermons.

..which can make life just a bit of a paradox when I'm asked to preach but there we are, a trendy postmodern like me can handle paradox (so I hide behind one whenever an inconsistency or contradiction comes my way! :-)

So, why don't I like preaching.  Essentially because I believe that it is antithetical to learning and I believe that the Christian's prime calling is to be a disciple (i.e. a learner).  "But" you exclaim, "how can people learn if they haven't heard?" ..or some such paraphrase of the apostle Paul.

Learning is a relational activity.  Learning is about going on in relation with others; it's a process of being able to take what others say and add or develop that into action or words.  So, if we want to learn and foster learning within the Christian family then we will look at what sort of relations create what sort of relations.  Certain ways of relating will further learning. Other ways, however well and prayerfully intentioned, will damage learning.  Preaching damages learning and so it damages discipleship.

The Brazilian educationalist, Paulo Friere, challenged what he called a banking type of learning, where teachers transferred something called knowledge into empty vessels - the learners.  He typified the relations in such a form of education as being subject-object relations, where the teacher was the active subject and the learner was rendered a passive object.  His main argument was that such learning was oppressive, giving huge power to the teacher (or leader) and leaving the learner in a dependent relationship to that teacher/leader. He illustrated this by reference to revolutionary movements in Latin America.  He had a further point.  These kind of relations just did not foster learning; they did not enable to the learner to be emancipated (or empowered) into their own learning and self-determined action.

My argument against sermons is this... that whatever the intentions of the preacher (and I'm sure that many preachers will try to point out that sermons are not lectures or simple teaching activities) they create relations of passivity amongst the vast majority of any congregation.  Maybe that's the fault of the congregation members - I don't know - but who we are, and the learning we do, is like an improvised performance created together with those around us, with whom we are in relation. Think of it like a dance, if our dance partner moves one way, then we will follow or the dance comes to an end.  It is the same with learning, if one travels as the active teacher then others will be rendered as passive 'learners'.

It doesn't have to be this way, there are other ways of learning and we can all contribute to learning relations that change us and the world we make. I've blogged about learning loads of times (forgive me if I've repeated myself) but to me, this is crucial.  The Church has, for too long, had converts, communicants, adherents or the faithful.  Too often, we have mentioned disciple in the same breath as discipline and obedience.  That's not wrong but it misses out on the wonderfully emancipatory potential of the gospel; that wonderful, learning pilgrimage from here and now through eternity... everyday a new opportunity to learn a new way of being, the journey where we have all eternity to explore infinity. 

hmmm, a rant I'm afraid... and I fear another series on learning coming upon me

The dog that didn't bark

A while ago, a friend of mine, called Terry, bought a dog.  He told me that he had wanted a dog for a long time.  He lived on his own, worked at home a lot and he wanted a companionable dog, who would be quiet and docile but be really friendly and loving.  Finally, after several failed attempts, Terry phoned me to say he thought that he'd found the right dog and would I fancy going to pick him up.  The dog, a small cross breed, was very quiet but happily came to you, wagging his tail when you called.  Perhaps I should have be worried when Terry decided to call him Butch.

Anyway, we got Butch home and Terry made a fuss of him.  I used to visit quite often and occasionally would take Butch out for a walk. He was a very docile old character, pootling along behind or just in front of me, sniffing around, occasionally scratching at rabbit holes to see if anyone was at home.  I confess that I was amused to think what on earth Butch would do if he ever met a rabbit... run in terror most likely!

A couple of times I went for a walk with Terry and Butch and watched as Terry tried to teach Butch how to play fetch. I lost count of the number of tennis balls that I had to go and fetch myself as Terry remonstrated with his dog about not rushing off to fetch the ball or the stick.  "Do you know a strange thing?" asked Terry, "He doesn't bark! There are times when I think that he's really a cat in a dog shape!" Terry sounded disappointed. "But Terry, you told the kennel that you wanted a quiet dog who wouldn't disturb you when you were working," I said.  "Well, yes but not this quiet; I want a real dog who barks and runs around and does doggy things."

