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I am literally writing this on the heels of my NCSC/J23 meeting, and I’m basically processing my meeting on my blog while in my head.  You could say that you’re getting the "locker room reaction".  I base this analogy off of football games, where the media goes into the locker room right after the game.  At that point adrenaline is high, emotions are rampant and every once and a while you’ll get an outburst of emotion.  It could be anger, to exuberant joy, to crying (unless you’re Kansas City Chief’s coach Dick Vermeil, who cries after every game).  Don’t worry, I’m not going to turn on the faucets today, but the point I’m making is that right now I’m led by emotion, and after reason sets in I might feel differently…

The meeting went about as I expected – which isn’t necessarily good.  It could have gone better than I was hoping for, but then again it could have gone worse.  However, I did leave disappointed with the result.

Good Things: I think I did a pretty decent job of going in with an open mind.  I didn’t make any personal attacks or belittle their opinions by any means.  I think they made an honest effort to listen to what I had to say.  They asked some very good questions, made some very challenging statements; and I manged to give them an appropriate response for each of them.  As far as discussions go, I think it was quite effective.

Bad Things:  Well the worst thing – I went in there hoping that there would be some change, and I left believing that there won’t be a significant change any time soon.  I really didn’t hear any logically objective concerns about our church’s involvement with NCSC.  All of the concerns I got were emotionally-led subjective concerns that namely one of the campus ministers had.  This person went to NCSC last year as a student, and I think when they went they had the expectation that the conference was going to be more like the FOCUS Conference.  While he was making his case he drew direct comparisons to the FOCUS Conference, alleging that the NCSC Conference was not as "spiritual" as FOCUS.  This person went home with a "bitter taste in his mouth" about the Conference and felt that his time would have been better spent attending the FOCUS Conference rather than the NCSC Conference.

Both Campus Ministers spoke about the fact that they didn’t know much about NCSC, and because they didn’t know much about it they didn’t feel comfortable "endorsing" NCSC with our campus ministry’s membership.

I responded with both of those concerns, conceding that perhaps the Conference didn’t meet the Campus Minister’s expectations of what "spirituality" meant.  I told him that I think that he connects with spirituality through catechises and liturgical sacraments, and while both were present at NCSC (there was daily Mass, two "big" Masses, Reconciliation, praise & worship, etc.), they were also integrated with all six aspects of Empowered By the Spirit.  There was so much more diverse programming available: from the opportunity to network with students from all over the country – with a variety of Campus Ministry programs and types, there were opportunities for students to have discussion about various international and social justice issues, there were opportunities for students to discern for leadership and connect with Campus Ministries more on a regional and national level, and I went on and on.  The point I was making that just because that particular student/campus minister didn’t get much out of the experience doesn’t mean other students took away much more.  It also doesn’t mean that this may be an unique opportunity to involve students who may not normally be involved in programming at J23.

In regards to their concern that they may not know much about it – I was deeply challenged by their sentiment in this statement.  Our campus ministry’s affiliation with NCSC was there before I came around to Campus Ministry, and was there long before any of the current campus ministry staff came around.  I struggle because they’re leaning too much on the inclination to fear something that they do not necessarily understand.  I attempted to draw some comparisons between our campus ministry’s affiliation with CCMA (Catholic Campus Ministry Association) and NCSC.  They hardly know anything about CCMA programming, yet somehow it’s very important that they become and remain members of CCMA.  Yet they use the same argument against the NCSC, even though these two groups are partner organizations.

I could go back and forth on points and counter-points, but I think that would be too tedious. However, I think that this issue is broken down in two ways: Methodology/Programming & Financials.

In regards to Methodology/Programing, I’m not sure if we’ll be able to come to a common understanding, or if they even want to.  The campus ministers speak about their lack of knowledge and experience in NCSC, yet they do not want to take the time or resources needed to learn more about it.  It was to my dismay to find that they actually had quite a bit of literature about NCSC, as well as all of the copies of the Collegian, the NCSC newsletter, yet they didn’t appear to read them or make their student leaders aware of those materials.  If you’re not going to break open the materials, it’s pretty hard to find value in them!

I think they feel threatened because 3 of the 4 students going to NCSC Conference are students that don’t regularly attend their weekly programming..  At the same time I would venture to say that all of these students who "got something" out of NCSC remain actively engaged in Parish life, are strong members in the Catholic Church, and through their NCSC involvement still have a strong connection to Campus Ministry.   There is part of me that is tempted to think that they’re prejudging the NCSC, simply based on the affiliation of myself and other students like me, who are no longer part of their programming.

