BLENDED FAMILIES

"Fragile: Handle with care. Blending in process."

"'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to give you hope and a future'" (Jeremiah 29:11, NIV).

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"Do I have to call him Dad now, too?" "Why do we have to leave our house and move into their house?" "How can she tell me what to do when she's not my real mom?"

Do these questions sound familiar? They probably do if you or someone you know is part of a blended family.

Blame it on The Brady Bunch. In that sugar-coated '60s sitcom, the blended Brady family looked alike, thought alike and worked together on problems that could be resolved in a half-hour television show.

In their "neat-o" universe, there was no such thing as step-family angst, unresolved anger, feelings of loss, issues of trust or unrealistic expectations. But those are just the sort of challenges most blended families find themselves working through.

What Is a Blended Family?

According to the Stepfamily Association of America (SAA), the phrase blended family refers to a stepfamily household, one in which a parent marries a person who is not his or her child's other (usually biological) parent. The term "blended" is somewhat misleading, because, as the SAA points out, children are not ingredients who can be "blended" into a new mix of family members; actually, they are individuals who are still connected to the other parent. And although each stepfamily is different, teens in stepfamilies of all types report that adjusting to a new family structure requires patience and flexibility.

A stepfamily can be confusing; it even has a language all its own. Take the following example. Suppose your parents are divorced and you live with your mother ( your "residential custodian"). If she remarries, her new husband is your "stepfather," and his children (if any) become your "stepsiblings." If your mother and stepfather have a child together, the baby is a "mutual child," another term for your new "half-" brother or sister. Things can get even more complicated if your father (your "non-residential parent")

remarries a woman with children of her own. Then you have TWO stepfamilies, complete with two sets of stepsiblings. And if they have a baby together . .

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The Statistics Are Staggering

One out of two Western marriages ends in divorce. Sixty percent of second marriages fail, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. 66% of marriages and living together situations end in break up, when children are actively involved, according to Stepfamily Foundation statistics. It is predicted that 50% of children in the US will experience their parents' divorcing before they are 18. Approximately half of all Americans are currently involved in some form of step relationship. According to the Census Bureau, more Americans have been living in step families from 2000 than in nuclear families.

In his 1994 study, "The Changing Character of Stepfamilies," Professor of Sociology Larry L. Bumpass of the University of Wisconsin says his research states that about half of the 60 million children under the age of thirteen in the U.S. were then living with one biological parent and that parent's current partner. Nearly half of all women, not just mothers, are likely to live in a stepfamily relationship, when we include living-together families in our definition of the stepfamily.

The Dynamics

If you think that life in an intact nuclear family (one where your original parents live together) is difficult, try sharing your most intimate moments with people you may hardly know. It's considered normal to fight with your own siblings, but is it OK to fight with your stepsiblings? You may get frustrated with your mother, but can you voice your opinions to your stepfather? Part of the dilemma is trying to learn where you belong within your stepfamily. Are there new rules? If so, what are they? Will anyone enforce them? Is there opportunity for compromise?

Common problems

The arrival of a new adult -- often with a child or two from a previous marriage -- can turn a child's world upside down, prompting fears, conflicts and doubts about the child's role and status in the family.

Common problems described by stepchildren include feeling unwanted by a stepparent; feeling alienated within the new family; being torn by tension between biological parents; and discomfort around holidays and major family events like graduations and weddings. Some teens resent stepparents who assume the role of parent (and disciplinarian) before the family has had a chance to evolve. Others are jealous of the parent's affection for his or her new spouse or other children living in the home. The child may resent a new parent for showing love and affection for his mother or father...

It is common for these fragile family units to see instant competition between stepchildren. Our sons and daughters were not shopping around for extra brothers and sisters -- or for a new parent figure. Now there are rooms to share, and, more importantly, competition for the attention, love and affection from their parent who has given affection to another adult...

There is very little that is simple in any stepfamily, and the level of stress you feel can range from tolerable to paralyzing. Sometimes, when you think you've got it all figured out, you get hit again with a wave you never saw coming, and your feet, already treading so carefully, are knocked completely out from under you. The stress can be suffocating. You know you're under too much stress when you feel out of control. Even if we have much to face, when we have some control over certain aspects of our lives, we feel less stressful.

Emotions

Children in blended families are more likely to be troubled simply because they experience conflict within the home plus conflict from interhousehold issues.

In addition, the youngsters - and often the adults - in blended families are grieving, but most often are not mature enough to explain why they are unhappy. Instead, their discontent shows up in negative actions and attitudes. (To be honest, it's hard enough for adults to verbalize their true feelings.). Most of them have lost - through death or divorce - a biological parent. They often have to move to a new dwelling away from their friends, school, neighborhood, church. They bring this grief and loss into a new situation where the stress of adjusting to new rules and expectations can sometimes be overwhelming...

Allow losses to be mourned:

By the time of a second marriage, it is often a child's third family unit, the first being the biological parents' marriage, the second being a separate or single family unit and the third being the new relationship which involves a stepparent. Children need parental permission and understanding to grieve these losses, before embracing the new family system. Failure to accept mourning as a natural feeling may result in angry outbursts and potential alienation.

When the inability of family members to cope with the enormous change thrust upon them supersedes the joy developing in the blended home, family members begin to feel trapped. This hopeless state opens the door for emotions to escalate or plummet out of control for everyone. Rage, jealousy, blame, substance abuse, despair, are the usual ingredients in a pretty volatile mix.

Many feel 'unwanted', uncherished, even unloved. Being unwanted is the worst disease that any human being can ever experience. Nowadays we have found medicine for leprosy, and lepers can be cured. There's treatment for TB, and consumption can be cured. But for being unwanted, unless there are willing hands to serve and there's a loving heart to love, I don't think this terrible disease can be cured.

[My wife and two adult daughters are involved in ministries to women prisoners and ex-prisoners. For the overwhelming majority of these women, the experience of abuse and/or feelings associated with being unwanted are at the root of their problems. But the abusers are mostly not in prison... There is something unjust there...].

What to do

How do you combat the stress of blending and avert disaster? By making each member feel loved and wanted. The adults should set the standard by showing a deep love and respect for one another. Then, seeing it's so easy for "blendeds" to feel unwanted, the parents have to make deliberate love choices with all the family members.

It doesn't take long to give a hug, write a card or say an encouraging word. Plan some fun into the family schedule. Children and fun go hand-in-hand.

Forgiveness

There is a never-ending need for forgiveness in a stepfamily. Regardless of how often the forgiveness is extended to you, you can reduce your stress when you extend it to yourself and others. Don't be afraid, it won't hurt a bit.

First, is there anything you need to forgive yourself for? You can't grow when you have that kind of baggage holding you down. Today, say out loud, "I forgive myself for those mistakes. I've learned from them, and it's time to move on." Then, examine the grudges you're holding against others. This may be harder, but make a choice to forgive them, too. You don't have to speak to the people who have hurt you, and you're not justifying what they've done. Just in your heart, let it go.

Each day this week, when you get up in the morning, remember that you have chosen to forgive yourself and those around you. Imagine those hurts and mistakes as a weight upon your shoulders that you have put aside, along with the stress that you don't need complicating your life.

Family Meetings and Rules

Parents need to look beyond behaviors and understand broken hearts. Holding family meetings, seeking occasional outside counsel, or becoming part of a blended family support group can help.

You and your spouse choose the time and place for your meeting, most likely at home, but it doesn't have to be. And the best time will be when you have plenty of time, so you won't have to rush, perhaps later in the evening or first thing Saturday morning.

Then give the kids a few days notice. They may be resistant, but if they can expect the meeting instead of having it dropped on them unannounced, they may be less uneasy about their participation. Ask them if there is anything they want addressed in the meeting, and if so, add it to your agenda.

Let the kids know that any member of the family can call a meeting anytime they need to. And if you decide on a regular schedule, let everyone know that, too.

Knowing what behavior is acceptable and what isn't will make life much easier for the children. If a child knows where the limits are, he has the freedom to go to the edge but not beyond. That knowledge is both comforting and enlightening.

Enforcing rules that are already established makes life much easier for the parents. Because discipline is different in a stepfamily, stepparents are sometimes reluctant to provide the structure and levy any punishment that stepchildren need. With the rules -- and the consequences for breaking them -- already established, the stepparent isn't overstepping any bounds at all, but merely following through with the plan.

Really work at building the relationship/s. Your new position in the home may grant you authority, but respect is something you earn. And remember relating to a new 'enforcer of rules' is hard: don't make it doubly hard by verbalizing rules and consequences more than you verbalize encouragement!

Make the step-children feel as important as your own natural children. If your stepchildren get a whiff of unfairness or bias against them, and feel you're favoring your own children against them, the hurt is doubly painful...

Remember this is your choice, not the children's. As a stepparent, you had a choice in the situation while the children did not. As the adult your responsibility must encompass an understanding that you will be expected to be concerned and involved in caring for these children and ensuring their sense of security in traveling through this transition.

One experienced counselor wrote: 'There is no such thing as instant intimacy. Respect one another and take the time to become acquainted. Let the relationship build security and caring on its own merit, without pressure to fill the fantasy of loving one another before a solid "like" has been established. On the average, two to three years is the time period for developing these bonds and stabilizing the new family.'

The Good News:

Although stepfamilies form as a result of loss, they also bring people together. Many teens, after getting used to the new family structure, grow to consider their stepparents as allies they can trust and confide in. When stepparents try not to assert too much parental authority right away, teens are often glad to find they have a new parent who can be friendly and impartial.

Teenager: remember that your new family will take time to develop. Everyone needs to learn to adjust to their new roles. But with patience and open communication, you may find that being a member of a stepfamily is something you can be proud of.

Others have made it: so can you!

Rowland Croucher.

Now here are some bits and pieces of wisdom I found on the World Wide Web:

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Advice to a Teenager for Dealing With a New Family

If you're having problems adjusting to a new stepfamily, you should know that your feelings are normal and that help is available. Many teens find it helpful to confide in a trusted neutral adult, such as a sports coach, a favorite teacher, a counselor, or a relative who isn't directly involved in the situation. Talking with a friend who has gone through a similar situation can help as well. There are also support groups for teens in stepfamilies, just as there are for stepparents. (Your school guidance counselor may be able to direct you to one)/

Ask your biological parent for regular time that you can be alone so you have the opportunity to discuss your feelings. Both you and your parent can benefit from one-on-one time together.

Keep your anger in check. If you're angry or upset, try writing down what's bothering you rather than yelling or expressing your feelings in a hurtful way. When you've calmed down, share what you've written with the appropriate person. If you present your feelings in a positive way, you may be surprised at how open your family may be to change.

Jonathan Schneider

http://kidshealth.org/teen/mind_matters/feelings/blended_families_p5.html )

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From Willard F. Harley, Jr., Ph.D.

Question: This is our second marriage for each of us. We each have two children, all of whom are older teens except one. We seem to constantly disagree on simple child rearing issues, i.e. cleaning the room, household chores, curfew, etc. My largest complaint is that since we have blended our families, it seems my children have had to make the most adjustments while my husband's children just seem to run wild when they are here (they live with their mother most of the time). My husband is always very critical of my children and their "conformance" to house rules yet his seem to make their own rules. While I have tried to stress that no two children are reared the same, he continues to punish them for seemingly minor infractions. This is causing a great deal of distrust among all of us. Is there anything we can do to rebuild trust between us? I am beginning to question my faithfulness to someone so unwilling to compromise.

