The Three C's of Minister Support



Small Peer learning Group in Action
(2010 Emotional Intelligence Seminar)

I keep trying to remember the three "C's" of clergy support needs.  This morning I spotted the old  book on my shelf and looked it up:  Barbara Gilbert, Who Ministers to Ministers? (Alban, 1987).  Here's a quote from the pertinent paragraph. 

"One study...proposed the 'Three C's' as basics:  Comfort, Clarification, Confrontation.  We need people whom we can trust with our pain and uncertainty and who will comfort us, often by just being good listeners.  We need people who help us clarify by asking the right questions and pointing us to significant resources. We need people who care about us enough to lovingly confront us with that which we don't see or have been avoiding."

As we keep working to find ways to build peer learning groups for ministers throughout their working lives, these keep cropping up for me as helpful in identifying what we need and what works.

Emotional Intelligence Seminar 2011!



David Harris (front left) facilitating a small group, EQ-HR 2010.



http://www.lpts.edu/Academic_Programs/Emotional_Intelligence_11.asp


Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary is once again offering its very popular course, “Emotional Intelligence and Human Relations,” an intensive and highly experiential week-long opportunity for strengthening leadership skills for congregational life. The course will take place on the campus of Louisville Seminary, August 22-27, 2011, and accommodations can be reserved on the Seminary campus at Laws Lodge.

Participants can expect to:

• Improve awareness of concepts of emotional intelligence and the impact of emotional intelligence on the participant and all with whom he or she interacts.

• Improve ability to identify, articulate, and reflect on various phenomena of group life and group process.

• Improve understanding of how one is impacted by a group and one’s own impact on a group.

• Increase skills in pastoral leadership for lay and clergy.

• Develop heightened awareness of the importance of constructive behavioral information about self and others as leaders.

• Develop heightened awareness of the presence of God’s Spirit in group life and ability to identify and reflect on that presence.

• Recognize the redemptive possibilities within groups.

A majority of time will be shared in small, unstructured groups of 10 to 12 people with two experienced facilitators. As group life unfolds, participants focus on their feelings and behaviors in the here-and-now in order to learn about the impact of their behavior on others through the appropriate use of feedback and experimentation. The work will draw on five areas of emotional intelligence as keys to improving leadership effectiveness for faith based leaders.



In preparation, participants will complete the BarOn survey on emotional intelligence. They will also identify up to 20 people who know them well and who are willing to complete the inventory for them. What results is a 25-page printout of one’s Emotional Intelligence Quotient (EQ). This will be for the participant’s eyes only and will provide the participant with personal items to explore in their small group. The $182.00 cost of the inventory is included in the tuition fee. Past participants have described this workshop as a life-changing event in their lives.

Leadership

Roy M. Oswald

Author, seminar leader, and former senior consultant for the Alban Institute, Oswald is currently Executive Director of the Center for Emotional Intelligence and Human Relations Skills. He has provided leadership for hundreds of conferences and training events in the U.S. and Canada. A variety of denominations have called on Oswald to focus on the pastoral role and the dynamics of parish leadership. He also frequently consults with local congregations and judicatories where his planning model utilizes norms, myths, and meaning statements from a church’s past. Oswald is identified with research into the transitions clergy make when they enter parishes for the first time and for clergy in longer pastorates. More recently, he has headed studies of the candidacy process, leadership needs of small congregations, and new methodology for assessing ministries using clergy/lay teams. His most recent book focuses on the Eight Polarities a Thriving Congregation Manages Well. (2007)

David R. Sawyer

David Sawyer is Professor of Ministry teaching in the areas of church leadership and administration, and directs the Lifelong Learning and Doctor of Ministry programs at Louisville Seminary. He has forty years experience as a pastor, associate pastor, interim pastor, new church development pastor, judicatory executive staff, and in group facilitation, human systems consultation, and workshop leadership. He is author of Work of the Church: Getting the Job Done in Boards and Committees (Judson Press, 1987), and Hope in Conflict: Discovering Wisdom in Congregational Turmoil (Pilgrim Press, 2007).