[Oe List ...] Internal screwed-up-ness

Thu Apr 30 11:52:03 EDT 2009

Thank you much for this reflection, Herman. Your first reaction was important, too, but this one certainly helps to round it out. Some folks have been held accountable, but sometimes they are perverts who seem to be beyond accountability, just as there are drunks who cannot be helped by AA. Our world is full of them, and though we may know a lot more about such perversions than we did at an earlier age/time, wisdom about dealing with the issues is not so easy. 

I realize that there is a whole range of hurts which would probably not fit the category of "perversion." I also know that most of us caused some of the pain, either knowingly or unknowingly. That is one reason we went to Daily Office--confession, praise, dedication (with all the sub-themes). We also changed our policies and stance as we went along, but none of that changed the need for "daily office." Charles and I have been married for 54 years and still we inflict hurt one one another. I can follow and appreciate the theologians who talk about "original blessing," and that point needs to be emphasized, or I can work at meditation and serenity; but when I look into the depths of my own life, humiliation abounds, as do grace and peace.

Doris Hahn

________________________________
From: Herman Greene <hfgreene at mindspring.com>
To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Thursday, April 30, 2009 8:06:51 AM
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] Internal screwed-up-ness

My apologies to Bill and all for my reactive email last evening. Some day I will have to take the time to write on my experience with the flawed but brilliant project we undertook and are still undertaking in our own ways. A baseline reflection is that we cared for the world but not ourselves—to some extent we sacrificed ourselves for a greater good and in other ways we failed to live up to standards that we would have wanted for others. And a second baseline is that by doing this we accomplished amazing things.

My own reflections recently have been on what I learned that is still valuable and how that can be passed on.

I don’t look back at my own experience with the order as suffering, though there were difficulties . . . many of my own making. I know, however, that there are those who did suffer, especially the children, and I would be inclined to open as much space as they need to remember, work through, process, grieve. I am not sure what accountability means or who should be held to account where there was innocent suffering. In AA there are traditions of taking inventory and making amends. Sometimes amends can’t be made directly because the person to whom the amend is owed is dead or direct amends would do more harm than good. Other times amends can and should be made directly. Then as HR Richard says after seeing the judgment and being the first to repent, there is leading in the resurrection, which is, with the help of the grace of God, changing and offering to others what one could not before. This is no doubt what Bill is saying—how to care next.

Herman

________________________________

From:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of KarenBueno at aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, April 29, 2009 6:24 PM
To: oe at wedgeblade.net
Subject: [Oe List ...] Internal screwed-up-ness

Good words, Bill.  You got it.

Karen (Wright) Bueno

In a message dated 4/29/2009 1:42:03 P.M. Mountain Daylight Time, pvida at whc.net writes:
Tim's comment reminds me why I've found 'total depravity' to be such a
comforting perspective!  Internal screwed-up-ness is a given in any human
institution (which we discussed in the HRN section on the church) but had a
hard time sorting through in terms of the Order as a human institution.  I
found it interesting that the 'need to be pure' that glossed over many
issues in the institutional church - covering up scandal, etc. - has its
counterpart in our own realities as well.  The flip side of that - being
offended and hurt that we've been treated in ways we consider unfair -
focuses us on 'shoulda-been' instead of taking the hit, grieving, and
figuring out how to care next.  At least for me.

Bill Schlesinger
Project Vida
3607 Rivera Ave
El Paso , TX 79905
(915) 533-7057 x 207
(915) 490-6148 mobile
(915) 533-7158 fax
bschlesinger.pv at tachc.org

-----Original Message-----
From: oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf
Of Tim Wegner
Sent: Saturday, April 25, 2009 8:23 PM
To: dialogue at wedgeblade.net; oe at wedgeblade.net
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] [Dialogue] Order annuity (and R. Niebuhr)

This is an intriguing thread. I would like to relate our discussion 
here to the theology of Reinhold Niebuhr (read on).

(By the way, the thread has diverged on the two lists, so if you are 
just on one list, you haven't seen all the messages.)

Susan and I didn't ever "leave the order", at least in terms of 
leaving the community. We did change our financial covenant by ending 
the contribution of my entire salary out of concern that some 
community members had become dependent and had lost the capacity to 
support themselves. We didn't feel it was ethical to allow the 
dysfunctional dependency to continue. This decision meant (in some 
people's minds) that we had left, so we didn't receive any annuity 
money. And in any case, shortly after we changed our financial 
relationship, the centralized structures of the order were disbanded.

I have been preparing a two-part adult class on Obama and Reihhold 
Niebuhr for my church, based on the wonderful "Speaking of Faith" 
program on NPR. See:
http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/2009/obamas-
theologian/

The way-too-simple synopsis is that Niebuhr believed that we live 
caught in a tension between, on the one hand, the need to respond to 
innocent suffering, and on the other hand, our flawed human nature 
which renders our well-meaning attempts open to the risk of counter 
productiveness because of our flawed nature. This tension plays out 
at the individual level, but Niebuhr's concern was more the large 
stage on which American power is excercised.

Mary Hampton is visiting us this weekend as she is attending an 
Occupational Therapy conference, and we have had some conversations 
about this. I connected this "order annuity" discussion with the 
themes of the Niebuhr study I am preparing, and found it cast some 
interesting light. The Order certainly responded to innocent 
suffering, but was certainly open to a Niebuhrian critique of 
ignoring our own human flaws. Hence we experienced issues like sexual 
abuse, unhealthy economic dependency, and so on (make your own list). 

I would be curious to know if Niebuhr's thought played any role in 
the early days of the Order, or was intentionally rejected in favor 
of the four theologians chosen for RS-1.

Susan and I should add that we are grateful for everything that has 
happened and is happening in our lives including our experience with 
the Order. We certainly had some wild adventures, and seem to have 
missed some of the worst problems. This appreciation doesn't prevent 
me from looking at our community with Nieburian eyeglasses and seeing 
a naively optimistic liberalism.

Tim

_______________________________________________
OE mailing list
OE at wedgeblade.net
http://wedgeblade.net/mailman/listinfo/oe_wedgeblade.net

_______________________________________________
OE mailing list
OE at wedgeblade.net
http://wedgeblade.net/mailman/listinfo/oe_wedgeblade.net

________________________________

Big savings on Dell XPS Laptops and Desktops!
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://wedgeblade.net/pipermail/oe_wedgeblade.net/attachments/20090430/dc8ee3b2/attachment.html>