Transcript PowerPoint Presentation - Slide 1 - Ohio

Healthy Congregations:
An Introduction
Rev. Joan Van Becelaere
Ohio-Meadville District
Overview
 Today, we will look at some key concepts from a longer
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series of workshops on growing Healthy
Congregations.
In the full workshops, we study video case studies and
discuss them. We look at examples from our own
congregations and analyze them.
Today, we’ll look at congregations as interactive,
interconnected emotional systems.
We will look very briefly at the affect anxiety has on a
congregational system.
And say a word or two about healthy leadership.
System Thinking
System Thinking
 To think “System” is to think in a unique way.
 Things do not exist independently, only in
relationships to something else
 The whole cannot be understood by simply
understanding each part
 Things only function as they do because of the
presence of one another
 Nothing is influenced in one direction, all is co-causal.
Systems Thinking
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When change in one part of a relationship produces
change in other parts of the relationship, you know
you are dealing with a system
All parts contribute to what is happening
The interactions between different people affect the
whole for good or bad
There is mutual maintenance of behavior, seeking
after stability, homeostasis
Relationships are not merely interesting-that’s all
there is
Congregation as an Emotional System
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Where two or more are gathered, there is an
emotional system.
All human beings live in emotional systems.
The same emotional processes occur in all
relationships.
Driving these systems are innate forces that seek
survival.
The resulting behaviors are not learned or
thought out. They are “wired in,” automatic,
instinctive, reactive, natural phenomena.
Congregation as an Emotional System
 Congregations are emotional systems with
patterns and habits.
 What happens in the every day life of the
congregation is natural, for it is what happens in
all emotional systems. It’s not unique.
 They resist change from the familiar pattern even
if it is dysfunctional, homeostasis. (We’ve always
done it this way – even though we hate it!)
 No emotional system will change unless
people change how they behave and function
with one another in the system.
What systems thinking tells us
about congregations
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Systems thinking takes away polarities of
either/or and cause and effect thinking.
There is no “one cause” to any system’s current
state of being.
Every cause is a reaction and every reaction is
also a cause.
What systems thinking tells us
about congregations
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Institutions tend to institutionalize the
pathology, or the genius, of the founders.
Patterns of behavior resist being changed,
homeostasis
Emotional processes in a church can cause the
system to get stuck for years and years.
Relationships in the present can have more to
do with emotional processes that have been
reinforced for many generations than with the
logic of their current connection.
What systems thinking tells us
about congregations
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Health is always linked to growth in depth,
mission and numbers.
Healthy congregations are more attractive to
new people who sense the feeling level in the
congregation as healthy.
Congregation as an Emotional
System
Emotional systems are driven by two major
forces - separateness and closeness.
 Every person and group functions within a context
of relationships. (That’s all there is!!)
 Two needs influence these relationships —
the need to be separate, to stand alone, to be
independent;
and the need to be close, to connect, to interact
with others.
Congregation as an Emotional
System
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Separation forces work to reduce the tension
associated with being too close to others and the
need to affiliate
Closeness forces work to reduce the tension
associated with individual differences and the need
to be distinct.
Anxiety may arise when individuals sense
themselves to be outside their comfort zone relative
to separateness and closeness.
Congregation as an Emotional
System
The Balancing of Separateness and Closeness is the
process of Self-Differentiation.
 A healthy person or group balances the two forces.
 Healthy persons (and group)s are separate and
responsible and accountable for their actions/lives.
 They are also connected and responsive to others.
 The Universe – from stars to lichen, work by a
process of balancing and differentiation.
Congregation as an Emotional
System
Because Separateness and Closeness are opposites,
the potential for tension exists in all relational
systems. This tension can be destructive or
creative.
 To relieve anxiety, people may go to extremes of
closeness (fusion) or extremes of separateness (cutoff).
 Either extreme is destructive if people get stuck there.
