Thursday January 15, 2009

insight on Spirit-Centred Leadership

by Tim Scorer

Writing the study guide for Experiencing Ecological Christianity led me to three further insights into what it means to offer spirit-centred leadership.

1. Order, Chaos, and Interactivity are the Raw Materials
An effective learning environment is so highly charged with interactivity that everything in it is constantly changing. Not only are the “teacher” and “learners” changing, even the subject matter evolves from moment to moment. That’s right: what we thought we were there to learn may actually change before we have learned it! The spirit-centred leader is aware of this creative dynamic and that learning emerges from an energetic combination of chaos and order. The skills that the spirit-centred leader needs are those that create highly interactive learning situations and that hold the chaos and order, so that those who are present feel a sense of satisfaction in the change and growth they are experiencing.

2. The Interdependence of All Those Present
When we gather for learning in interactive small groups we embrace the principle that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Something is generated in our forthright and honest sharing with one another that just wouldn’t be available if we were studying individually. I’m reminded of tribal people who when they first wake up, gather together to tell one another about their nighttime dreams. They are aware that the dream of the community is one dream and that the dream of one only makes sense in the context of what is revealed in the sharing of the many. The life of the community in the day ahead can then be ordered based on what has been discerned in the sharing of the dreams. The spirit-centered leader enables the members of the community to see their essential interdependence.

3. Covenants About How to Be Together
When learners make agreements or covenants together about the kind of learning community that they will be, they are connecting to the great wisdom teachers of human history. These wisdom teachers gathered to them circles of wisdom, awareness, and action, to become what Bruce Sanguin refers to as centres of willingness and creative emergence, and sources of planetary healing and human transformation. If that sounds serious and demanding, let it be so. The work we are about in our study groups these days is as important as anything we have ever done. The spirit-centred leader is one who takes seriously the life and work of the group, leading participants to agreements about who they will be together.

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insight on Small Groups

by Tim Scorer

O Wonder!
A small-group activity for people who want to remain wonder-filled

In his book Darwin, Divinity and the Dance of the Cosmos Bruce Sanguin writes:

If you want to gain a sense of the wonder of the world, take a walk with a two-year-old. Do not be in a hurry. I learned this with my own daughter. Every twig and blade of grass was an occasion for her to squat down and take a real good look. Without the same agenda-driven, caffeine-infused urgency of her father, a bug struggling through the forest of grass was an opportunity for relationship. I remember the monk-like, single-minded attention she bestowed upon this creature. Similarly, a piece of coloured glass stopped her in her tracks for a good five minutes, as she turned it over and over in the sun to capture the changing colours. An hour passed and we hadn’t progressed even a block. Such is the enchantment of two-year-olds for the natural world. (p. 45)

That amazing human capacity for wonder is still in us; it just may not be exercised as frequently as when we were two years old. We need to exercise more often than we usually do.

Think of times when you are overcome by wonder and awe. Choose one or two of those and write them down inserting them into a “when” clause that begins with the words, “When I…” For example: “When I see the patient devotion of a parent for a child…” or “When I look at an image of another galaxy taken from the Hubble Telescope…”

Once everyone has had time to write their “when” clauses, proceed with the litany, asking each participant who is willing to read their clause to do so as part of it. Take a moment to light the candle on the table in the centre of the group just before the litany is read.

Litany of Wonder
One: When I _________________________
All:  You are a caretaker of wonder!

Wonder Readings from Scripture
Genesis 28:16-17
Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!” And he was afraid, and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”

Habakkuk 1:5
Look at the nations, and see!
Be astonished! Be astounded!
For a work is being done in your days
that you would not believe if you were told.

Psalm 8:3-4
When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
    the moon and the stars that you have established;
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
    mortals that you care for them?

Luke 2:8-10
In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people!”

Luke 2:27-32
Guided by the Spirit, Simeon came into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him what was customary under the law, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying,
“Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace,
according to your word;
for my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel.”

Acts 3:9-10
All the people saw him walking and praising God, and they recognized him as the one who used to sit and ask for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.

Psalm 139:14
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works; that I know very well!

Prayer
Awesome and Holy One,
we turn to you with wonder too deep for words.
Hear the adoration of our hearts and minds
as we gather in this circle of learning.
Hold each of us in the vastness of your never-finished creation.
Let us feel the breath of your presence
blowing winds of change and imagination into every corner of creation.
Let us touch the pulse of your heart
beating rhythms of desire and compassion into the unfolding of your universe.
Let us know the depth of your wisdom
blessing your creation with insight and a passion for justice.
We pray in the name of Jesus, source of holy inspiration and infinite grace.
Amen.

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insight on Spiritual Practice

by Lois Huey-Heck, co-author of The Spirituality of Art

There’s a belief that when we get to know each other, peace has a chance. When we see and hear and appreciate each other, it’s harder to hold our prejudices. It is harder to hate. This dynamic is poignantly evidenced in the classic story of “Christmas” breaking out across enemy lines in the trenches of WWI. As a young art student, I also noticed that all the models for life drawing class became beautiful to me when I spent time seeing them well enough to draw them.