I struggle with this because their role as Campus Ministers is not only to provide transforming and life-giving programming for college students, but to also identify and utilize resources and opportunities that would serve ALL students in their Campus Ministry.  This is a tried & true resource for Campus Ministry that has been around John XXIII for 15 years, yet they want to close the door on this because "students who are currently involved probably won’t get much out of this".  This is incredibly short-sighted and goes against what it means to be a campus ministry – you’re turning students away because you’re not willing or able to offer programming that serves them.  I’m not a relativist, two years ago John XXIII was a very life-giving, nurturing and challenging place, but now it’s no longer that for me.  Granted, I have changed over the years, but I think our faith community has been doing most of the changing.

Finances – this one should be a no-brainer but somehow this is a big issue.  Simply: THERE IS MONEY IN THE BUDGET FOR THIS!  There has always been, and unless they’ve made drastic cuts, there should be money for it this year.  Yet somehow they pedaled me this story about how they need to raise money for everything that they do – and they cannot do an activity if they don’t have a way to fund-raise for this.  I simply countered by asking them where their money to pay for CCMA dues comes from, do they have to fund-raise for it?  They didn’t have an answer to that question.  I asked them to discuss this with the Pastor and truly explore if there’s funding available.

I’m pissed because I’m lobbying heavily for our church to find $100 to renew our NCSC membership, yet someone behind the curtain can whip up $40k+ to keep FOCUS here.  Give me a break!

The finances are the least of my worry because I was graciously offered money to pay for the NCSC membership from our previous Pastor, who is now at another church.  While it’s very generous and a testament to how important experienced Campus Ministers consider the NCSC, it’s strange that another church is giving their offertory money to fund something that our church should automatically be doing.  At the same time this isn’t so much about money as it is about principle.  Truth be told, I have money from my Christmas bonus that I could use for the CM Membership renewal – but what’s the point if I (or another church) give our hard-earned money if the people receiving it aren’t willing to understand why it’s important enough for us to do this.  It’d be one thing if they couldn’t understand – education can fix that – but for them not willing to understand is the heart of the problem.

I guess they’re now going to go talk to the Pastor to see if they have the money available, but they indicated that they’d want to meet with me (and it would be great if "I could bring students that actually got something out of NCSC") to discuss this further.

I really don’t know where this is going to go…  Something tells me that NCSC will have Colorado State University membership in Lafayette, CO or we may end up forming the "Colorado State University Catholic Student Coalition" before this is all over.

Perhaps more to come as emotion subsides…

So today is a relatively big day for me, NCSC/J23-wise.  Today I have to meet with the Campus Ministers and convince them that being in NCSC is a good thing, that we need to renew our membership, and that they need to continue to receive emails from the NCSC List-Serve (and should be passing them along to student leaders as well).  Like I’ve said before, I’m really struggling with needing to have this meeting in the first place, and I’m praying that this is hopefully just an educational moment.

Today they rescheduled on me for the second time.  This meeting was supposed to take place last week, then they rescheduled on me the day before (postponing this by a week), and now I got another email today saying that they’re going to push me back 20-30 minutes to have a Alternative Spring Break interview…

Maybe I’m reading into this a little too much, and being a bit too sensitive – but it’s not very respectful to keep jerking me around like this.  And what does it say when I want to have this meeting about the NCSC and you reschedule this meeting for other things that are popping up AFTER we scheduled our original time.  This makes me realize where I fit in their priorities.  I’m kinda pissed I’m being jerked around like this, and I hope this isn’t a preview of what’s to come in today’s meeting.

I’m still about nervous about what’s going to happen.  I have a good sense of what I’m going to say and how I’m hoping this will go, but I really hope that all of us can go into this meeting with an open mind.  What I really hope is that I don’t need to take a defensive position during this meeting and basically defend against their ignorance and pre-judgement.

The benefit I have is that I have an assured end-result.  CSU students will become members no matter what.  Our former Pastor, who is now the Pastor of another church about an hour away has offered to cover registration expenses – so I have a last-resort option.  I really don’t want to use this though, I think it’ll fix things in the short-term, but in the long-run this won’t be a good thing.  It’ll become another way our community is split and I don’t want to build up this "resistance/alternative campus ministry".