The relationship went from bad to worse. Terry was now sure that he wanted a dog that barked and Butch didn't bark.  I watched on, puzzled, for it seemed to me that Terry was cross because Butch was the quiet dog that he had asked for. At some moment Terry's ideas had changed and he blamed Butch for not being the dog that he wanted now.

Tim van Eyken

Ages ago, Paul Roberts (via his blog) directed me to Tim van Eyken's myspace site and his song John Barleycorn.  Ever since, I've returned to the site playing John Barleycorn and Australia, sometimes more than once. It's just great music.

Paul liked the ambivalence of the lyrics but its the music I enjoy.  It starts off with a simple riff on the base strings - it just draws me in, there's so much anticipation in the opening bars... and then an electric guitar comes in with simple chords... I don't know enough about music to explain what's going on but it's just right. Do go and have a listen here

On Careers and being a Kohathite

I found myself in the book of Numbers today... not, I confess a book of the bible that is etched on my memory but I'm trying to read through the whole bible a few pages at a time and round about now I'm in Numbers and I read about the Kohathites.

"Very good Caroline, so what?" I hear you ask

Well, to explain, the Kohathites were a clan of the Levite tribe of Israel and they had the special task of clearing up the mess after the priests had done their bit.  Very important I'm sure but not what I'd call a great career move. And that was when it struck me... their work was chosen for them because of their birth not because of some career choice plan. How far removed we are from parts of the bible.  Could you imagine young people today accepting that their role in life was determined by their birth - no get out clause, not career progression, no professional development...

As I write that, of course I'm reminded that the great majority of the world are condemned by poverty or oppression to live out one particular role.  But that's part of my point, I suspect that most of the people reading this post would see being consigned to one particular role because of their birth to be an oppression, to be a negative, to be something wrong.  But the Kohathites were called to be the clearer-uppers, whilst other clans were called to be the carriers of tent fabric or tent poles.  This wasn't a negative thing this was just their place within the economy of God's people.

Today, we all have careers.  They may not be very exciting careers, in personal hygiene, social or healthcare but no matter how lowly, we are encouraged to see our work as a part of a career, and to seek opportunities for training, developing and bettering ourselves.  We are to seek progression, moving up the ladder, achieving ambitions, fulfilment.

The Kohathites, on the other hand, just had their place within the economy of God's people, they cleared up after the priests. I guess they were 'paid' for their work, maybe some of them became leaders of clearing teams. Might they have had shifts? "Oh good grief, it's Eleazar on duty tonight; he always makes more of a mess with the sacrificial lambs than his father does"...

and a question starts to wrestle it's way to the front of my mind

if the economy of God's people is based on people being in their place, and doing their work because of their calling (and not because of some desire for bettering themselves and progressing their careers) might we occasionally damage the church when we go about developing our careers?

Church in a way that I'd like it...

I knew st long ago when we both helped out on CYFA houseparties - he used to play the most wonderful boogie-woogie version of "We really want to thank you Lord" - huh, guess that dates us but

he now gets to do church in ways that I can only hope about read here and here for some terrific ideas.  The quiet days one is just terrific, church as enabling rather than as entertaining.

Belonging?

I recently had a brief email correspondence with Richard White.  Richard has long been one of my favourite bloggers and I miss his blog but enjoy what he writes at Dream. He always writes something that is imbued with encouragement and spiritual loyalty and ambition for our God.  I find my heart warms to him and I enjoy sharing his pilgrimage (even if only virtually together).

I mentioned in my email that I often read the Dream posts but, because I wasn't a part of the Dream set up in the North West, I didn't think it right to comment.  Richard's reply was typically generous, pointing out that openness was a core Dream Value (those are well worth reading by the way).

Now that got me thinking, if we're serious about creating fellowships that are strong on community, welcome and belonging... what part do boundaries play.  If I can not commit to or contribute to the physical life of that community in an ongoing manner, is it helpful to dip in and out?  We are all aware, I suspect, of the problems that boundaries cause in our world and daily life but do they also help create belonging and community as they ask more for participants than the dilettante's occasional visit?

hmmm, dunno.... gonna thing id over my cuppa tea an toast...