The following practice is one of deep “seeing.”

Preparing
Choose a natural object: something live like a plant, a tree, a cut flower, a rock, a shell, a piece of driftwood, or a vegetable*. Get a pencil and paper (any kind will suffice.)

The Invitation
Take some quiet time. If you keep Sabbath you may choose to use some of that time for this practice. Begin by gathering yourself in (centring yourself). At minimum it’s helpful to take three mindful breaths to help bring yourself into the present.

Continue by looking – really looking – at your chosen piece of nature. If your mind tells you that this is a waste of time, that you already know what a “rock” looks like, gently replace that thought with an attitude of discovery, and keep looking. Look for several minutes. Next, pick up the pencil and, while continuing to look at your chosen piece of nature, slowly and meditatively draw it. Don’t look at the paper. This is not about the drawing. This is about the seeing. This is an important distinction in our relationship with all of creation. Something in the process of looking carefully enough to be able to make marks on paper turns our looking into seeing. It has a parallel in the verbal realm in the difference between listening and hearing.

This practice is inspired by the work of the visionary artist, author, and spiritual seeker Frederick Franck, who created and lived well into his nineties. In his phenomenal best-selling book The Zen of Seeing: Seeing/Drawing as Meditation Franck wrote, “…this Seeing/Drawing (is) a way of meditation, a way of getting into intimate touch with the visible world around us…” May it be so.

* I once spent weeks drawing green peppers for a school project: Whole, cut into various sections and segments, fresh, withering… It has forever given me appreciative eyes for the fruit and vegetables I wash, peel, seed, core, cut, and eat.

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insight on Authors

by Ingrid Turnbull

Tim Scorer

TIm Scorer is a master of experiential spiritual formation. Experiencing Ecological Christianity is his third in the Experiencing! Adult Faith Formation Curriculum series, in which he has created the learning process and written the Leader Guides and Participant Handbooks. Tim is passionate about transformational faith and here talks briefly about the shifts he has seen in his own perspective as a result of the process of being immersed in Darwin, Divinity, and the Dance of the Cosmos. Tim has had much practical experience with community organizations, congregations, and retreatants and was a longtime member of the management team of Naramata Centre, a retreat education centre of the United Church of Canada. He lives with his wife Donna on Bowen Island, British Columbia, Canada.

Tim is also author of Experiencing the Bible Again for the First Time, Experiencing Jesus, and Experiencing the Heart of Christianity.

Ingrid: Could you talk about how writing the Experiencing program based on Darwin, Divinity, and the Dance of the Cosmos and thus working so closely with ecological Christianity has changed the way you understand your own faith?

Tim: Three things occur to me that are all about the meeting place of my own faith with the work I have done in shaping the study guide.

Firstly, Bruce’s emphasis on evolution happening through us, not just to us, has helped me be more thoughtful about my participation in evolving life on this planet that is home for us in the vastness of an ever-expanding universe. I often find myself thinking and speaking about the human place in the evolutionary unfolding of the universe from a deeper consciousness. Make no mistake: it’s still a challenge for me to give myself fully to the practice and spirit of “being the change” that we present in the study guide, but when I do, I’m much clearer about why I’m doing it.

Secondly, this project came along at a time when I found myself needing to make more time for contemplation in my life. Bruce’s insistence that we give ourselves to the radiance and beauty of the creation in which we are immersed really struck a chord with me and deepened that opening to the contemplative.

Thirdly, the subject matter of Chapter 7 in Bruce’s book marks the “edge of the unknown” for me. Since I began working with the material of that chapter I have found numerous places of connection to other people who are exploring things such as the divine exchange, the 21st century significance of the Trinity, the dynamic interaction between chaos and order, or Sophia as divine presence. My faith is always a process; it is never frozen. I’m a lot clearer now about the issues of faith and spirit that I want to address not just intellectually, but in all aspects of my being.

Ingrid: You say you are clearer about why you are committed to the practice and spirit of “be the change.” Could you talk a bit about what and how things became clearer?

Tim: A shift happened in me when I started to see myself as an agent in the process of evolution and not just an observer and a recipient. The change agents and revolutionaries for whom I have the highest regard are able to see very clearly that the most perfect expression of our humanity is through activity which makes the divine visible in human affairs. In the Sufi tradition these words are attributed to the Creator, the Source of our being: I was a hidden treasure and I longed to be known, so I created both worlds, the visible and the invisible, in order that my hidden treasure of generosity and loving-kindness would be known.

Jesus was a revolutionary who understood that the universe is a verb, not a noun. He lived that Sufi awareness that we are here to satisfy God’s longing for love to be made known. I feel more empowered to be engaged in change when I think of change and transformation in this way. 

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