First Unitarian Universalist Society of San Francisco
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A couple of weeks ago I preached a sermon in which I said that conflict is something we avoid, if at all possible, but that actually conflict is intrinsic to the growth process of a community such as ours. Just as it has been for so many of our movements and institutions throughout history. The early Christian church was founded in conflict. The story of the woman from Samaria convincing Jesus to heal her daughter is symbolic of the struggle amongst the followers of Jews, as to whether their membership should include gentiles, as well as Jesus, and under what conditions. One of the earliest conflicts was over whether pagan converts to Christianity would have to be circumcised, to become like Jesus and his disciples. Out of this early conflict arose the Church Universal. Nearly two thousand years later, in the United States, Martin Luther King had difficulty persuading his followers that he must take his campaign for racial justice up into the northern cities and transform it into a campaign for economic justice on behalf of all the poor folk living in the inner cities. Those who were out of work or under-employed, doing the most menial tasks, those who were homeless, or virtually so, those who were under-educated and those lacking healthcare. Out of this social conflict arose the vision of the Good Society - open to all. Of all the world's religious traditions, I think the Hindu has the greatest understanding of what a creative role conflict plays in a community over time. A community without conflict is dead, it's not stretching to embrace greater diversity, it's not growing into a more mature understanding of itself, it's not challenging itself to accommodate the new. In this church, because we have no dogma or creed which enforces a uniform belief system on us, each person is free to follow their own spiritual path, naming the holy in their own words. And we pride ourselves on our diversity in all aspects of our lives. When you have such diversity there is greater opportunity for conflict. Even naming our differences might look like conflict - and we react instinctively against that risk. We are not comfortable with conflict, having had bad experiences when it was not handled well, not knowing how to deal with it constructively or, not even accepting that conflict can be a healthy part of a congregations maturing. Last weekend I was at a Unitarian Universalist conflict management workshop in Cupertino. It was intended for the conflict management teams from each of the Western Districts. Good offices people were also invited because we work closely with our teams. I am one of those Good Offices people for the ministers of this district. If a minister is involved in conflict in their congregation, the role of the Good Offices person is to consult with the minister, and I do this from time to time, though most of my work is supporting my colleagues in their ministry. The workshop was excellent and I not only learned at greater depth about the stages of identity-based conflict I spoke about two weeks ago, but I also learned to become more comfortable with the idea that conflict, if well managed, is healthy. For those who were not here, or can't remember, I will briefly recount the four stages of Antagonism, Resonance, Invention, and Action. Antagonism, the first stage has to be very carefully managed by an experienced facilitator. In this stage each side vents their anger, blame, projections on the other. The talk is about the other; it is all their fault. After a cooling off period there is a second stage: Resonance, in which the facilitator encourages each side to speak about themselves. "What's in it for you?" "Why do you care so much?" Underlying values and emotions surface, as each side begins to express some of their humanity to the other. In the third session, Invention, the two sides can come together to create ways in which they both may have to let go of some things, yet each can get what they most deeply want. Only, then, are they ready to come together for the fourth stage, Action, and create a plan for the next steps. Last weekend at the workshop we spent a great deal of time on the first stage, Antagonism. Many of us had questions about it, it was the stage we were least comfortable with. The reason the Antagonism stage is so important in identity based conflicts, is that if the emotions are not expressed they will remain festering - and will prevent any meaningful work between the two sides. Identity based conflict is very tender because it is about one's self-identification. In a congregation this kind of conflict is not about whether we serve Peets' coffee or Maxwell House at coffee hours. It's about things like changing the name of the congregation, or altering membership requirements in the By Laws. Any identity-based conflict is about who we are in our deepest being. An emotional experience I had over identity based conflict, was when I was minister of the church in Plainfield, New Jersey about ten years ago. I belonged to a Ministers Study Group that met twice a year in a remote monastery in New Hampshire. Before each meeting we would pick a topic to study, read books, write papers. It was all rather formal and academic, and had until quite recently been an all-male group where I was told the ministers would sit up until the early hours of the morning drinking whiskey and talking more and more brilliantly as the night wore on. This particular session the topic was to be Men's spirituality. During the winter in preparation for this I had read several books about Men's spirituality, and I had even written a sermon on the topic in which, I was critical of the Men's movement for being too self-centered and not active enough in the world, where so many young men grow up without male role models, where there was such a need for healthy male mentors. The morning I delivered the