First
delivered at UUCB on December 14, 2008
The sermon title this morning is
a quote from Shakespeare.
He
is well paid that is well satisfied;
And I, delivering you, am satisfied
And therein do account myself well paid:
My mind was never yet more mercenary.
The play in which these lines
appears presents modern audiences with a great number of difficulties. I imagine
most Unitarian Universalists would bristle when the judicial court orders a man
to convert his religion as part of his judgment. But despite the context in
which these lines appear, the sentiment is one we can appreciate as a faith
community dependent upon the leadership and contributions of volunteers.
Although I chose the first line of the passage for the title, I would like to
emphasize the second line, “and I, delivering you, am satisfied.” Portia’s
satisfaction is because she rendered a service to someone she cared about
deeply. To be delivered is to be saved. What deeper spiritual reward can we
receive aside from bringing salvation to the people we love?
Leadership, especially unpaid
volunteer work, may seem a bit of a dry topic and unlikely to keep you riveted
on a Sunday morning. You may also be wondering why this is considered an
appropriate subject for a sermon at all. I chose to address the concept of
leadership this morning for several reasons.
1)
Our annual congregational meeting is a little over a month away. The
majority of our board member positions will be open for election. Understanding
the nature of leadership and its importance to our community will hopefully help
us make better decisions when we gather for this purpose at the end of January.
2)
Fortuitously, I recently returned from the December meeting of the
Humanist Institute in Washington, DC where my class’ focus was on leadership and
administration.
The leadership session of the
Humanist Institute includes readings, reflection and discussion in the areas
of:
- Theories of Leadership
- Board Governance and
Effective Board Membership
- Systems Theory
- Administration and
Negotiation
- Marketing and Media
Relations
I have addressed systems theory
here in the past and would like to pick this up again in a future sermon, but
will point out something about which we must all regularly remind ourselves.
Whether you joined this church last month, last year or in a previous decade,
decisions and relationships that predate your presence have an impact on the
experience you will have here. When we decide to join a congregation, we make a
conscious decision to affiliate ourselves with an established identity, value
system and patterns of relational behavior. If we are to responsibly trust other
members of the organization with our journey to spiritual maturity, knowledge
and understanding of the history and patterns of behavior of this congregation
are essential. This is precisely why my orientation meetings with potential
members include an honest, if not always flattering, explanation of our church’s
history. We may seem too good to be true to someone finding us after years of
religious oppression or spiritual neglect and consequently we are placed upon an
organizational pedestal from which we are destined to fall. Like every other
church or religious group in town, we’re comprised of human beings with all our
glorious strengths and occasional faults. Our leaders help us capitalize on our
strengths and fulfill our mission despite our faults.
Every single topic in this
weekend’s session has direct application to what we are hoping to achieve here.
If our vision is to cultivate a sanctuary for diverse believes, committed to
providing peace and love, personal spiritual growth, and service to the larger
community than we absolutely require leadership that will help us transform as a
body into just such a sanctuary. We have to invest in training leaders who
understand what it takes to translate our values into concrete action. Some of
you sitting here today have to have faith in yourselves and be willing to come
forward as these potential leaders.
Several of you, hopefully not too
many, may be sitting there thinking, “oh please don’t let her look at me. She
can’t possibly mean me. I’d stand in the intersection of Wickham Rd. and 192 in
a down-filled parka in August directing traffic if it meant I didn’t have to
serve on a board, chair a committee or supervise a project or task.”
Well let me tell you, you are
doing yourself and your fellow congregants a huge disservice. I understand being
over-extended with time commitments—I’m going to take this opportunity to pat
Harold Phillips on the back for leading a 55-minute board meeting this past
Wednesday. Yeah, Harold! However, the important point is not that the meeting
was unusually brief by our congregation’s standards, but that the board
accomplished its objectives and performed its duties within that time frame.
Even with a promise of all board meetings not exceeding an hour’s length, we
must face reality. Some of us truly do not have one more minute of our lives to
devote to another responsibility—now. That is not to say we might not be able to
do so in the future. So why not begin to explore the idea now when you have no
immediate pressure to actually possess “what it takes” to lead?
I understand feeling unprepared
and not willing to do something about which you know absolutely nothing. But
with respect to this objection, I’m going to take everyone here to task. It’s
not rocket science. There is absolutely no excuse why someone who can read and
can ask questions should have little to no idea what constitutes leadership and
what our board’s duties and obligations are. If you haven’t read the by-laws of
the organization you joined—shame on you. If you haven’t read the published
minutes of our board meetings—shame on you. If you have ever wondered what goes
on at a board meeting and declined to attend or not bothered to ask someone who
has attended—shame on you.
I understand being shy,
soft-spoken, anxious about conflict or possessing some other trait traditionally
seen as contrary to good leadership. I’m here to tell you these traits that
would supposedly hinder you from being an effective leader are really not a
barrier to becoming one of the best leaders our congregation has ever had. Yes,
it is true that church leadership must deal with conflict, but with the proper
training, compassionate relationships and mutual trust we can bring about a
church culture that puts conflict in its proper place as a means to growth
rather than over-inflate its potential for disastrous divisions within the
congregation. Fear of conflict and subsequent avoidance of decision-making will
always, always, always create splits where creative and compassionate
problem-solving is a spiritual endeavor leading to healthy personal and communal
growth.
