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Friends United Meeting |
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April 2000
Commitments
Change or Crisis? Part 2
In January's "Commitments," I mentioned the importance of our General Board's taking the time to pray and reflect, not just react, to the changes happening at FUM and the changes happening in the world around us. One of the future changes at FUM that I didn't mention in that column was my own departure from the staff this coming July. I will write more about that in an upcoming issue, but we do want you to be part of the search for a new FUM general secretary. We are also looking for a director of yearly meeting relations-one of the new staff positions that emerged from the February meeting of the General Board-and we continue to seek a new editor for Quaker Life. (Ben Richmond will continue editing this magazine until that new appointment happens, or until the end of this year.) These searches are running parallel with the general secretary search, but the final decision-making will run one step behind, so that the new general secretary's input can be part of the process. (See the announcements on pages 21 and 28.)
Back to the General Board: As it turned out, the Board did take the time to pray and reflect, during their meeting of February 11-14. We had asked for prayer for those meetings, and we certainly saw the results. It was a truly wonderful event. A central part of our experience that weekend was the role of our retreat facilitator, Patti Crane. Patti was the communications and marketing consultant, who, along with her colleagues, produced the study, Among Friends, which Doug Bennett described in our November 1999 issue. Before her involvement with that study, Patti and I had become acquainted because of her role in helping the Church of the Brethren consider its denominational identity and communications puzzles. Her involvement with the Church of the Brethren continues.
At our Board meeting, Patti confronted us with two important challenges.
First, she asked us to consider, in the context of the whole Friends movement
and the larger Church, what can only FUM do best? As our honorary General
Board journalists report on page 5, the creative ferment which emerged
as we grappled with that question led to the three-dimensional focus for
our staff work: coordinating our yearly meetings' cooperative relationships,
communicating normative Quaker faith and practice attractively and with
balance, and administering Friends missions.
Her other challenge underscored the importance of that communication function.
She movingly testified to the power of Quaker faith and practice as she
experienced it when she crisscrossed the continent researching Among Friends.
She said to us, "The world needs this message!" So, why, she
continued, do we put so much of our energy into intramural arguments?
She compared us to frogs puffing at each other from one little pond to
another, wasting the energy that we should be devoting to the huge ocean
of need which awaits our ministry and message.
The new general secretary will head the administration of FUM, as before. However, he or she will also have direct responsibility for our communication functions. We envision adding-on staff or by consultancy-a new marketing capacity, helping us and local Friends communicate to our neighbors, to the "ocean" of need. His or her senior colleagues will be in charge of those other main tasks-a director of yearly meeting relations to work directly with yearly meetings, their staffs and committees, for increased effectiveness in ministry; and a director of World Missions to administer and expand our cross-cultural work.
In a way, I know you "had to be there." However, I still hope
our Board reports succeed in conveying something of the beautiful spirit
of creativity, unity and enthusiasm that marked our Board retreat. I continue
to be amazed and very grateful. God is good!!
Johan Maurer is the general secretary of Friends United Meeting.
Send your comments : QuakerLife@FUM.org.
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