Response: Marriages with blended families tend to be very unsuccessful, one of the greatest predictors of divorce. And you have first-hand experience to see why this is the case. It is common for each spouse to put his or her own children's interests first. It is often in an effort to compensate for the trauma children experience when there is a divorce. But when the children's interests are first, the interests of the other spouse and the other spouse's children are found somewhere down the list, and that's a formula for marital disaster.

However, in cases that I have witnessed, these marriages can be saved if both spouses are willing to follow my Policy of Joint Agreement (Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse). In effect, whenever you follow this policy, you put your spouse's interests first, where they should be.

Following this policy means that neither you nor your husband act to reprimand or discipline any child until you have reached an enthusiastic agreement about it. At first, you may not agree about much of anything, in which case you are not to discipline the children (they may do whatever they please). But as you practice applying the policy, you and your husband will begin to establish guidelines in child-rearing issues, and agreements will start to form. Eventually, you will agree on how to discipline your children in a way that takes each other's feelings into account, and your marriage will be saved.

Child rearing is a huge problem in blended families, but it's not the only issue in your marriage, I'm sure. Regardless of your conflicts, however, you'll find that you can resolve them all when you have learned to negotiate with the Policy of Joint Agreement.

Incidentally, here are a few guidelines that will help you negotiate an enthusiastic agreement:

Set ground rules to make negotiations pleasant and safe: a) try to be pleasant and cheerful through your discussion of the issue, b) put safety first--do not threaten to cause pain or suffering when you negotiate, even if your spouse makes threatening remarks or if the negotiations fail, c) if you reach an impasse, stop for a while and come back to the issue later.

Identify the problem from the perspectives of both you and your husband. Be able to state the other spouse's position before you go on to find a solution.

Brainstorm solutions with abandon. Spend some time thinking of all sorts of ways to handle the problem, and don't correct each other when you hear of a plan that you don't like. You'll have a chance to do that later.

Choose the solution that is appealing to both of you. And if your brainstorming has not given you an answer that you can enthusiastically agree upon, go back to brainstorming. The reason you argue is that you are incompatible -- you have not learned how to act in the interest of both of you at the same time. But if you follow the Policy of Joint Agreement and use the guidelines for negotiation that I have just described, you will find yourselves in greater and greater agreement. Eventually, your marriage will turn out better than you could have ever hoped.

If you don't follow this policy, however, you will eventually make each other so miserable that you will lose your love for each other and divorce, like most marriages with blended families. This process has already begun. Stop it before it goes any further.

http://www.parenthoodweb.com/articles/phw155.htm

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Rules for Stepfamilies from the Stepfamily Association Ten Steps for Steps, by Jeannette Lofas

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Step 1. Recognize that the stepfamily will not and can not function as does a natural family. It has its own special state of dynamics and behaviors. Once learned, these behaviors can become predictable and positive. Do not try to overlay the expectations and dynamics of the intact or natural family onto the stepfamily.

Step 2. Recognize the hard fact that the children are not yours and they never will be. We are stepparents, not replacement parents. Mother and father (no matter how AWFUL the natural parents) are sacred words and feelings. We are stepparents, a step removed, yet in this position can still play a significant role in the development of the child.

Step 3. Super stepparenting doesn't work. Go slow. Don't come on too strong.

Step 4. Discipline styles must be sorted out by the couple. The couple, ideally with the help of a Stepfamily Foundation trained professional, needs to immediately and specifically work out what the children's duties and responsibilities are. What is acceptable behavior and what are the consequences when children misbehave? Generally, in the beginning, we suggest that the biological parent does the disciplining as much as is feasible. The couple together specifically works out jobs, expected behaviors and family etiquette.

Step 5. Establish clear job descriptions between the parent, stepparent and respective children. What specifically is the job of each one of us in this household? We need to be as detailed as we are in business.

Step 6. Know that unrealistic expectations beget rejections and resentments. There is no model for the step relationship except for the wicked stepchild and invariably cruel stepmother of fairy tales. Note the absence of myth around the stepfather. It is vital for the survival of the stepfather to be able to see and delineate expectations for each member of the family, especially the primary issues of upset in step: e.g., money, discipline, the prior spouse, visitation, authority, emotional support, territory and custody.

Step 7. There are no ex-parents . . . only ex-spouses. Begin to get information on how to best handle the prior spouse.

Step 8. Be prepared for conflicting pulls of sexual and biological energies within the step relationship. In the intact family, the couple comes together to have a child. The child is part of both parents, generally pulling the parents' energy together for the well-being of the child. In step, blood and sexual ties can polarize a family in opposite energies and directions.

Step 9. The conflict of loyalties must be recognized right from the beginning. The conflict is particular to step and is a round robin of confused emotions. Often, just as the child in step begins to have warm feelings toward the stepparent, the child will pull away and negatively act out. He/she feels something like this: "If I love you, that means I do not love my real parent." The feelings are normal and must be dealt with. The pulls of "Who am I loyal to first?" go all the way around in the stepfamily.

Step 10. Guard your sense of humor and use it. The step situation is filled with the unexpected. Sometimes we don't know whether to laugh or to cry. Try humor.

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Parenting In Blended Families

"Loss and unresolved grief is the underlying issue that parents encounter when raising children in blended families"

Published in "The Family News", May, 2001

By: Michael G. Conner, Psy.D, Clinical, Medical & Family Psychologist More Information: http://www.CrisisCounseling.Com

Nationally, nearly three out of five families are raising children from another parent, different marriages and different families. Blended families include adopted children, divorced families raising children together and children from other marriages or relationships. An increasing number of grandparents are raising their grandchildren. And foster parents are raising their own children with the children of other parents. Parenting in a blended family is a challenge with unique problems.

Separation or Divorce. The first problem of raising children in a blended family is a direct result of parental separation or divorce. From the moment of birth children form emotional bonds with their parents. Children who have two parents in their life become confused and experience emotional turmoil when their parents separate. A young boy I worked with made the issue very clear to me when he said, "How do I know my parents won't leave me? How can people stop loving each other?" Parent counseling or education can help you deal with this.

There are impacts on children even when a separation or divorce is entirely understandable, necessary and in the best interest of a child. For instance, if parents become hateful during a relationship or marriage, then children will struggle and experience emotional conflicts. Children end up learning that love and relationships are not something they can count on. But in all fairness to parents, there are circumstances where separation or divorce can help. Keeping a destructive or violent marriage together can be even more damaging than a separation or divorce.

Adoption, Abandonment or Death. The second problem happens when a child is adopted, a parent abandons their child or a parent dies. The loss of a parent or both parents creates a void in a child's life. Children naturally have questions, and the answers to these questions will take time for a child to understand and accept. Counseling and educating parents to handle this can help.

Children have feelings about missing parents or any void in their life. Typical feelings include loss, guilt, feeling empty inside and especially grief. But adoption and taking on the responsibility of a parent can be a very positive and rewarding act. Providing a stable and loving home for a child is tremendously important and can help heal a child. It can help prepare them to get on with their life.

Parenting under these circumstance is not necessarily more difficult than parenting in general, but it does present unique challenges. Loss and unresolved grief are the underlying emotional issues that parents encounter when raising children in a blended family. This can look like fear, anger, depression and other insecurities in a child's behavior. In many cases, children will seek out and discover ways to avoid or "cover-up" their feelings. Arguments, blaming, defiance and acting like a victim are the most common ways that children try to take control of their life or to avoid even the reminder that their life is not necessarily secure and predictable.

The psychological and emotional needs of children raised in blended families present unique challenges. Many parents do not feel equipped to raise children who are not theirs, nor parent children they did not raise since infancy. But there are some useful guidelines if you are "blending" a family or parenting children in a family that is already blended. The following are only guidelines because children cope with and adjust in ways that are very individual.

Dating and Co-habitation. Single parents should minimize dating, and couples should not live together for at least 6 months following a divorce, separation or the end of a parental relationship. Children are usually vulnerable and emotionally unstable for at least three months. In most cases children need a stable relationship with a primary parent and they don't respond well to competition with another adult who is an outsider. Many children are ready to move on with their life somewhere between three and six months. Six months is a good time for a parent to take small steps and begin raising the possibility to their child that life goes on.

Marriage and Committed Relationships. Parents should avoid getting engaged, living with a fiancée or getting married for at least one year after a traumatic loss or breakup in a family. How long you wait really depends on the child, but one year is a good estimate.

Children grieve, let go and move on in different ways and over different time frames. Blending a family may be necessary for practical and financial reasons, but doing so can be stressful and will raise many uncertainties for children. Life goes on, but ignoring stress when blending a family can produce emotional and behavioral problems. Children tend to act out their feelings when they are under a lot of stress. Family counseling or advice may be helpful and even necessary if children are having difficulty with an early transition into a blended family.

Disagreements, conflicts and inconsistent discipline methods between separated or divorced parents can cause emotional and behavioral problems. Children should not be exposed to parental conflicts. Children begin to think they can do whatever they want when parents argue and disagree in front of their child. More than any other issue, the tension between divorced parents can be the surest way to create problems for kids. Children feel the tension between parents and they suffer when parents create problems, emotional distress and don't get along. Over time, children begin to resent feeling that way, get angry or they take their anger out on others. If not, they end up believing the problem is their fault and their life will always be this way.

Primary responsibility for parenting should be left to the biological or responsible parent. Children who have lost one parent don't want to lose another. Children will naturally seek the support and help of a responsible adult. But they don't want to share a parent with another adult. A couple should begin to co-parent equally when they formalize their relationship and make a commitment to each other and members of the family. This commitment, when accepted by a child and supported by other family members, will provide a helpful structure. Over time this will enhance a child's emotional and psychological well being.

Co-parenting requires cooperation between the responsible parents and it requires consistent discipline. Blending a family is not easy. Some children will test the relationship between a man and woman. They will break the rules, ask for exceptions and challenge parents to make a choice between them and the other parent. Children need guidance, instruction, training, choices, consequences and supervision. These are roles that any caring and responsible adult can provide. Regardless of the approach to parenting, couples should never threaten the bonds between a parent and their child.

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You're soon becoming a step-parent!

A somewhat frightening endeavor, especially if you're adding a child or two yourself, thus making a his-and-hers blended family. The most important part of becoming a stepparent is the prior planning you and the biological parent do before the wedding.

First and foremost, the adults need to agree in advance about discipline. Who, what, when, where, and how is a good place to start with your discipline plan.

Then agree on rules for your home. In fact, agree on all acceptable behavior and the consequences of behavior that is not acceptable. After the adults have agreed, it is time for the children to have the new regime and the new rules explained to them.

The second most important aspect of a blended family is that each adult support the other. No giving in or allowing children to manipulate the rules. Manipulation and inconsistency guarantee that you will have a "blender" family instead of a "blended" family.

Parents should discuss upcoming changes with their children in detail appropriate to their age. But it should be clear from the beginning that the adults are deciding which changes will be made.

The best stepparent in the world is probably not going to saunter into an immediate loving and grateful situation. However, the biological parent should explain to the children, that although love is not necessary for the stepparent, respect and cooperation are mandatory. Make it clear to your children that you expect your new spouse to be treated in a civil manner.

If you are the biological parent, explain that this is your new husband or wife, not a potential father or mother. Tell them also that if love happens, that will be wonderful and make you and your new husband/wife very happy. But in the meantime, respect is the order of the day.

Every blended family has its ups and downs. From sullen teen-agers to former spouses who would never dream of cooperating with anyone, you'll find life in a blended family is challenging.

Go slow. You will not be a family in one day or possibly even in one year. Many experts say it can take three years or longer!

Persistence is the key. Stepfamilies are a long-term commitment.