Congregation as an Emotional
System
Self-Differentiation is the ability to define self to
others and still stay connected to them – even in
the midst of anxiety. It is taking responsibility for
one’s own emotional functioning.
 The goal is to be able to balance the two needs.
 Some folk have difficulty balancing. These people may
experience difficulty in leadership.
Congregation as an Emotional
System
Self-Differentiation is most evident in the way we
work out differences and conflict with each other.
 Self-Differentiation is the capacity to “like the way your
mother fried potatoes but not to be overwhelmed by
anxiety if someone else’s mother fried them differently.
This means you don’t try to convert others to your
mother’s fried potatoes, nor do you give in to another’s
need for fried potatoes of a certain kind. And you do not
disconnect from another until they fry their potatoes
your mother’s way.” (Steinke)
Healthy Congregations Workshop
Mission
“If a sailor has no destination – no clear idea of
where to go – the sailboat meanders or stays
adrift. The sailor needs a destination in order to
adjust the sails in relation to winds. Communities
are no different. Without a destination (mission),
their responses are random, habitual, or
meaningless. Congregations with a vision set
their sails. Leaders are sailors.” (Peter Steinke)
Healthy Congregations Focus on
Strengths and Mission
 Humans have a pervasive need for connections and
relationship.
 A congregation is an expression of that need for
connectedness and purpose.
 We need to explore and know why we have come
together (mission)
 Leaders are the guardians of the mission and keep it
alive.
 Leaders help the congregation develop a vision of how
it will live out its mission.
Healthy Congregations Focus on
Strengths and Mission
 A common vision is an expression of hope for the
future that captures imagination, mobilizes energy
and connects people.
 All healthy relationship systems exist in a creative
tension between vision (ideal, future) and reality
(present).
 Unhealthy systems don’t deal with the tension and lower
the vision to match the current reality, live in the past.
 Healthy systems accept tension as a motivation to
transcend reality of what is for the sake of what can be.
Healthy Congregations Focus on
Strengths and Mission
 When a congregation focuses on strength, it will look
to the future and increase the potential for change or
renewal.
 A group focused on weakness and what is wrong will fall
into hopelessness, pathology, blame and deficits.
 A group that looks to its strengths will build on them
and move forward through change and anxiety.
Healthy Congregations Focus on
Strengths and Mission
 A focus on strength is a focus on learning.
 Welcomes new ideas, dialogue, and differences.
 A focus on strength helps a congregation reorganize
itself after change or loss.
 A focus on strength is a focus on grace and
graciousness.
 Health in people and systems is hurt by emotions of
vengeance and envy and depression.
 Health is promoted by emotions like gratitude and
appreciation.
Anxiety in Congregations
 Anxiety is natural. It affects all human
relationships, communities and systems.
 It is an automatic response to a change or a threat
– real or imagined.
 We can't live without it.
 It arouses us to make changes in our lives.
 But when it gets too intense and crosses a
threshold it paralyses us and affects our thinking.
Anxiety in Congregations
 Anxiety may be ordinary, acute or chronic.
 Ordinary anxiety is part of life in the midst of
social change.
 Acute anxiety is the emotional disturbance that is
change or crisis generated.
 Chronic anxiety is habitual. It is structured into
the relationship or system itself. Any trigger sets it
off, small or large
 Healthy systems handle anxiety with resiliency.
 Unhealthy systems crack under anxiety.
Anxiety in Congregations
 When people are highly anxious, they find it hard
to avoid extremes in reactions.
 Highly anxious people want safety, self
preservation. Instincts take over.
 When driven by anxiety, we loses imagination,
clarity, insight, direction, good judgment,
discriminatory powers, and resiliency.
 The same can happen in congregations.
 We can get stuck. Love and covenant are out the
door.
The Human Brain and Anxiety
 To understand anxiety’s effect, we need to
look at how the human brain functions.