sermon I had hardly left the Sanctuary before men began coming up to me complaining about what I had said. I had no idea what a strong reaction I would get from the men's community. I did my best to hear their complaints, their criticism. I tried to listen to what they had heard me say. A week or so later I had breakfast with six of the most out-spoken men with a member of my ministerial relations committee presents. A couple weeks after that I participated in a meeting with all interested men, about forty showed up and we had what I though was a good dialogue. Gradually I began to notice a greater ability in the congregation to deal with the differences between women and me. We could begin to joke about some of the problems between men and women. Deborah Tannens' book "You Just Don't Understand Me" was read by many people. But none of this prepared me for what happened in the spring a month or so later when I went up to the study group. This group had been founded some fifty years ago and historically it was limited to 30 - when I belonged we were ten women and twenty men. I had brought up a copy of my sermon to show other colleagues and get their honest feedback. I showed it to two of my female colleagues before the session started - they did not find anything offensive or untrue in what I said. They were shocked by the response I had got from the men in my congregation. I think there was a general sense that we were handling dangerous material. One of my women colleagues, trying to establish a safer space for us to begin, asked that when we broke into small groups for discussion - the women should meet together in a separate room. This was responded to angrily by one of the male ministers - why should the women want to segregate themselves? "Because we don't feel safe," was someone's answer. This led to further angry, hurtful exchanges, but the women held faster to their demand as the tension mounted, and finally it was agreed this is what we would do - then we'd regroup and men and women would be in mixed groups for further discussion. It went from bad to worse. This was a group of mainly quite experienced ministers - but some how the issues between men and women were something we had not really dealt with. As the men became upset their voices grew louder - one sat on the edge of his chair shaking his fist at me, the women also grew sharper and more willing to attack. What was it all about? It was very unclear that first long evening of head-knocking. Exhausted some of us went off to bed, some were in tears, some were still arguing loudly, and one got in his car in the middle of a snowy night and drove away never to return to the group again. Another, more temperate, drove off next morning, but did return six months later when we next met. However, the rest of us went through an amazingly difficult three days; our positions as men or women became more entrenched. We touched the accumulated emotions of past hurts, past wrongs. Emotionality and fear rose, making it very difficult to keep talking to each other. But, there was the courage to stick with it because we had faith that confronting our differences would allow a new and better community to emerge. Women spoke of the way they felt intimidated by men: their competitiveness, their physical size, the loudness of their voices, their implicit ability to inflict harm. Men spoke of how constrained they now felt as a result of the sexual misconduct of some clergy - all clergy now have to be careful not to hug, not to touch, not to meet a person in your office with the door closed. "There is a feeling I have I'm always about to be blamed," one male minister said. A woman minister spoke of feeling she was not taken seriously by her male colleagues. On the afternoon of the second day I heard a man explain what he feels like when a woman breaks off communication." She is my link to emotions," he said, "without her I cannot get in touch with my feelings." We began to hear each other. We began to see beneath the label "man" "woman" to this particular human being. And when you really see another human being, you find love. It was an extraordinary three days. The group was transformed from the Old Boys club it had been, in which women were only tolerated as second class citizens, to a group in which men and women were equal; where we actually showed affection for each other; where what someone was feeling mattered just as what they thought mattered; where there was more conversation about families, children, parents and less conversation about budgets, building plans and membership size. And each of us were changed. It took courage to go through that confrontation but we emerged with new energy in the group, new compassion for each other, and a new sense of ourselves. Ultimately it was a wonderful, cathartic, experience for the group. Based on what I have seen happening in other situations of conflict and resolution, I am convinced we can reach out to touch one another, only if we are willing to go down into the depths of our own spiritual truth, letting go of the superficialities which divide us. We can connect with people who are very different from us who may even be in conflict with us and together we can build a community. Here in this church we have the opportunity for this kind of creative exchange at a deeply human level in relation to the issue of whether there should be a body of stories that our congregation might use for teaching children and adults. Different viewpoints have been raised, among them: · Should there be a core body of stories at all? All these and many more questions are being asked. I am confident that out of the struggle can come ideas and plans that are new and better than anyone of us could have dreamed alone. If we have the courage and faith to stay together in the conversation, love will transform our differences into a new and better way. This is my hope; this is my prayer.
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