If you cultivate patience, concentrate on the positive, and keep your sense of humor, you, too, can become an effective and loving stepmom or stepdad. But setting the ground rules first will go a long way to making your new family successful.

http://www.cyberparent.com/step/newstep.htm

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Building a Blended Family: 1. Drafting a Blueprint by Deb Lockwood

I don't know of any construction company that would start a construction project without a blue print. They wouldn't even pour a foundation. Why is it that most of us start other long-term projects, like building a family, without so much as a plan scratched out on a paper napkin? In this article, we'll discuss what my husband and I discovered about developing a blue print for our family.

When a custom builder is going to design a house for you, the first thing they want to know is what type of house do you want? They would ask questions like how you live, how many rooms do you need, how many people will be living there, what style do you like?

If we apply this analogy to building a family, we want to know what do you want the family to look like. How many people will we be blending, what backgrounds do they have, what are their interests? What are our family's goals-short-term and long? What's important to our family, where do we want to focus our cumulative energies, and where do we want to spend our finances?

After we became engaged, one of the first things Evan and I discussed was what our family priorities should be. We came up with two biggies: (1) buy a house, and (2) combine our family-fragments into a blended family.

First and foremost, we wanted to create a stable environment for the children. After being shaken and uprooted by the divorces, we knew they desperately needed some normalcy-some stability-in their lives. When we were discussing our plans, Cathy and James were going to be living full time with their Mom. That left Luke as the only child under our roof full time. James and Cathy would visit every other weekend.

Even though we would only have one child full time, Evan and I felt it was very important for each of the kids to have their own room. We reasoned each of the children would need a safe harbor; a place they could call their own and that wouldn't be invaded by anyone else. There are unpleasant moments in any family situation and we wanted to ensure everyone had some guaranteed private "space" if needed. Also, we wanted all three kids to feel they were equal members of this family.

Because Evan and I weren't making very much money, we looked for quite some time for the right house. Our criteria for a house was 4 bedrooms, at least 2 bathrooms, and close to a bus line. Our budget was so small in fact that our real estate agent laughed when we told him what we wanted to spend. Since the agent was a family friend, we kept him on, but we began looking for houses ourselves. At last we found the perfect house; a HUD (Housing and Urban Development) home that needed a lot of work but it met our three criteria. We won the bid, despite our laughable finances. Evan moved in the summer before our wedding so he could start working on the house before the rest of us moved in.

After buying the house, our first priority was to have everyone choose their bedroom. Then, we let everyone choose their paint and we started our repair/redecorating phase. (By the way, with our house, the repair phase has never stopped.) Because finances were so tight, we bought all of our furniture at garage sales and thrift shops. Within just a few months, everyone had a room to call their own, no matter how often they were actually living in it.

Circumstances changed and within a year of our wedding, both Cathy and James came to live with us full time. We were all really happy that we had bought a house with so many rooms, especially the bedrooms and bathrooms.

You may be wondering where you can get ideas for a family blue print. The logical place to start is in your house of faith; your church. Search your church publications for articles on families. Ask a pastor for some advice. Find a family that you admire-someone who seems to be doing things "right"-and ask the parents for some ideas. Pursue a mentor relationship with those folks.

Another source of ideas would be your family members. Do you have an aunt, uncle, brother, or sister you can talk to about their experiences? How about your parents? They've certainly been through the experience of raising a child. Grandparents are a wonderful source of parenting tips and advice. They know so much, but we often forget to ask.

The main thing you need to do is open a dialogue with your spouse (or fiancée, if you're not married yet). Figure out what is important to you and your family and write those priorities down on paper. You now have a blue print. Remember to involve the children in this decision making process. The ideal time to design a blue print is before you begin building, however, in the case of building a blended family, today is not too late to start.

Hint: House Rules

We established a few house rules early on at a family meeting. Everyone was encouraged to participate and discuss the rules. Evan and I insisted we have less than 10 rules. More than that would have been too cumbersome (and I, for one, would not have been able to remember them all). One of those rules was that everyone's room was their haven. If I went to my room and shut the door, another family member must ask for (and receive) my permission to enter my room. This rule has come in handy several times during confrontations. Of course, the rule could be overridden by a parent, if absolutely necessary. (I can only remember two times when an override was necessary.)

Building a Blended Family: 2. Defining Who You Are by Deb Lockwood

In the previous article, we discussed the necessity of drafting a blue print. This blue print defines what is important to your family and helps you figure out in which direction to head. The second Building a Blended Family fundamental is to define who "you" are. At first glance, this definition might seem obvious, but it is an issue with which our family has struggled.

When you come into any marriage, most of us know you are not only marrying your spouse; you are marrying their parents and their siblings. With a second marriage you get a large familial bonus. Not only do you get to marry your fiancé and his or her immediate family, you are also marrying your fiancé's children, ex-spouse, ex-in-laws, ex-spouse's new spouse.you get the picture. All of these people have an historical influence in your new spouse's life and they continue to have a direct influence on your new step-children. And, if you think that influence stops at the altar, you are very mistaken.

Defining who we are comes easily in some cases.like "parent". That seems like an easy one. When you really look at it, though, parent could mean a birth parent, a step-parent, an adoptive-parent, or a "never been a parent before" parent.

When defining who we were, one of the things we did was to count how many people actually lived under our roof; daily and every other weekend. That was the "who" of our family unit: Evan and I and our three children (James, Luke, and Cathy). We tried not to make a distinction between step-this and step-that. For instance, if one of the kids was ill and I called in to the school, I would say I was their mom; not their step-mom. When we introduced the kids, it was "This is my daughter, Cathy," not "This is my step-daughter."

A part of defining who you are is making sure everybody understands his or her role within the family. Also, they need to understand how the other people in their lives fit into the picture. If your children (both step and birth) are old enough to participate in the conversation, consider spending some time with them discussing everyone's roles in their lives. One of Cathy's and James' worries when they came to live with us was that I was going to try to take their birth mom's place. It took me a while to figure out what the problem was, but I finally did. I talked to them both and let them know I had no intention of trying to replace their birth mother. There was no way I could-or would want to-replace her. I was an additional parental figure in their lives, not a substitute.

That conversation helped, but trust in that statement only came with time. I earned their trust with the little, day-to-day things. For instance, when birth mom called on the phone and asked to speak with one of the kids, I started calling them to the phone saying "Mom's on the phone for you" instead of "Carlina is on the phone." Subtle changes like that went a long way toward proving to the kids (and to Carlina) that I accepted and respected her place in their lives.

Every family situation is different. Luke's dad dropped out of our (Luke's and my) lives as soon as the divorce was final. From the time Luke was 18 months old, he never saw his dad. To this day we don't know where he is. In a way, his absence made things easier for me since Luke's dad and I didn' t have the constant struggle about support payments or about differing child-rearing philosophies. On the other hand, Luke missed out on the experience of having a father until Evan came into his life. As a father figure substitute, I made sure Luke was involved in a church youth group that had strong male influences, as well as being involved in Cub Scouts. But, those activities were a poor second to having a relationship with his birth father. Since we've been married, Evan has adopted Luke; figuratively and literally.

Defining who you are and clarifying everyone's role in the "family" can make blending seem more like preparing a favorite recipe and less like a science experiment (one that could blow at any moment).

Hint: Expect the Unexpected

When building a blended family, it helps to expect the unexpected. Flexibility can be a great virtue, and-luckily for me-it is also an attitude that can be learned. I am a very focused person who carefully considers a path before I go down it. At that point, I'm like a tank; not a lot of maneuverability, but great at knocking down obstacles. My tenacity, however, makes me seem inflexible. Because our lives are constantly effected by influences and schedules beyond our control, I have had to learn to be flexible. Take it from the voice of experience, in any marriage you need to be flexible. A second marriage only adds to the number of situations in which flexibility is advisable, if not necessary. If you remain flexible, the road will be smoother for you and your family; kids, spouses, ex-spouses, and new spouses included.

Building a Blended Family: 3. The Fine Art of Blending by Deb Lockwood

Have you ever made homemade gravy? When my mother was teaching me to cook, she told me if you didn't want lumps in the gravy (and lumps were considered a very bad thing), you couldn't just dump thickener into the hot liquid already in the pan. Instead, you put a little bit of that hot liquid from the pan in a cup and carefully blend the thickener into it using a whisk. Once the blended thickener in the cup was smooth and free of lumps, you slowly pour the thickener into the rest of the liquid that was in the pan, and voila - no lumps.

Even when I was first learning to cook, I realized that this gravy-making process was an art that would take patience and lots of practice to learn to do well. Blending families is also an art that takes patience and practice.

The purpose of blending anything is to combine the separate parts into an integrated whole. Our blended family started out as a bunch of "people-parts": mom, dad, step-dad, step-mom, step-sons, step-daughter, grandparents, step-grandparents. Everyone had their own identity, their own interests, their own needs and wants. My husband and I knew that we had to somehow blend our disjointed parts into one whole family. We also knew that parents have the most critical role in this blending process, since they have the whisk and get to stir!

One of our successes was making a conscious effort to identify everyone's strengths - what they were really good at already or things they had a propensity for. Once we had that knowledge, we asked that person to use their skill for the benefit of the whole family. For instance, our eldest son James has always been very artistic. Whenever the family needed a sign drawn or a picture made, we asked James for his help. Not only did James enjoy being the resident artistic expert, Evan (my husband) and I appreciated the fact that we could delegate those artistic projects to someone else.

Probably the lumpiest part of our blending experience has been Evan's and my differing parenting styles. We both had prior parenting experiences with different spouses, so we had different parenting behavior patterns. Plus, we each learned different parenting techniques from our own mothers and fathers while we were growing up. It took us quite a bit of time to figure out what we were going to do. All the while, we knew it was critical to the health of our blended family to show a united front.

Eventually we came to an agreement, but not without many, many discussions. In fact, these discussions still happen all the time. The difference now is the discussions happen out of habit instead of a conscious decision to confer.

If the answer to an issue is not obvious, we excuse ourselves from the family so our conversation stays private. We believe it is essential the children see us as a unit, not as two separate individuals who disagree. We discuss the issues and come to a consensus. When we make our decision, we find the appropriate child (or children) and tell them the decision.

Don't get me wrong - the children do have lots of leeway to plead their case when appropriate. My point is we don't let them in on the content of our parenting conversations. We want to leave them no room to "divide and conquer," playing one parent off the other. In our opinion, the children don 't need to know who was for or against a proposition. They just need to know what father and mother decided.

Okay, so how do you blend a family? Just like you make homemade gravy: patience, practice, and a really big whisk!

Building a Blended Family: 4. Looking Out For Emotional Landmines by Deb Lockwood

In our introduction, we mentioned that both Evan and I brought emotional baggage with us into our new marriage. The kind of baggage we're referring to leads to what we refer to as "emotional landmines". As anyone who has experience with landmines will tell you, they are extremely dangerous. One of their most lethal aspects is they are difficult to see because they are hidden just below the surface.

The first line of defense against a landmine is to expose it before it can explode. That is exactly what we hope to accomplish in this article. By exposing the emotional landmines that may be lurking just under your family' s emotional surface, you might be able to take action and disarm the landmine before it explodes.

There are several emotional landmines we have discovered that we'd like to expose for you.

(1) Misunderstanding

When blending a new family, you must learn to speak the same language. The biggest hint I can offer you - one parent to another - is to not be overly sensitive about what other family members say. I learned this one the hard way. At the beginning of the blending process, there will be misunderstandings. Make sure you ask your children and your new spouse clarifying questions: When you say this, what exactly do you mean? Most times, you will find that hurt feelings are caused by misunderstandings, rather than someone purposely being mean or spiteful. Make sure you keep the lines of communication open.