So please say a prayer for me today at 4:20ish MST.  I’ll update on how things turn out.

Last weekend was a very exhausting and jam-packed, but also was one of the most amazing weekends I’ve had.  Last weekend we had our fall NCSC Team West retreat, bringing our regional team over to Fort Collins for the weekend.  Unfortunately our California members weren’t able to come out due to the distance, so our team was a big smaller this time, but we made up for our numbers through our accomplishments! 

With all of the chaos leading up to the retreat, I was getting nervous about what to expect.  In all of the difficulty of locking in a place, I wasn’t able to do all of the busy-work until Thursday night.  But through the grace of God I managed to get everything done, with time to spare.  I took Friday afternoon off from work to grocery shop and to get everything gathered.  Leanne came up early and was a big help as well.  We actually got done early enough to watch Batman Begins while we were waiting for everyone to drive in – not bad!

Everyone from New Mexico arrived about 7:30, and we got everyone settled and took them down to everyone’s favorite Fort Collins watering hold – Old Chicago’s!  It’s kinda funny because Old C’s was the first place the National Team went when everyone was in town.  We had a good team dinner and then we went to Walrus for ice cream.  We tried to keep Friday low-key considering we had to be up early the next day for the retreat.

Saturday we got up early (7:30ish) to eat breakfast and head over to the Scotch Pines Clubhouse for our retreat.  The clubhouse turned out to be pretty decent.  In some ways it was nicer than the space we would of had at Heatheridge – the view was a bit nicer and the rooms were broken out giving people more privacy if they wanted it.  They had this ugly red and green carpet, which basically looked like someone laid wrapping paper all over the floor. 

There was also this weird sculpture that was hung above the fireplace:

But during one of our breaks team members decided to decorate it (they called it "decorating the Christmas tree") with all of the random stuff that we brought for the retreat – mainly snack food.  Here is their work of art:

Ummmm Yeah….

The retreat was fantastic.  We ended up covering everything that we had in the schedule (wow!), and our discussions were engaging and thought-provoking.  I am really excited about our plans for our Regional Time at Conference.  I think we’ve put together the magic formula to keep students interested, to make them stakeholders in our regional success, and also to make discernment a worthwhile and life-giving process for everyone.

We also got our shirt design and banner figured out, began planning for LA Congress, and actually did our own leadership discernment process.  One of my favorite parts was at the end of the day, when one of the members of the Spirit Fire student leadership team at John XXIII joined us.  First he asked us some questions about our Conference experiences, and it was really neat to hear the diversity and wealth of experiences that everyone on the regional team has experienced.  Afterwards we had a good conversation about Evangelization, FOCUS and what are some things we can recommend to the future National & Regional leadership teams.  By the end we were all really tired, but we accomplished so much.  I am really happy about this weekend.

That night we went out on the town to celebrate our accomplishments, eating dinner at Hu-Hot Mongolian Grill, then went over to the Drunken Monkey, the new bar down the street.  They opened up a few weeks back, and they’ve really cleaned the place up.  The bar stools are actually swings hanging from the ceiling, and there’s actually a cage by the door, that I guess you need to dance in order to get out.  We had a lot of fun, as you can see below:

Again, we tried not to stay out too late, because we had an even earlier morning on Sunday.  We woke up at 6am (ugh) and drove down to Lafayette to go to Mass with Fr. Bob.  It was such a nice experience and a very enjoyable Mass, we then went out for our team breakfast (where I had to break out of early) and the team went home.  The rest of my Sunday was awesome as well.  I planned on going to to Sophia’s (my Goddaughter’s) dedication, which also happened to be in Lafayette.  But because of my inability to follow directions (arggh), I ended up being a 1/2 hour late and missing her dedication.  I was so bummed out and frustrated with myself.  I got to hang out with Sam and Sophie for the rest of the service, and we went back to their house afterwards for a nice lunch and some good times with their family – an awesome Sunday morning!

Needless to say I was tired when I got home, and ended up dosing off watching the Broncos game later on…  I was so blessed to have this weekend go so well.  In the last few days I got some really nice emails from my regional team members, which really affirmed me in my decision to stay back from DC and do the meeting.  I’m thankful that everyone was able to be there, and we had such a productive and fun time.