 Three parts of the brain have specialized
functions:
• Amygdala – Survival Processes – Reptilian
• Limbic System – Emotional Responses –
Mammalian
• Cerebral Hemispheres – Conscious rational
thought - Neocortex
The Human Brain and Anxiety
 If anxiety is intense, we move to a reptilian response,
self-preservation.
 The reptilian brain wants a rapid reaction to potential
danger. You see a snake about to strike – you move!
 The mammalian brain interprets whether something
is painful or pleasurable.
 Strong anxiety can push the brain’s reaction to love or
hate in the extreme.
The Human Brain and Anxiety
 The thinking brain has the potential to regulate the
mammalian and reptilian brains.
 A mature, differentiated person has the capacity to
regulate reactions and respond creatively,
thoughtfully to anxiety triggers.
 If we are intensely anxious the lower brains can
overwhelm the thinking brain.
 Certain issues, triggers, can bring out emotional
reactions in undifferentiated people/groups that
bypass the thinking brain.
Anxiety and Congregations
The fourteen most common triggers of anxiety in
congregations:
Old versus new
Growth/survival
Staff conflicts/resignation of staff member
Internal or external focus
Major trauma, tension, or transition
Money
Type of worship
Anxiety and Congregations
Issues involving sex/sexuality
Pastor’s leadership style
Harm done to a child/death of a child
Property building, space, territory
Distance between the ideal and the real
Lay leadership’s style
Boundary issues
Anxiety and Congregations
 Anxiety is contagious. Peer pressure, group think,
and mob panic are examples.
 Anxiety acts like a virus and can become out of
control.
 Anxiety does not have a simple, single cause.
 Anxiety that runs wild is being maintained and
nurtured & fed by the larger system.
 Anxiety is usually focused on people in two positions:
the most responsible and the most vulnerable. People
want to relieve tension & focus anxiety somewhere.
Anxiety and Congregations
 To control anxiety, emotional systems use three
primary mechanisms: distancing, fusing, and
triangling.
 Emotional distance gives an individual time to
control his own reactions to others by avoidance or
withdrawal.
• But it is reactive.
• It can heighten anxiety because distancing increases the
separateness between people.
Anxiety in Congregations
 Emotional fusion results in the opposite. People
become “stuck together.”
• Anxiety is bound by pleasing or manipulating others.
• We put blinders on re: bad behavior, afraid to rock the
boat
• The relationship is stable but less reliable.
• Trust and mutual respect diminish.
Anxiety and Congregations
 The most common way to control or bind anxiety
is emotional triangling.
• We form healthy (and unhealthy) triangles all of the
time.
• In a situation of anxiety, triangles detour potential
conflict.
• But anxiety not addressed in one relationship is
played out in or pushed onto another relationship.
Anxiety and Congregations
Source of real
tension
 THE ANXIOUS
TRIANGLE
 Anxious relationships
tend to become
triangular. Most anxious
parties will bring in a
third party to reduce the
tension.
Party A
Party B
Rescuer
(willing to experience
another’s anxiety)
(assigned by role to carry the anxiety)
Anxiety and Congregations
 Chronic Anxiety has an Effect on Individuals, the
Congregation, and Leadership and ability to
handle Conflict.
• Reactivity. Knee-Jerk Behavior
• Psychic Clumping, Cater to the Weakest
• Over Focus, Blame, Criticism
• Quick Fix, Immediate Relief
• Secrecy, Cover-ups
• Invasiveness, No Boundaries
Anxiety and Congregations
Chronic (Habitual) Anxiety is an issue in many
churches across all denominations.
 Constant state of crisis over everything.
 Constant criticism of others inside and outside
 Use of threats, manipulation and tantrums
 Splinter groups repeatedly form
 Leadership roles rapidly change
 Those who introduce change of any kind are rejected
 Communication is closed, secret and distorted
 People think in polarities – black/white, win/lose
Anxiety and Congregations
 Healthy groups are not always peaceful & tranquil. But
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not chronically anxious, either.
Healthy churches respond to change and problems
with resiliency, flexibility.