(2) Verbal cues

When Evan and I were dating, we reacted automatically to certain phrases or attitudes. For instance, something that Evan and I have recently discovered is that he looks for hidden meaning in what other people say. (That's probably a hold-over from his earlier training.) Anyway, I am a very up front kind of gal. There is little hidden meaning in anything I do or say because I do and say what I mean. Evan was always trying to drill down beneath the surface of what I said to see what I really meant. When he couldn't find anything, he would get frustrated. All the time I was oblivious that there was a problem. We've pretty much resolved the issue now, but it is still an automatic reaction that Evan has to be aware of.

(3) Not just adults

Something else we discovered in our blended family experience was parents are not the only ones bringing emotional baggage to a new family. In fact, the children are usually less able to handle this type of automatic reaction than adults. The best thing to do is to help your children understand a new family means you have to find a new place in that family. Circumstances and relationships aren't the same as they were. Make them feel as secure in your love as possible. That security goes a long way toward creating a calm household.

(4) It's my fault

A big landmine to watch for in your children is the "it's my fault" syndrome. In many divorces, the children feel their parent's break-up is their fault. They accept the guilt themselves. Watch out for this one and, again, reinforce your love.

(5) Will you fall out of love with me too?

One thing that I told Luke about my divorce is that my first husband and I did not love one another any more. When Luke was older, he asked "Will you fall out of love with me too Mommy?" That question tore my heart apart, but it had to be answered. I explained that a parent's love for their child is a different kind of love from a marriage. My advice: prepare yourself for that question and formulate your answer now, before that landmine blows up.

(6) Rivalry

Another emotional landmine: sibling rivalry. Sibling rivalry, however, is only one of several rivalries happening in your blended household. There will be rivalries for attention from parents, grandparents, friends, and ex-spouses. Each parent's birth children will also compete with the new spouse for attention.

We've exposed some of the landmines we discovered in our blended family experience. The most important thing is being aware landmines exist and preparing your responses and reactions before these landmines can damage your blended family.

Hint: Learn when to interfere and when to leave well enough alone.

Example #1: Evan is a rough and tumble kind of dad. He likes to tease the kids, which included bouts of tickling and rolling around on the floor. When we were first married, Evan tried to treat Luke in the same way he treated James and Cathy. Luke would get his feelings hurt or be offended because of Evan's rough-housing. Instead of barging in and stopping the play (which was my first inclination, by the way), I spoke privately with Evan and asked him to talk with Luke about the "play" time. After Luke understood that Evan was only playing, Luke began to really enjoy their play times together. In fact, most bouts then turned into a three (the kids) against one (dad) event.

Example #2: While folding laundry near our downstairs play room, I overheard an argument between the boys. Cathy was in the room too. I almost barged into the room to declare a truce, but something in my heart held me in check. After a minute, Cathy chimed in and very effectively negotiated a solution. By not stepping in to their dialogue, the three children were able to solidify their relationships with one another.

Hint: Pray for One Another!

There is no quicker solution for those having a problem with someone else than to pray for that person. I have found once I start praying, God changes my heart toward that other person. Because of those prayers and my changed heart, He gives me a renewed relationship with that person.

~~~

Step-Mother

The step-mother relationship is one of the trickiest there is.

Expect resentment from the kids. Paula, a new step-mother, knows that the children resent her, because she has "replaced" their mother in their father's eyes. Because Paula is younger than their mother Heather (as is often the case), the kids continue to feel betrayed on behalf of Heather. However, if the children want their father, Scott, to be happy, and if they think Paula is a good person who will make him happy, then they may end up welcoming her.

Don't try to replace their mother. Paula knows well enough not to attempt to replace Heather, the children's mother. She does not compete with Heather, speaks well of Heather, and cooperates with Heather as much as she possibly can. The children appreciate those things.

Challenges of parenting. For a younger child, Paula sometimes finds herself in the role of having to be a parent. The children are visiting, Scott is working, and Paula is preparing meals or supervising homework. This is extremely tricky terrain. Paula tries to uphold existing standards set by Scott and Heather. Paula will be more parental, and have more success being parental, the younger are the children, the closer in age she is to Scott, and the more the children stay with Scott and Paula.

Challenges of an adolescent. It sometimes happens that the new spouse is only ten years or so older than the oldest child. In this case, the step-mother is tempted to become a buddy with the oldest child. This is fine, to a point. The adolescent girl may even feel more comfortable sharing details of her social life that she can not share with her mother. But this has to be a one way street. The step-mother should not share intimate details with her step-daughter.

Challenges of new children. If Scott and Paula have another child, the older children will feel very left out. Scott will tend to be very focused on this new child, as, of course, will Paula. Scott has to work very hard to be sure to continue to make the older children feel wanted and loved.

Challenges of the ex-spouse. Because of the marriage, Heather now has a "family"-type relationship with Paula. The more Heather can put aside all her emotions toward Paula and work with her for the good of the children, the better off the children will be. Some couples that are bound together this way are actually reasonably cordial toward each other -- although this is much less likely where the man had dated the second wife during his first marriage. Heather must work hard to refrain from trying to find out about Scott's new marriage. But if she manages it, everyone will probably be happier as a result.

Husband gets in the middle. Scott is now in the middle. Often he's the referee, between Paula, who wants the kids to eat their vegetables (for example), and the kids who don't. It's a no-win situation for Scott, as he can't afford to alienate either side. The best Scott can do is to call them as he sees them, then talk it over separately with the "losing" side afterward, basically to assure them of his continuing love.

[Source Unknown].

~~~

Step-father

When Kimberley marries Arnold, Arnold becomes a step-father.

Be ready for trouble with boys. Kimberley's daughter is more amenable to a new stepfather than is the son. Boys strongly resent the new man "replacing" their father. The son may also be reacting against the new man replacing him as the man of the house, and replacing his relationship with his mother. It's the Oedipal reaction again.

Attraction to daughters. Step-fathers often find themselves attracted to the adolescent daughters of their new wives. Arnold finds Helene attractive.

He's not sure whether he's allowed to admit it to himself. He's tempted to react by severely limiting her social life, to show her that he's against any sort of adolescent social activity. But he instead lets himself be guided by Kimberley. He does admit the attraction to himself, but he keeps it to himself. Sometimes, he wants to pick a fight with Helene, just to prove that he's not attracted to her. But he does not do that, either. Ease into discipline. Arnold's position is ambiguous. As a man, he thinks he should be the key disciplinarian. But the children are virtual strangers to him. He's unsure of his role. And he is wondering how good a parent he will be to these children. Some men react to these uncertainties by jumping into the role of strict disciplinarian right away. Arnold makes what is usually a better decision: he decides to ease into it. At first, he lets Kimberley continue to make and enforce the rules, as she has been doing. Then, very gradually, as he gets to know the children and understand what they need, he may assume some responsibilities. He knows that it's better to never get there than to jump in too soon.

Develop separate relationships with the children. Arnold knows that the children have to develop a separate relationship with him. At first, he is just a man who happens to love their mother and happens to live with them. But, through a thousand tiny loving and helping transactions with the children, he builds a separate relationship with the children. Only then does he will become a part of their family, in their eyes.

[Source Unknown].

~~~

A 'blended' family or stepfamily faces many challenges. Stepfamily members have experienced important losses. They have limited shared family histories or shared ways of doing things, and they may have very different beliefs. As with any achievement, developing good stepfamily relationships requires a lot of effort.

According to adolescent mental health specialists, a young person may feel torn between the parents he or she lives with, and the "divorced" parent who lives somewhere else. In addition, newly married couples may not have enough time alone to adjust to their new relationship. If these challenges are faced creatively, members of the "blended" family can help build strong bonds among themselves through:

Mourning their losses

Developing new skills in making decisions as a family

Fostering and strengthening new relationships between parents, as well as step parent-to-step child and step sibling-to-stepsibling

Supporting one anotherin maintaining original parent-child relationships

While facing these issues may be difficult, most stepfamilies do work out their problems by consulting grandparents, clergy, support groups and other community based programs. Parents experiencing difficulties might find it helpful to seek outside support, when any family member feels alone dealing with the losses, torn between two parents or two households, excluded, isolated by feelings of guilt and anger, unsure about what is right, or uncomfortable with any member of the original family or stepfamily.

The following signs, if they are lasting or persistent, also suggest the need for outside help:

The child vents his or her anger upon a particular family member

One of the parents suffers from great stress and is unable to help with the young person'sincreased needs and anger

A stepparent or parent openly favors one of the children, or a young person resents a stepparent or parent.

Only the natural parent, not the stepparent, is able to be influential in disciplining the young person.

Any member of the family gets no enjoyment from normally pleasurable activities such as learning, going to school, working, playing, or being with friends or family

Most stepfamilies, when given the needed time to work on developing their own traditions and to form new relationships, can provide emotionally rich and lasting relationships for the adults, and help the adolescents develop the self-esteem and strength to enjoy the challenges of life.

[Source unknown].

~~~

Good Internet Resources (I am indebted to all of these for some of the wisdom shared above. If any material has been quoted at length, acknowledgement of the source has been made).

http://www.blendedfamily.com/blendedfamily/resources.html http://dmoz.org/Home/Family/Parenting/Step_Parenting/ http://www.parentsplace.com/family/stepfamilies/ http://www.cyfc.umn.edu/Parenting/parentlink.html http://parenthood.library.wisc.edu/Bliss/Bliss.html http://kidshealth.org/teen/mind_matters/feelings/blended_families.html http://boards.parentsoup.com/messages/get/psblended51.html http://members.yahoo.com/interests/blended_families-1600042071 http://boards2.parentsplace.com/messages/get/ppblendedfamilies11.html http://www.thefamilycorner.com/services/experts.shtml http://www.split-up.com/splitgen/sp/gn/newrelationships.htm

Blended Families' webring: http://www.blendedfamily.com/blendedfamily/blendring.html

And even a website for special Blended Families' Greeting Cards - http://www.sbbink.com/

~~~

ISSUES FOR DISCUSSION

Select any or all from the following:

1. Have sitcoms like The Brady Bunch help us cope with the realities of blended families - or discouraged us?

2. List some ways to reassure children - your own, and step-children - that they are loved.

3. What are some "blended family bonding experiences"? IOne blended family's list: camping trips, vacations, rock climbing adventures, sailing and general stuff that "the guys" can do together. What are yours?

4. How do you teach children about loving people you don't like?

5. Is it wise for a step-parent to disclose to a step-child that they don't 'like' him or her?

6. Chores: what's the best approach? How should chores match the age-level, gender, and special abilities of the child? How should chores be negotiated with children - together with 'consequences'?

7. 'Pocket-money should never be given to children for doing jobs around the house. That's part of their privilege/ responsibility in belonging to a community.' Do you agree? Discuss some of the wisdom about how much money to give to children, when, for what?

8. The tidiness question: some children are better organized with their things than others. How do you figure out the guidelines here? At what age do teenagers become totally responsible for the tidiness/cleanliness of their room?

9. The Bible has little or nothing to teach us about blended families as such. But share the age-tested principles from the Scriptures which guide us here...

Rowland Croucher

LIVING WITH AMBIGUITY

My thoughts are not your thoughts and your ways are not my ways, declares Yahweh. For the heavens are as high above earth as my ways are above your ways, my thoughts above your thoughts. We know only imperfectly... When I was a child, I used to talk like a child, and see things as a child does, and think like a child; but now that I have become an adult, I have finished with childish ways. Now we see only reflections in a mirror, mere riddles... Now I can know only imperfectly. The marriage relationship is doubtless a great mystery, but I am speaking of something deeper still - the marriage of Christ and his Church. So, then, where does that leave the wise? or the scholars? or the skilful debaters of this world? God has shown that this world's wisdom is foolishness! How great are God's riches! How deep are his wisdom and knowledge! Who can explain his decisions? Who can understand his ways? As the scripture says, 'Who knows the mind of the Lord? Who is able to give him advice? Who has ever given him anything, so that he had to pay it back?' For all things were created by him, and all things exist through him and for him. To God be the glory for ever! Amen.
(Isaiah 55:8,9, JB; 1 Corinthians 13:11, JB; Ephesians 5:32, JBP; 1 Corinthians 1:20, GNB, Romans 11:33-36, GNB)