However I’m still recuperating from this weekend, and I feel sickness knocking on my door.  I need a little more rest to fully recuperate, but so far so good

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p align=”left”>See all of my Team West Retreat Pictures

So the latest drama out of our church, and another sign that times are still bad for our faith community – our music minister has resigned, after less than 15 months on the job…

I don’t blame her one bit for leaving, and in all actuality understand and support her reasons for doing so. J23 has to be a tough place to work.  It’s disappointing when volunteers aren’t adhering to your requests and completely ignoring any policy that you’ve set.  It sucks because the previous music minister had this "laissez-faire" approach and really wasn’t all to invested with the music groups, so these groups have spent years doing pretty much anything they’ve wanted.  The leadership at the church has been pretty hands-off as well, which hasn’t helped the situation.

On top of all that the leadership amongst the staff has become weak.  This starts with the Pastor drastically cutting the music ministry’s budget, without even having the courtesy to inform the music minister.  Then with members of staff failing to acknowledge the music minister’s presence doesn’t bode well for that staff member’s perceived value.  Whether this was done intentionally is not an issue – the damage that has resulted is still the same.

The music minister’s departure is especially concerning for both the staff, the music ministry and ultimately our faith community at John XXIII.  Her hire 15 months ago was part of a massive turn-over we had, with 4 (of the 9) staff members leaving within weeks of each other.  In my opinion, her hiring was the only staff upgrade we made between the old staff and new staff (with the other staff members leaving big shoes to fill).  I’m really anxious to see if we’ll be able to find someone who has a skill set remotely comparable to our departing music minister.  Quality, talented people will not come in to work for weak leadership.

With that comes my greatest fear and likely prediction: that they’re not going to replace the music minister.  The pastor is going to make the same statement he made about the former "Director of Campus Ministry" position we had: That the money isn’t available, the search process would likely be difficult and there will have to be a period of time that will need to pass before we can hire someone.  Better yet, in order to make the books look better, we won’t hire someone until the end of our church’s fiscal year (June 2006), and the choirs will just have to manage on their own for a while.  Then when the summer roles around, the leadership will claim that we really don’t need a music minister, and there’s no need to hire one.

Mark my words: something like that will happen.  The result with the music ministry will be catastrophic.  The musicians are all hard-working, thinly-stretched and under-appreciated, and have this desire to be recognized for the contributions that they make.  They need to feel relevant, and the church needs to support them by providing a competent, organized staff member that can coordinate their efforts and serve their needs.  If a music minister is not hired before the spring, you will see 1-2 more choirs disband by the summer.  This will be a grave situation for our faith community, being that our strong music ministry has always been a staple of our liturgical experience (and for many, one of the few reasons to go to J23 rather than another Catholic church in Fort Collins).

I just hope I’m wrong…

Okay, the letters don’t really match, but with the way things are going in these meetings, it might as equate into the spelling.  Last night we had another UMAC meeting, and as always, lived up to it’s regularly scheduled drama and excitement, even more-so because we went over.  The meeting’s scheduled to end at 9pm, but I didn’t pull into my parking lot until 10:15pm.  So yeah, one of those nights.

I’m not really sure where to begin, I don’t think my thought-process or your reading experience would not be well-served by recapping the entire 3-hour meeting, but there are a few points & statements that spoke out to me:

The University Ministry "core" staff (for lack of a better term – which consists of the two University Ministers and the FOCUS campus director) drafted a mission & vision statement, along with a 1 year plan and solicited UMAC for feedback (the main topic on the agenda for this evening)  The reasoning surrounding creating a Mission & Vision was based on the UM Staff’s perception that there was not a smooth transition between our former Campus Ministers and our current staff, resources were not available and a Mission/Vision statement did not exist

The mission statement frankly reads more like the FOCUS mission statement, then anything that was part of the institutional memory at John XXIII.  The statement includes words like "the Magisterium and all of her teachings" and "The commission of evangelization", not only that, but the lone reference to the "Empowered By the Spirit" document which has shaped our Campus Ministry program, was referenced incorrectly, calling it the NCCB when it should be USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops).  While reading it to us, the Campus Minister actually needed help with the acronym, which leads me to question just how much they’ve read the letter.

At this point concerns were raised specifically to the process of how this document was drafted – that it was done between only three people without any collaboration or buy-in from stake-holders.   Additionally many people had problems with the wording (which I specified above).  At this point the meeting started getting a little out of control, with the discussion somehow off-track to topics like Church Teaching & the Infallibility of the Pope and pornography in CSU libraries (don’t ask me how we got to that topic).  It was definitely getting out of hand.