They allow for change and control reactions to anxiety
and stress with insight, reflectiveness and objectivity.
They analyze, evaluate calmly and develop effective
responses to acute anxiety.
The leaders help the people reason through
differences.
Healthy Leadership
 Leadership is the spiritual process of discerning what
one believes (clarity), acting on that belief in the
public arena (decisiveness), and standing behind that
action despite the varied responses of people
(courage).
Rev. Frank Thomas
Healthy Leadership
 Leaders and followers are a system. Leadership is cocreated.
 The leader is the person who most influences an
emotional field or system.
 The differentiated, non-anxious leader works on his/her
own functioning.
 His/her influence does not rely on personality,
consensus, techniques or skills, piles of information, or
expertise.
 The system is influenced – positively or negatively - by
the leader’s BEING (non-anxious presence) and DOING
(differentiated, balanced functioning).
Healthy Leadership
 There are similarities between viral infections and
relationship conflict.
 Healthy leadership functions as the community’s
system of immunity.
 Leaders recognize if certain behaviors are damaging to
the welfare of the whole.
 The health or illness of a system depends on its
leadership’s capacity to function as an immune system.
 Leaders recognize threats, respond thoughtfully and
carefully, and remember how to respond.
Healthy Leadership
 “Leaders contribute to the health of a
congregation. They are healthpromoters. The true mark of a leader is
spreading health throughout the
community. The presence of mature,
self-aware, and faithful leaders means
health is possible in the community.”
(Peter Steinke)
Healthy Congregations Workshops
 Starting Jan. 23, First UU Church of Columbus and
North UU Church (Lewis Center) will host a four –
session series of free workshops focused on
strengthening congregational health and resiliency in
the face of societal and congregational anxiety.
 Congregational lay leaders, clergy, and other
interested folk are invited to participate. The series
will be facilitated by the Rev. Joan Van Becelaere,
Ohio-Meadville District Executive.
Healthy Congregations Workshops
 Jan. 23 (Columbus) Creating Healthy Congregations
and Healthy Congregations Respond to Anxiety and
Change. (congregational dynamics and systems
theory, the nature of group anxiety and its effects on
congregations)
 Feb. 20 (Lewis Center) Leadership in Healthy
Congregations (how healthy leaders can learn to be
self-differentiated and successfully work with group
anxiety)
Healthy Congregations Workshops
 March 20 (Columbus) Building Relationships in
Healthy Congregations (how anxiety affects
congregational relationships, how we can help form
healthy, supportive relationships in healthy
communities)
 April 17 (Lewis Center) Healthy Congregations
Nurture Generous People (the larger view of
stewardship, nurturing healthy generosity of time,
talent and treasure)
Healthy Congregations Workshops
 Each Saturday, gather for coffee at 8:30 am. The
workshop starts at 9 am and ends by 12:30 pm.
 Registration is free, but advance registration is needed
so we know how many chairs to set up, handouts to
make and how much coffee to brew.
 Please register on the Ohio-Meadville website at:
www.ohiomeadville.org
Thank you for being here today!
Healthy Leaders - Video
After viewing the video, please respond to the
following statements:
 The more leaders accept responsibility for anxiety that
is not theirs, the more they become stressed, function
less effectively, and lose sight of their goals.
 Congregations that function well have leaders who feel
less threatened by the reactions and reactivity of
others.
Discussion
 Leaders need to be able to tolerate “pain” both in
themselves and others. They need to be able to make
decisions that might bring change and, thus, pain to
others.
 Place yourself on the chart “Toleration of Pain in Self
and in Others.
 What impact does this have on your leadership at this
time?
 What groups or persons in your congregation are
unable to tolerate pain and change?
Discussion
 What signs do you see that a person may be acting like
a virus?
 Are there instances in your congregation where
someone or a small group has acted like a virus? How
did the congregation respond?
 How do congregations enable anxious reactivity to
viruses?
 What can you and other leaders do to provide a strong
immune system?