~~~

God is mystery. We can never encompass him in thoughts or words. When we talk about God we are trying to describe the divine from the point of view of the human, the eternal from the standpoint of the temporal, the infinite in finite terms, the absolute from the severely limited perspective of the relative. Rudolf Otto describes the sacred as 'mysterium tremendum et fascinans', the awe-inspiring mystery which fascinates us. We are tempted to hide from the fearful majesty of God, but also to gaze in wonder at his loveliness. We encounter mystery in the descriptions of the ways of God in the Bible, in the sacraments, liturgies and rites of the church, in nature, and in the events of history. Mystery pervades the whole of reality. Indeed true knowledge and freedom are not possible without an experience of mystery. In the languages of literature, art, music, we touch the hem of God's garment and feel a little tingle of power, but God will always remain incomprehensible. Mystery also surrounds the human creatures who are both made in the image of a mysterious God and who have, by their sinning, marred that image. Pascal says this doctrine of the fall offends us, but yet, without this mystery, the most incomprehensible of all, we are incomprehensible to ourselves. So Christianity, says Kierkegaard, is 'precisely the paradoxical'. (Paradox - from the Greek para and doxa, 'against opinion'). The idea of mystery invites us to think more deeply, not to abandon thinking; to reject the superficial, and the simplistic. Prejudice is, in essence, idolatry: the worship of my - or my group's - ideas, even ideas of God. If I know all the answers I would be God, and 'playing God' is the essence of idolatry. One of my greatest dangers is to relax my vigilance against the possibility of prejudice in my own life, or to suffer from the delusion that I can ever be really free from it. We human beings are more rationalizing than rational. Thomas Merton said somewhere 'No one is so wrong as the one who knows all the answers'. Alfred North Whitehead says 'Religions commit suicide when they find their inspiration in their dogmas.' 'If you understand everything, you must be misinformed', runs a Japanese proverb. People who are always right are always wrong. The dilemma is summed up by W B Yeats - 'While the best lack conviction, the worst are full of certainty and passionate intensity.' The key lies in distinguishing between faithless doubt and creative doubt. Faithless doubt, as Kahlil Gibran put it, 'is a pain too lonely to realize that faith is his twin brother'. Or it is a cop-out to save us being committed to anything. Its accomplice, 'neutrality' is also evil: the apathy of 'good' persons results in the triumph of evil. The worst evils in the world are not committed by evil people, but by good people who do not know they are not doing good. The authentic Christian is willing to listen, as well as to save. Creative doubt, on the other hand, is 'believing with all your heart that your belief is true, so that it will work for you; but then facing the possibility that it is really false, so that you can accept the consequences of the belief.' (John Reseck). So faith is not about certainty (certainty makes faith invalid and unnecessary). Its core is the mystery - and the reality - of the Eternal coming into time: 'Our God contracted to a span, incomprehensibly made man' (Wesley). The essence of Christianity is not dogmatic systems of belief, but being apprehended by Christ. True faith holds on to Christ, and for all else is uncommitted. It is about a relationship with Christ (and all meaningful relationships involve risk). The true God does not give us an immutable belief-system, but himself. He became one of us to 'make his light shine in our hearts, to bring us the knowledge of God's glory shining in the face of Christ' (2 Corinthians 4:6). Alleluia!

~~~

The essential difference between orthodox Christianity and the various heretical systems is that orthodoxy is rooted in paradox. Heretics, as Irenaeus saw, reject paradox in favour of a false clarity and precision. But true faith can only grow and mature if it includes the elements of paradox and creative doubt. Hence the insistence of orthodoxy that God cannot be known by the mind, but is known in the obscurity of faith, in the way of ignorance, in the darkness. Such doubt is not the enemy of faith but an essential element within it. For faith in God does not bring the false peace of answered questions and resolved paradoxes. Rather, it can be seen as a process of 'unceasing interrogation'. Kenneth Leach, True God

'Stage 5' faith involves going beyond explicit ideological systems and clear boundaries of identity; accepting that truth is multidimensional and organically independent than most theories or accounts of truth can grasp; symbols, stories, doctrines and liturgies are inevitably partial, limited to a particular experience of God and incomplete. This position [ie. that an appreciation of mystery and ambiguity is the essence of maturity] implies no lack of commitment to one's own truth tradition. Nor does it mean a wishy-washy neutrality or mere fascination with the exotic features of alien cultures... Rather, each genuine perspective will augment and correct aspects of the other, in a mutual movement toward the real and the true. James Fowler, Stages of Faith

I believe, because it is absurd;... it is certain, because it is impossible. Tertullian Nicolas of Cusa expressed what the human heart had always surmised: all opposites coincide in God. This insight has weighty implications for any attempt to speak about divine realities. The closer we come to saying something worthwhile, the more likely that paradox will be the only way to express it. 'When I am weak, then I am strong' (2 Corinthians 12:10). 'In losing one's life one will find it' (Matthew 10:39). 'In spite of that, we call this Friday good' (T.S.Eliot, Four Quartets). David Steindl-Rast, Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer

Most of us find it very easy to hurl an epithet or fashion a label. We like to smooth out wrinkles, sand down rough edges, simplify the mysteries that are threatening precisely because they defy categorization. There is certainly enough confusion in our lives, we reason. Shouldn't it facilitate our day to day living if we are clear on what is good or bad, who is left or right, what is profound or drivel? The fact is that those who have attempted to nail down or write off mystery end up 'undone' by the very pride which led them to play God in the first place... the Pharisees did not rest until they had nailed an upstart dissenter to a tree. Donald J. Foran, Living with Ambiguity

If you want to attempt to travel through life without trouble, believe everything (be gullible) or believe nothing (be cynical), and don't be committed to anything (be 'neutral'). Source Unknown

Whilst we might deplore [any] lack of openness to any new thing God is doing, nevertheless this is the psychology of the human creatures God has made. Those whose thinking is rooted in 'simplicity this side of complexity' must not be too harsh with others who enjoy 'complexity the other side of simplicity'. Ideally, we are all moving towards 'simplicity the other side of complexity', but we must be patient with one another on the way there. Rowland Croucher, Recent Trends Among Evangelicals

There's a wideness in God's mercy,
Like the wideness of the sea:
There's a kindness in his justice,
Which is more than liberty.

For the love of God is broader
Than the measures of man's mind:
And the heart of the Eternal
Is most wonderfully kind.

But we make his love too narrow
By false limits of our own;
And we magnify his strictness
With a zeal he will not own.

F. W. Faber

The ultimate gift of conscious life is a sense of the mystery that encompasses it. Lewis Mumford

The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. Albert Einstein

If they [the ministers of the church] had no doubts, they would hardly be very good Christians, because the intellectual life is as ambiguous as the moral life... The element of doubt is an element of faith itself... What the church should do is to accept someone who says that the faith for which the church stands is a matter of one's ultimate concern... Dogma should not be abolished but interpreted in such a way that it is no longer a suppressive power which produces dishonesty or flight. Paul Tillich, A History of Christian Thought

At ebb tide I wrote
A line upon the sand
And gave it all my heart
And all my soul.

At flood tide I returned
To read what I had inscribed
And found my ignorance upon the shore

Kahlil Gibran

~~~

Lord God, the God of security and the enemy of security too; I come to you, confused, needing the reassurance of your gracious acceptance; broken, needing your healing - or else the promise of your presence; thirsting for reality, to the Fountain of life; desolate, yearning for a loving touch as from a Parent. Help me to love you above everything else; to trust your goodness when I do not understand your ways; to affirm your constancy in spite of my fickleness; my times are in your hands.

Eternal God, the light of the minds that know you, the joy of the hearts that love you, and the strength of the wills that serve you; grant that I may know you, that I may truly love you, and so to love you that I may fully serve you, whom to serve is perfect freedom, in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (St. Augustine of Hippo)

In this day, may my thoughts, words and deeds betray a little more of your image in me, less of the influence of the world, the flesh and the devil, so that all I meet I shall treat as Christ and be as Christ to them. Amen.

~~~

A Benediction

Knowing the love of Christ, which is beyond knowledge, [may] you be filled with the utter fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:19, JB)

~~~

(St. Augustine of Hippo, adapted from a prayer in Tony Castle (comp.), The Hodder Book of Christian Prayers, Hodder and Stoughton, 1986, p.18 Rowland Croucher, Recent Trends Among Evangelicals, Albatross, 1986, p.40 Albert Einstein, 'The World As I See It', quoted in Melvin Konner, The Tangled Wing: Biological Constraints on the Human Spirit, Heinemann, 1982, p.431 F.W.Faber, 'There's a wideness in God's mercy', The Baptist Hymn Book, London: Psalms and Hymns Trust, 1964, no. 419 Donald J. Foran, Living With Ambiguity: Discerning God in a Complex Society, Alba House, 1971, p. xvi James Fowler, Stages of Faith, Dove, 1981, pp. 186-7 Kahlil Gibran, quoted in James L. Christian, Philosophy: An Introduction to the Art of Wondering, Hold Rinehart, 1981, p.203 Kenneth Leech, True God: An exploration in spiritual theology, Sheldon Publishers, 1987, p. 25 Lewis Mumford, 'Orientation to Life', The Conduct of Life, 1951, quoted in The International Thesaurus of Quotations, comp. R.T.Tripp, Harper & Row, 1970, p.105 Blaise Pascal, Pensees, Brunschwig ed., # 434. John Reseck, quoted in James L. Christian, Philosophy: An Introduction to the Art of Wondering, Hold Rinehart, 1981, p. 195 David Steindl-Rast, Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer, Paulist, 1984, p.210 Tertullian, quoted in Stanley Romaine Hopper, 'Paradox' in Arthur Cohen and Marvin Halverson, (eds.), A Handbook of Christian Theology, Abingdon, 1958, p.261. Paul Tillich, A History of Christian Thought, SCM, 1968, p.xvi.)

Rowland Croucher

John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization

QUOTABLE QUOTES from John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization, Penguin, 1997.

I remember as a graduate student reading Fullbright's 'The Arrogance of Power' and saying 'Yes, yes' aloud right through the book.

Some key quotes from John Ralston Saul:

# If economists were doctors, they would today be mired in malpractice suits.

# Cicero: 'He who does not know history is destined to remain a child'.

# Socrates was executed not for saying what things were or should be, but for seeking practical indications of where some reasonable approximation of truth might be. He was executed not for his megalomania or grandiose propositions or certitudes, but for stubbornly doubting the absolute truths of others.

# People become so obsessed by hating government that they forget it is meant to be their government and is the only powerful public force that have purchase on.

# In general, democracy and individualism have advanced in spite of and often against specific economic interest. Both democracy and individualism have been based upon financial sacrifice, not gain. Even in Athens, a large part of the 7,000 citizens who participated regularly in assemblies were farmers who had to give up several days' work to go into town to talk and listen.

# Whenever governments adopt a moral tone -- as opposed to an ethical one -- you know something is wrong.

# Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants, it is the creed of slaves. William Pitt, House of Commons, 18 November 1783.