So enough with the excuses for
avoiding leadership roles. How about some reasons for jumping at the chance to
serve your congregation?
Good church leaders are essential
to facilitating the spiritual maturity of the entire congregation while learning
new skills that enrich your own religious sensitivities. In the context of your
service to the congregation, you can develop the skills of principled
negotiation, keep the congregation’s focus on our values and principles, ensure
all of our actions and activities are in congruence with the vision and mission
of our church, and recognize and reward “staff” activity thereby meeting the
need for affirmation. By the way, in this context, I am referring to not just
paid staff, but every action, paid and volunteer, that contributes to our being
able to function as a religious body serving the needs of our congregants and
community. In return, the leader matures and has needs of his or her own met as
real satisfaction is gained by providing the opportunity for others to sprout,
grow and bloom.
This is most definitely a two-way
street. In order to transform our congregation into a vibrant society actively
engaged in the translation of values into action, we need two things.
1.
We need individuals who don’t just grudgingly agree to serve because we
need a warm body for a quorum. We need people who truly believe they will be
engaged in a personally satisfying experience. And indeed, it will foster
spiritual growth in people committed to such leadership who are prepared for the
inevitable times of frustration that come between rewarding successes.
2.
We need a congregation prepared to invest in nurturing leaders. We need
to be aware that not just accepting, but encouraging such change will
destabilize our historical patterns of behavior before new and healthier
behavior emerges.
The wonderful thing about a
congregation that invests in preparing and nurturing its leaders is that
although the destabilization period can be uncomfortable, particularly for those
personalities most resistant to change, the final transformation—into a
congregation that seamlessly and congruently acts on our values and principles
results in an exciting place to be. It creates an environment and indeed a
healthy family system that grows rather than stagnates or declines.
Our board for 2009 has the
opportunity to transform themselves and others. They can affect the cohesive
identify of a congregation of diverse individuals without sacrificing the
spiritual journey of the individual.
Here is what I want from our
potential leaders sitting here today: Good judgment, passion and commitment, an
understanding of our vision statement and our UU principles, and the willingness
to learn and practice what you learn.
And here is what I want from our
entire congregation, past leaders, present leaders, and future leaders: I want
an investment in preparing our leaders to serve and guide us effectively. That
means providing them with books, sending them to district training events,
setting aside time for internal leadership retreats.
I am not joking when I say the
first order of business for the new board should be a Saturday retreat here at
the church. It should be held late in February to give the new board members
time to read four short easy-to-read books.
Doing Good Better: How To Be
An Effective Board Member of a Nonprofit Organization.
Dearly beloved, this book is 136
pages of pure gold. I highly recommend the church authorize the purchase of a
copy for every member of the board and make one available in the church library
for anyone interested in what the board should be doing or perhaps contemplating
board membership in the future. Recalling my days as a trustee, vice president
and president of our Board I absolutely cringed while reading this book. I think
I highlighted virtually every page with an example of something we were doing
not just incorrectly, but 180 degrees wrong!
Getting to Yes: Negotiating
Agreement Without Giving In, Nonviolent Communication and The
Dance of Anger are the other three books.
I have probably now made serving
on our board sound like an incredible burden, but you’ll just have to trust me
that doing this one thing will make the rest of the year a golden opportunity
for personal growth and organizational transformation. Even if you have no plans
to serve, I highly recommend these books. Several of them have been of enormous
value when trying to have a productive conversation with a son on the cusp of
the teenage years.
Remember what I said to our youth
earlier in our service. Reading these books and understanding the knowledge they
impart is important, but not quite enough. Board service provides an opportunity
to put into practice the theories and skills these books convey. As you bring
your own unique experiences to the boardroom table, you will work together to
create good habits of negotiation, administration, problem-solving and
governance. This opportunity to repeatedly translate what you have learned into
wise action will be invaluable in all areas of your life.
I would like to also take the
time to point out that board service is policy governance, not taking on the
myriad tasks that need to be done around our church. If the board members are
identifying what needs to be done, assigning themselves the tasks of doing it,
and then carrying out those tasks than they’re going about it all wrong. In a
congregation our size, of course we’re going to be wearing multiple hats. Which
means we need to make doubly certain we are aware of which hat is perched on our
heads at any given time. Remember that at any given time we are all leaders and
we are all followers. Whether you are on the board or not, you—as a voting
member of the congregation, a contributing friend of the church or a guest today
have a real impact on the direction of this congregation. Do we pursue our
vision with concrete action or do we pay it lip service? How we lead one another
will answer that question for us. We are all well paid when we are well
satisfied. The spiritual rewards for ourselves and our larger community that
come from our investment in leadership are incalculable.
Peace be with you.
Copyright
© 2008
Ann
Fuller, December 2008
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