# Criticism is perhaps the citizen's primary weapon in the exercise of her legitimacy. That is why, in this corporatist society, conformism, loyalty and silence are so admired and rewarded; why criticism is so punished or marginalized.

# The Third World debt crisis is now $1.5 trillion…

# Every day currency traders move $1 trillion around the world. Money markets, unrelated to financing real activity are pure inflation. The unregulated money markets have now given us over twenty years of crisis, instability, gratuitous speculation and no real growth.

# 'We've had a hundred years of psychotherapy and things are getting worse' (James Hillman and Michael Ventura).

# The cost of the managerial superstructure is now far too heavy for the producing substructure.

# It seems to me that a sensible list of the human qualities would run as follows: common sense, creativity or imagination, ethics (not morality), intuition or instinct, memory, and, finally, reason. ...these qualities cannot be defined usefully, but only as abstractions, which they are not. ... These qualities are the basic tools of humanity. In more aggressive verbiage, they are our weapons for use in what can only be described as a constant war against ideology.

# The virtue of uncertainty is not a comfortable idea, but then a citizen-based democracy is built upon participation, which is the very expression of permanent discomfort. The corporatist system depends upon the citizen's desire for inner comfort. Equilibrium is dependent upon our recognition of reality, which is the acceptance of permanent psychic discomfort. And the acceptance of psychic discomfort is the acceptance of consciousness

# The acceptance of corporatism causes us to deny and undermine the legitimacy of the individual as citizen in a democracy. The result of such a denial is a growing imbalance which leads to our adoration of self-interest and our denial of the public good.

# Socrates: 'Let no day pass without discussing goodness.'

# No Western population has been asked to choose corporatism, let alone demanded it. It simply creeps up on us, a bit more every day… It would be impossible for the corporatist structure ever to reward or admire criticism.

# The money used to produce a 20 second spot for McDonald's would finance hours of television programming. Propaganda is therefore the purpose. Content is the frill or decoration.

# And Socrates again: 'If I say I cannot 'mind my own business' you will not believe that I am serious. If on the other hand I tell you that to let no day pass without discussing goodness and all the other subjects about which you hear me talking and that examining both myself or others is really the very best thing a man can do and that life without this sort of examination is not worth living, you will be even less inclined to believe me. Nevertheless, gentlemen, that is how it is.'

Rowland Croucher

March 1999

Robyn Davidson: No Fixed Address: Nomads and the Fate of the Planet

Robyn Davidson: No Fixed Address: Nomads and the Fate of the Planet

'Quarterly Essay' is an Australian journal which features a 25,000-word essay, plus correspondence. Prominent Australians like Robert Manne, Mungo MacCallum and David Malouf have written previous essays.

This one (Issue 24, 2006) features well-known social anthropologist, traveler and raconteur Robyn Davidson, who first came to fame with her book 'Tracks', the account of her epic journey across the Australian desert with four camels, back in the 1970s. She says she has lived with nomadic peoples on and off for thirty years: in this story she shares the joys and privations of a small clan of Tibetan nomadic pastoralists.

Our time as 'Homo sapiens sapiens' (the wisest of the wise) began about 200,000 years ago, but we have lived in settlements for less than 10,000 of those years. Now fewer than about 0.001 per cent of us are true hunters and gatherers (though there's an increasing number of human-wanderers who live that way because they're rich).

Robyn Davidson is something of a romantic, but with good reason: she says nomads care for the earth better than anyone else; they're comfortable with uncertainty and contradiction, cosmopolitan in outlook, and are less concerned with the accumulation of wealth than with accumulating knowledge. And they are more tolerant and adaptable than the rest of us.

It's a good read, just 50 pages, interesting, empathic (her word) and wise.

-- --

Shalom! Rowland Croucher

January 2, 2007

http://jmm.aaa.net.au

One God: The Deity Revealed in Jesus

Book Review: Peter Cotterell, One God: The Deity Revealed in Jesus, Spring Harvest, 2006.

Peter Cotterell, says the hard-to-read mauve-on-purple print on the back cover.... ahh I can't read it anyway. The London School of Theology website says his distinguished career includes 19 years lecturing at London School of Theology, where he also served as Principal, and 23 on the mission field in Ethiopia, where he founded the Ethiopian Graduate School of Theology. His publications in Linguistics, Missiology, Islam and Communications total 17 books.

The phrase 'mission field' connotes 'conservative evangelical', and yes, Peter is one of those. This little book, comparing and contrasting the 'essential/historic' Christian view of God with the beliefs of other major religions is an easy read, even though the author is discussing some big, and sometimes complex, ideas. He writes irenically, with lots of quotes from here and there, and, on the whole produces an excellent introduction to comparative religions from a Christian perspective. Being 'conservative evangelical' the book is strong on Western classical views of, say, the Atonement, and is also therefore fairly weak on social justice/love; strong on ideas, weak on stories, (though the one about the Ethiopian debt-collector is a beauty, p. 93).

Dr. Cotterell begins with a chapter about the 'meaninglessness of life' and Why we Need God. Life isn't fair, people break the rules and get away with it, and though the UN has a Universal Declaration of Human Rights which most countries signed, it isn't universal: Saudi Arabia isn't a signatory because they believe Islam does not give Muslims the right to change their religion. And in countries which did sign, those rights are trampled on all over the place... In such a world is it surprising that the number of atheists has grown (according to Barrett and Johnson) from 226,000 in 1900 to 107 million in 2004?

Where is God when a Tsunami or Auschwitz happens? Did God plan those things? 'The Muslim answer is "Yes, Allah did." The Christian answer is, "No, Yahweh didn't".' (p. 22). This 'either/or / yes/no' polemic is common: 'Either Jesus did die on the cross (and the Bible is right) or else he did not die on the cross (and the Qur'an is right).' (p. 35). Cotterell says he prefers 'credible answers' (p. 53) to, presumably, living with unanswered questions. Which is why it's important for him when discussing the Qur'an to underline the Islamic notion of 'abrogation': 'Allah can abrogate, cancel out a verse of the Qur'an already given, and replace it with something else'... [thus]Muslims 'can show from the Qur'an both that it teaches peace and that it teaches war' (p. 61). All this is clear enough for a beginner, but a more mature thinker will want to know if/whether the Christian Bible doesn't do the same thing - with a warrior-God in the Old Testament (and the Book of Revelation) contrasted with a peace-loving Jesus. And whether the paradigm-shift of accepting Gentiles into the Christian Church without their having to submit to Jewish laws isn't also an example of 'abrogation'...

Cotterell quotes John-Paul II (1994) with approval: 'There is no room [in Islam] for the Cross and the resurrection. Jesus is mentioned, but only as a prophet... not only the theology but also the anthropology of Islam is very distant from Christianity' (p. 70).

The author's conservative evangelical credentials are everywhere. For example: 'In Jesus we had God incarnate, God in human flesh' (p. 71); 'Jesus was not just a prophet, not just a remarkable teacher, in fact not just a man, but God come to us as a man, come to die for the sins of the world' (p. 86). What does the death of Christ mean? For Cotterell, there are eight dimensions: ransom, redemption, expiation, propitiation, atonement, sacrifice, reconciliation, and substitution. My response: all of these are 'classical Western' theories, but it can be argued that in the New Testament there are two other dimensions which are equally, if not more important: the death of Christ as a demonstration of the love of God, and of the victory of God (see http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/9638.htm ).

After examining all of the 'great religions' - Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Traditional Religions - Cotterell offers (after Eric Sharpe) four dimensions of religious belief and practice - existential, institutional, intellectual and ethical. He then suggests three approaches to them from a Christian viewpoint (after Lesslie Newbiggin and others) - pluralist ('all religions can save'), inclusivist (all religions do save), and exclusivist (his own, of course - 'religions other than Christianity are human constructions... and cannot lead their followers to salvation') (p. 107).

The book ends with a discussion of the best way to 'do dialogue', and makes this important point: 'We have been quick to apologize to the Muslim world for what so-called Christians did in the Crusades, although we have been less ready to own up to our mistreatment of the Jews' (p. 115). He re-tells the best story for Muslim-Christian dialogue - that of St Francis visiting Egypt during the Fifth Crusade in 1219, 'not to fight but to talk about Jesus'... 'Just after his meeting with St Francis, the Sultan ordered the release of some 30,000 Christian prisoners, and commanded that they should be treated with respect...' (p. 117).

Which suggests that if we too treat others with deep respect, despite our ideological/theological differences, we're more likely to celebrate an outcome like this one.

In the 'Did You Know?' category:

* 'If David Barrett and Tod Johnson are right there were 167,000 Christian martyrs in 2004' (p. 13).

* [According to John Polkinghorne, previously Professor of Mathematical Physics at Cambridge, now retired and an Anglican minister]: 'If I took a target an inch wide and placed it on the other side of the observable universe, eighteen thousand million light years away, and took aim and hit the target, then I would have attained an accuracy of one in 10 [with superscript/to the power of 60]'. Cotterill notes: 'But this incredible balance is necessary if on the one hand stars are to form and on the other hand the entire universe is not simply to collapse back in on itself before anything interesting could emerge from it' (p. 28).

* 'We can date [the modern worldwide reawakening of Islam] from Gamal Abdul Nasser and his resistance in 1957 to France, Britain and Israel when they attempted to take over the Suez Canal. He became a hero to the Muslim world' (p. 65).

* [After Constantine's conversion to Christianity] 'Christians were not merely allowed in the Roman army: *only* Christians were allowed in the army' (p. 71).

It's a good read, and especially recommended for new/young Christians and others who want a clear outline of the differences between Christianity and other faiths. See http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17938.htm for a review of a similar book, by Dr. Mark Durie, and http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17630.htm for an important article 'Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God?'

Copies of Dr Peter Cotterell's book are available at http://bookshop.ridley.unimelb.edu.au/bookweb/ (AUD $17-50).

Rowland Croucher

September 12, 2006.

http://jmm.aaa.net.au/

Pastors-in-transition

Hi friends,


Here's a summary of my thinking about pastors-in-transition, written mainly from an Australian (Victorian) perspective. It's too long and yet too brief, and off the top of my head. There are many other angles on all this.


~~~


# A Baptist ex-pastor in another state thought his credentials were current, and happened to come across a Baptist Union Yearbook - to discover his name was not there! No contact from anyone, no phone call, no pastoral care...


# An Australian Pentecostal pastor's ministry was terminated by a church meeting and a phone call on Sunday, and on Monday an elder called to his home to arrange for him to hand over the manse keys. No farewell, no thanks, no holiday pay, nothing.


# Reverend Joe served two rural churches, but both pastorates ended badly. He asked to be put on the Baptist Union's 'list' for another pastorate. The meetings of the Union's 'settlement committee' came and went and Joe's name would come up each time. But there wasn't a 'suitable' church. (One of the members of that committee said to me, 'We have to be efficient, because there's always a lot of business each month. But these names... they're people! This is their vocation, their job, we're talking about. We don't pray for them except generally when we 'bless the meeting' in a pious way, or even meet some of them. They're mostly just names. I feel very uneasy about the whole process.'). I'd met Joe when I preached at the Baptist church he attended. We made a time to talk - at the local McDonald's. He got there early and was waiting for me, with a cup of coffee. (I learned later he found a used styrofoam cup, and asked for a 'refill', as he couldn't admit to me that he was penniless). His wife was supporting them both with some 'agency nursing', but her health was not good, and she could only do about two shifts a week. After mortgage payments, and other bills, they had about $50 a week for food. He couldn't find a job - and his old trade wasn't a possibility any more. (More of this story - http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/2039.htm )




In some of our older church buildings there's an honour roll dedicated to the memory of those who've fallen in battle. But if you're wounded in the pastorate, you're often left to die, sometimes all alone. Occasionally not even your comrades-in-ministry will call you. (About half of all Baptist ex-pastors tell me they had no significant contact from their peers when they left pastoral ministry...). The majority of those who are no longer in parish/pastoral ministry, whether by choice, or because their ministry was prematurely terminated, walk a lonely road...


Pastoral ministry, commenced with high ideals and expectations, had become a source of stress, had caused a lowering of self-confidence, and a sense of powerlessness for over half of the 243 ex-parish pastors who responded to our John Mark Ministries questionnaire. And yet many would identify with the person who said, 'but my "sense of call" remained; [I] felt guilty that I could not fulfil my calling.'


About 20% of ex-pastors in parish settlements left to move into another career (either within their denomination, a para-church organisation or a secular position). One-quarter of these have done so without hurt, conflict, loss of health, or plain boredom, being their underlying motivation. The few can say, 'I had enjoyed a total of 15 years of parish ministry and I felt ready for a new challenge in ministry', or saw the move into another vocation as the natural next step because of the gifts and the expertise that they possessed. Many more would say something like, 'I was "burnt-out". God gave me a way out - I was tired of fighting unproductive battles...'


PASTORS AND CONFLICT


The most significant reason for leaving (for about half of the sample) is conflict. This conflict may be with local lay leaders, colleagues in the parish, members of the congregation, or denominational leaders. Conflict with local church leaders (lay and other pastors) is mentioned as one of the most significant factors in the actual decision to leave by one quarter of all respondents, and difficult relationships with denominational leaders by approx. 20%. When this is combined with the fact that half of the ex-pastors surveyed have felt a lack of support/encouragement in the pastorate, this raises serious questions about the quality of community in many of our churches. The ex-pastor is often left with intense feelings of failure, anger, a sense of betrayal (not only by others, but also by God), resentment, guilt and shame. These can take many years for the pastor, the pastor's spouse and teenage or adult children to work through to a point of healing - if it ever happens.


SPOUSE/FAMILY ISSUES


Spouse/family issues are often significant in the decision to leave the pastorate. Problems in the marriage relationship are mentioned specifically by 13.5% of respondents, 10% of spouses have had problems accepting the lifestyle, and 16% mention family problems. Factor analysis of the various factors operating when pastors leave parish ministry has shown a definite clustering around the questions relating to spouse, family, housing, finance and mobility. When these factors are considered together, the significance of the pastor's personal relationships would appear to be important for about a third of those who decide to leave the pastorate. A regular response in the questonnaires is the felt need 'to spend more time with my wife and family'. Adultery on the part of the pastor is the sole reason for leaving for some of our respondents. Sadly, this often occurs when the pastoral ministry has been progressing effectively. One perceptive ex-pastor for whom adultery and the subsequent break-down of his marriage had been the key issue said: 'The inability of the church to deal with my situation, the closing off from expression/acknowledgement of issues relating to sexuality and lack of opportunity for support/examination or reflection to help me was significant.'


'SELF' AND HEALTH


These two issues recur as very significant reasons in the decision to leave the parish. 'Self', including a loss of self-confidence, inability to continue to cope, and awareness of weaknesses, is the most often given reason for leaving. Health factors (often associated with stress/burnout) is the third reason given (after self and conflict with local church leaders). It would be very wrong to assume that the third of pastors who acknowledge self as a factor in their decision were unsuited to the pastoral ministry. (There are a few for whom this is so.) Many ex-pastors (about 40%) have good self-knowledge, and have learnt through their experience. One ex-pastor said: 'Some of my inter-personal skills needed attention', and many have sought counseling help to look at themselves.


Only 4% of the respondents returned to the pastorate.


WHERE TO FROM HERE?


In an ideal world, the 'marriage' of church and pastor ought to be 'for better and for worse, for richer and for poorer'. But we do not live in an ideal world. Sometimes divorce is the only option when this important relationship breaks down. Today, it's both easier and harder to be a pastor - and indeed any sort of church leader. It is easier for pastors because there are so many resources available to help him/her do a professional job. (See for example, 'The Professional Pastor' in Paul Beasley-Murray's 'A Call to Excellence', Hodder & Stoughton, 1995). But it's harder for both pastors and church leaders primarily because churches are becoming more specific in their performance-expectations of their pastor, and more likely to initiate a termination if the pastor doesn't meet those expectations. In a world of 'performance standards' or even 'downsizing', executives these days are disposable.


No one wins when a church feels forced to terminate the services of a pastoral leader. In many (most?) instances, not all church members favor the action or the process and tempers flare and often times a church split results. If forced terminations become the "norm" for a church, there is negative witness in the community, and sometimes that church gets a 'name' for crucifying its pastors.


My counseling of 'pastors in transition' has led me to believe that a major component of their conflict has to do with unresolved childhood issues. Some bristle at this suggestion, but I can only report what I have learned from the stories of hundreds of these people. When the media asks 'Why are there so many ex-pastors?', I now respond: 'There are 41 discrete answers they give to the question "Why did you leave?" A list of those responses can be found at http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/2001.htm . Second, the _occasion_ of leaving was often conflict of some kind - usually with powerful people in the local church. But I think we then have to ask: "What causes those conflicts?" And the broad answer to that question might suggest reasons associated with a mismatch of expectations and reality, but beneath all that is the inability to get along with others because of unfinished business in various people's lives - the pastors' and/or the leaders'...


A significant number of ex-pastors don't 'attend church' for short or long periods - or ever. And many who do attend as 'laypeople' do so for the sake of their children. And they generally can't express their hurt and anger: anger is a most misunderstood emotion, and poorly handled in the vast majority of Christian contexts... (more on that below).


Many cannot easily find another vocation: the one they left to enter pastoral ministry might not exist any more. There are financial problems - particularly if they do not own their own home. The families suffer from geographical dislocation. The spouses and children often become angry with the church - and this causes issues of loss-of-faith for many.


OUTSIDERS


So what can be done? First, let's note the biblical precedent of Barnabas relating to Saul of Tarsus and to John Mark - two 'outsiders' who had very different reactions to their life-situations. Can you hear good Christian folks saying to Barnabas: 'Saul? Don't touch him. He's trouble!' 'John Mark? He's a loser: the mission is more important than one individual...'


The Barnabas option is time-consuming, and emotionally demanding. So the church-as-institution often follows the easy road. When ex-pastors say to me 'The denominational leaders didn't help, I was viewed as a capital-p Problem', my response is sometimes: 'And didn't you have to deal with problem people in your pastorates, and what was your strategy with these?'. This situation is complicated by role-conflicts: the denominational leaders are by default both counsellors-of-pastors and gatekeepers to other possible appointments. So they wisely refer pastors-in-transition to outside counsellors. But then there's the inevitable response: 'They had no time for me; I was shoved off to someone else to get sorted out; and I've not heard from my denomination's leaders again.'


How are pastors-in-transition helped? Depends on their personality, pastoral experiences, unfinished family-of-origin business and a host of other variables.


In all cases there's a need for confidential, caring, listening by a trusted 'other'.


Here we have to note two pastoral dynamics (there are others):


1. Intimacy. Gordon Macdonald writes: 'A preponderant percentage of those of us drawn to pastoral leadership have a higher-than-normal urge to engage with other people. We love to get below the surface of people's exterior lives: to understand their dreams and their burdens, to urge them on to higher possibilities, to sympathize with their feelings and fears, to show them grace and mercy when they fail' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17246.htm ).


And so we might have a higher-than-average expectation others will do that for us if/when we fail.


2. Power. Most ex-pastors, if they're honest, say they miss preaching more than anything else. The pulpit is about the last place in our society where someone can speak to a crowd without being interrupted - or often even questioned, at least directly. We humans love our little occasions of power, and when deprived of them don't know sometimes how to handle the concomitant powerlessness.


~~~


Should some of them, in their pain, 'act out' their rage? In my view, and in a minority of cases, and in a safe and appropriate context, yes. There's the role-play model, where they 'let fly' at an imaginary person sitting in a chair. Occasionally I've taken people driving along a freeway at night to shout/scream/swear (the only context I know in the city/ suburbs where they can safely do that without someone calling the police!).


Some people have been taught that they shouldn't externalize their strong emotions. I'm wary of that advice, but, yes, I know that 'self-control' is a 'Fruit of the Spirit'! (I was talking to someone recently who said 'I'm from a Greek family. And we say what we think, and we're often "in your face" with each other. Then we get over it. But I'm married to an English spouse, who doesn't understand the Greek way of solving conflicts!')




I reckon also we have to be frank about the strengths and weaknesses of institutions. Walter Wink is helpful here. Where two or three join together to do something there's institutional power at work. When someone inhibits the process of 'getting the institutional thing done' they're usually ostracized. 'Good guys' conform to the institution's aims and norms of behavior. Troublemakers are 'bad guys' and are excluded from the institution's benefits. Some 'troublemakers' then rage at the institution, occasionally sabotaging any good/reform which might result, and suffer the consequences. (Today's news: Melbourne Storm fined $15,000 by the NRL for claiming they are victims of a conspiracy by the northern states to destabilise their club). Biting the hand that feeds you is not generally a constructive strategy!


Oh, that'll do... there's much much more, but some might like to respond to some of this... Like asking:


1. How do we as pastors encourage discipline and maturity in these matters while acknowledging genuine pain and rage in someone?


2. How can we exercise constructive loyalty to our group/denomination without suffering from 'institutional preciousness'?


3. How is someone (like most ex-pastors I talk to every week) encouraged to 'own their own stuff' while debriefing on conflictual situations?


4. Where does the (enlightened) notion of 'restorative justice' fit into all this?


5. How can 'outsiders' become 'insiders' without compromising their convictions or becoming less 'prophetic'?


6. An issue of the GRID leadership letter - 'Do Yourself a Favour: Encourage your Pastor' provoked a record 600 responses to World Vision (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/2019.htm). Why?


7. We pastors are supposed to go after lost sheep, but are not good at helping 'lost shepherds'. True? Why?


~~~


Resources


'How many ex-pastors in Australia? Somewhere between 10,000 and 13,000' (More - http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/16971.htm )




'Moral failure: Let's require that every man and woman in Christian leadership belong to a peer-oriented group that creates covenants of behavior such as no casual dining with a member of the opposite sex, no travel of any kind with a colleagues of the opposite sex, no team relationships unless three or more people are involved' (More - http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17246.htm )




'Churchie behaviour: to be accepted on a Sunday you have to behave a certain way. I am simply not that person that I am supposed to pretend I am whilst in church' (More - http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17126.htm )




Motivation? 'I used to pray for everyone individually, phone them up to ask how they were, show an interest in their kids and budgie and labrador... but what was my motive? To be nice and win 'em for my flock. Why don't I do that now that I'm not in a pastorate?' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/16899.htm )




'I found that I was sick of running a small business. More and more of my time seemed to involve administration. I have been involved in such diverse admin duties as: developing an environmental impact study for a new development, creating a registered training authority, running a community development and training programme, developing a men’s refuge from the ground up. All quite worthwhile but miles from where I was trained and from my real interests and love. And the number of meetings really began to take their toll.' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/15764.htm )




'In 2002, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America found that its clergy were far more likely than non-clergy to suffer from clinical depression and financial difficulties. They also experienced higher levels of work-related stress and had an increased likelihood of substance abuse and obesity' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/14446.htm )




'Despite what some people say, quitting is not just for losers. It can be the best thing you'll ever do.' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/14291.htm )




'People love labels and pat explanations so they won't have to think too hard. But if you have just walked away from bible religion, you are rediscovering the joy of thinking freely.' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/14236.htm )




'What are some of the core reasons a pastor doesn't get a call? (much of this material is taken form a previous Baptist Union of Victoria paper "When the call to leadership is not confirmed") 1. The pastor may not have the gifts appropriate to the needs of a given church. This is more so today than ever when there are so many different kinds of churches with different styles and approaches to ministry'. (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/14003.htm )




'I think my greatest pain though was the fact that, when I shared the problem with my minister friends, they started keeping their distance. None of them had any sympathy. It's like they couldn't believe that such a bizarre thing could happen, so they just shake their heads and say, "Ummm..." ' (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/12013.htm )




'In one recent year 72,000 pastors/clergy were fired across America. For reasons that were partially their fault, for reasons that were not their fault, some for reasons no one knows but God Himself. Nevertheless, they and their families were fired, force terminated, pushed out into the streets' (http://www.thecents.org/ )




And many more stories/ideas like these - http://jmm.aaa.net.au/catalog/section/xp1.htm


Footnote: This writer has experienced both highs and lows in pastoral ministry. For a story of my 'lowest low' see a recently-posted article on 'The Vancouver "Adventure"' on our website (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17347.htm )


Rowland Croucher

JESUS AND POWER

Jesus and Power

(Notes from last Sunday's preaching at a Wesleyan Methodist Church).

Mark 10: 32-45

Four items from this week's news:

1. Last week Italian police arrested Renato Cortese, the Sicilian mafia's
'boss of bosses', after he had been at large for four decades. He was living
in squalid conditions in a decrepit farmhouse. Why was he prepared to live
like this? The Interior UnderSecretary said: 'Because of his dedication to
pure power'.

2. 'Lucy' left the Opus Dei community after 20 years of menial work, 12-hour
days, 6-7 days each week, and being refused permission to attend her
sister's wedding because the ceremony would not be Catholic. (Time, April
24, 2006).

3. Radical commentator John Pilger said an ID card (in Britain) would not be
a good idea. Private businesses will have full access to the national
database if you apply for a job. 'There will be a record of your movements,
your phone calls and shopping habits, even the kind of medication you
take... These databases will be sold to third parties without your
knowing...'

4. Dawn Rowan won a defamation case against two governments and two TV media
chains, but because the Australian Government won on appeal she now has to
pay their costs - to the value of her home. Your taxes at work! (See
http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/4728.htm )...

~~~

Where two or three or more humans are together, there is power... Power for
good, or evil; the abuse of power or the non-use of 'good power' which can
both be evil...

Power encounters are part of every human interaction. I am exercising power
by speaking to you and noting that you're listening. But you have power too:
for example if most of you started talking to one another or dozing off
while I'm preaching! Earlier our worship leader said 'Let us pray' and we
all went quiet. Powerful! And how did you feel when our blind friend sang
about Jesus making the blind to see? She's been the only person so far in
this service powerful.
enough to make me feel emotional!

Power is not evil in itself. We use power over nature, physical objects,
cooking ingredients, words etc. to live. But power is often abused when in
the hands of selfish humans.

Earlier in Mark 10 Jesus suggested to a rich man that the factor inhibiting
his entry into God's kingdom was his wealth. The opposite of rich is not
poor, but free.

Then Mark tells a story about another inhibitor - power. 'What can I do for
you?' Jesus asks James and John (the same question he asks Bartimaeus later
in the chapter). Earlier they'd been arguing about who would be greatest in
Jesus' kingdom. Now these two wanted the 'seats of honour' in the messianic
banquet. Now what's wrong with that? There are 'high tables' in many
institutions: you could tell in the synagogues who had the most
power/authority by noting who sat where.

But where they saw a throne, Jesus saw a cross. 'Can you drink the cup, be
baptized with the baptism...?' 'Yes,' they said (and James was certainly
executed for his faith; we don't know about John). Jesus then goes on to say
that the Son of Man would be mocked, spat upon and scourged... three forms
of abuse not mentioned elsewhere in his predictions about his death. (How
did he know? He'd read the prophets).

The next time Mark talks about 'the right, the left' he's describing the two
crosses either side of Jesus...

At least the disciples were 'up front' about their desire for power. And the
others were angry (because they wanted power too). It all goes back to Eden:
human beings don't like being dependent upon God, but want to run the show
their way. Pagan authorities exercise power-by-force, said Jesus. It's not
to be like that with you.

What kind of power does Jesus exhibit? Servant leadership: the badge of
office for him is not a throne but a towel (John 13). So with Jesus' church.
For example, the pastor is a servant of the church (though the church is not
his/her master).

Robert Greenleaf in his book Servant Leadership re-tells Herman Hesse's
story about a band of pilgrims en route to life in a contemplative order.
Brother Leo is their servant, who with his happy demeanour cheers them up
along the way. But then Leo disappears, and the group disintegrates. Later
the narrator finds him - and he's head of the Order.

Power for good or evil can be wielded by individuals or institutions. An
institution is two or more people who combine to do something. A family is
an institution. Have you noticed that in Matthew's parallel account of this
story it's James and John's mother who asks for seats of privilege for her
sons! Happens all the time! (Another item from this week's news: two
football-fathers bashed a referee who they felt was biassed because his son
was in the winning team, and he'd made a controversial decision which
decided the outcome of the match).

Within families everyone - even little people - exercise power. When either
of our granddaughters wants our attention, they yell, and they get it! In
marriages she may use her tongue (or withholding sex) to exercise power; he
may 'give her the silent treatment'. I'll let you into a secret about our
marriage: my wife has absolute power in determining what I wear - especially
to preaching occasions. Our choices are often in conflict: I wear what's
comfortable; she suggests I wear what looks nice, colours that match etc.
But when she's not there, the power belongs to me - so today (look!) I'm
wearing sandals, although I know Jan would have preferred shoes. (I tell her
the biblical people wore sandals too, but despite her being a pastor and
Bible-lover, that doesn't cut much ice!)

In creation power-displays happen everywhere all the time. The birds who
visit our feeder have a fairly distinct pecking-order: the crows at the top,
then the magpies, followed down the order by the rainbow lorikeets, the
crimson rosellas, and then the doves (though so-called 'peaceful doves' can
get stroppy with each other!)

According to the radical sociologist Robert Merton, the evil perpetrated by
human institutions is greater than the sum of the evil of the individuals
within them. Walter Wink writes about the 'spirits' of institutions
(referring to Paul's notion of 'principalities and powers'). Walter
Brueggeman's classic The Prophetic Imagination says the key to understanding
the biblical record of institutional behavior is to see a contrast between
Solomonic institutions (whose aim is to accrue power) and the 'prophetic'
approach which is not fooled by this.

Some institutional evil is in-your-face, overt: like the rape of about 1,000
women every day mostly by the military, in the Congo. Or the persecution
waged against Christians in many Muslim-majority countries. The Archbishop
of Nigeria, in this context, made an interesting comment that Christians
should not expect to be passive in the face of such persecution (though he
stopped short of encouraging counter-violence).

How are we to react to institutional evil? Moses confronted the Pharaoh.
Paul shamed the authorities in Philippi. Peter and John flatly refused to
obey the injunction of the Sanhedrin to be quiet and not preach about Jesus.
Karl Barth has famously noted that the civil authority in Romans 13, when
carrying out their order-mandate must be obeyed, but that same authority
(Rome) in Revelation 13 is 'the beast from the abyss' which will be judged
by the very Christians it is persecuting.

All political systems abuse power, even Western democracies. You know
Churchill's comment about Wesminster-style democracy being a terrible
system, but it's probably better than the alternatives! It's just that 'Yes
Minister' style politics is probably more subtle about power-abuse than
other political institutions. In Nepal at the moment, for example, power is
in the hands of the protesters on the street, and the Maoists, and the King,
whose power is probably about to evaporate...

Nations play power-games with each other. Note what is happening between
Australia and Indonesia at the moment. With Papuan asylum-seekers fleeing
from alleged oppression in their country, we Australians have the power to
humiliate/ shame the Indonesians. But with their greater population and
because of economic considerations, we are somewhat cautious about
alienating our powerful neighbour. (The Canadians used to tell me, vis-a-vis
their
relationship with the U.S.: 'If you are going to sleep with an elephant,
you'd better move when it turns over!').

Back to confronting evil powers: Here's a good quote: "If only it were so
simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing
evil deeds and it were necessary to separate them from the rest of us and
destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of
every human being. And who is willing to destroy
a piece of his own heart?" Who said that? Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.

Here's a summary of the classical Christian wisdom on power, and how to obey
Jesus' warnings about its abuse:

1. Be a servant to others, as Jesus demonstrated in the acted parable in
John 13 and was exhibited in the life of the greatest Christian since Jesus
(Brother Francis). Ask others 'How are you traveling?' with a genuine desire
to know (and pray for them). Do some 'secret kindnesses' every day...

2. Be humble. That is, know who you are: don't have too high or too low a
view of yourself. Expect God to send you at least one 'humiliation' ('loss
of face' for you Chinese) every day so you won't experience too much hubris.
And all the monastic orders encourage our doing some menial jobs regularly,
wherever we are in the pecking-order.

3. Live gratefully. Expect nothing and you won't be disappointed.

4. Be accountable to a mentor and to a group of peers, who will help do the
necessary and regular reality-checking for you, and keep you faithful to
your promises to live a life of faith, hope and love...

5. Empower others: give power away. See
http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/8109.htm which describes how pastors and
churches are supposed to do it...

6. In prayer, forgive your enemies, as the Lord's Prayer encourages us to
do...

7. Sometimes you simply submit to 'the powers' as Jesus and Nelson Mandela
and Gandhi and Martin Luther King have taught us. In Jesus' case there might
seem to be nothing more powerless than a body on a cross; but in God's
purposes the Easter-event became the turning-point in human history. (Pilate
said he had absolute power over Jesus, who responded 'No you don't unless
God gives it to you.')

8. Be committed to a life of justice, which is the right use of power.
(Micah 6:8, Matthew 23:23, Luke 11:42).

Finally let us hear our Scripture passage from Eugene Peterson's excellent
translation, The Message:

Back on the road, they set out for Jerusalem. Jesus had a head start on
them, and they were following, puzzled and not just a little afraid. He took
the Twelve and began again to go over what to expect next. "Listen to me
carefully. We're on our way up to Jerusalem. When we get there, the Son of
Man will be betrayed to the religious leaders and scholars. They will
sentence him to death. Then they will hand him over to the Romans, who will
mock and spit on him, give him the third degree, and kill him. After three
days he will rise alive."

James and John, Zebedee's sons, came up to him. "Teacher, we have something
we want you to do for us." "What is it? I'll see what I can do." "Arrange
it," they said, "so that we will be awarded the highest places of honor in
your glory--one of us at your right, the other at your left." Jesus said,
"You have no idea what you're asking. Are you capable of drinking the cup I
drink, of being baptized in the baptism I'm about to be plunged into?"
"Sure," they said. "Why not?" Jesus said, "Come to think of it, you will
drink the cup I drink, and be baptized in my baptism. But as to awarding
places of honor, that's not my business. There are other arrangements for
that."
When the other ten heard of this conversation, they lost their tempers with
James and John. Jesus got them together to settle things down. "You've
observed how godless rulers throw their weight around," he said, "and when
people get a little power how quickly it goes to their heads. It's not going
to be that way with you. Whoever wants to be great must become a servant.
Whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave. That is what the Son
of Man has done: He came to serve, not to be served--and then to give away
his life in exchange for many who are held hostage."


Shalom! Rowland Croucher

April 2006