I tried to do what I personally could to shift topics back on track, offering my feedback, expressing my disappointment that the 6 Aspects of Campus Ministry in Empowered were not better incorporated, that their document virtually had no mention of Social Justice issues (which are two of the defined aspects!) or much in the way of forming Christian Leaders for the Future.  I then tried to offer an alternative suggestion and threw out possible utilizing the Campus Ministry Leadership Institute as opportunity to structure their visioning & planning.  I didn’t wordsmith their document or tore it apart, and I was careful not make any criticism that could perceived as a personal attack.  But I fear that my suggestions, along with everything I said that night fell on deaf ears.

As the meeting progressed things got more out of control, which resulted in one of the Campus Ministers becoming outwardly emotional.  Somehow this got back to the well-told tale of "We never wanted the staff there, we never wanted FOCUS and now we’ll never trust them."  The reason I use the term "well-told" and seem apathetic is because this discussion has taken place at more than half of our UMAC meetings, and it seems that we always go back to re-hashing the same points.  We have to assure the UM Staff that it’s not the fact they were chosen (or "brought here"), but the frustration lies with the process in which it happened (developing multiple search committees, soliciting feedback from all of these advisory groups, only to later have the Pastor completely break down this process, take matters into his own hands).

I may be cold, but it’s really time to grow up and move on.  First off, I have no idea how the Pastor could ever think it’d be a good idea to tell his staff that no one wanted them there.  Maybe he was trying to go Coach Boone in Remember the Titans, motivating his team with "No one thinks you can do it, but I believe in you.  Prove them wrong."  But obviously this has done more harm than any good it could have ever done.

As for the campus minister that got emotional – I’m sorry, but you need to find some way to heal and move on.  I remember the first time he cried, and I felt bad for what he went through (probably the same way some UMAC members felt last night), but when this is the 8th time I’ve seen him get emotional, and all I could really think was "Here we go again!".  I’m not completely heartless, but my patience has completely worn thin.  Someone I listen to on the radio always says "There’s no crying at work.", and that could be more true.  Obviously there are exceptions to the rule (like a death in the family), but the reason this is a rule is because you need to find some productive way to release your emotion.  If you keep crying it work, you need to stop taking things so personally…

…which I think is the heart of the matter.  The UM Staff at this point cannot take any form of criticism.  Last night they were literally asking for it, drafting this statement and asking for feedback, but when people even try to frame it in the most constructive manner, it’s still taken personally.

I’m not a therapist – I just play one on TV – but the UM Staff’s problem is that they’re ignorant and arrogant – and you can’t be both.  You can be arrogant about a situation if you are the authority of your topic and know what you’re talking about – we’ll give you room.  You can be ignorant if you approach a situation with humility and are willing to learn – we’ll be patient. You can’t be both – which is what I think in many things the UM Staff does, is happening.

I have problem with the fact that they always play the victim card and get defensive.  They constantly play their fiddle about "the rough transition" between UM Staff and that "they walked in with no vision or resources in place".  You guys built the house you’re living in.  While you only had a week to knowledge transfer with the previous University Minister (the short time-table was dictated by the Pastor to begin with), you had a wealth of knowledge available in myself, other members of Spirit Fire (2 which have been intimately involved with UM programming), as well as many former student leaders who were passionate about University Ministry at John XXIII.  The leadership’s inability to hear criticism or suggestion (ignorance + arrogance) has been the undoing of University Ministry at John XXIII.  The unwillingness of the UM Staff to learn from the institutional memory has driven that resource away, to the point of virtual extinction.

During these last few months I’ve worked hard to shape my feedback so it can in no way be perceived personally, and I’ve also made it a point to not offer any criticism without an alternative solution (i.e. "You don’t incorporate Empowered aspects, but here is a program that could really help you.").  Nothing helps!  My comments are still largely ignored, and from my perspective I’m dismissed because of who I am.  The majority of my campus ministry knowledge came from my experience with our former Campus Minister.  I feel like I’m seen in some circles in the staff as "the Pegge-incarnate"- any comments are make must be comments she would have made.  They don’t understand the intentions of the previous program, and because they don’t understand they fear it, which is why I’m ignored.

The meeting ended with another pearl of wisdom from the Pastor, basically stating "When it comes to staff & advisory groups, I’ll always side with the staff and support them."  In reflection I could see what he was trying to convey, but he failed miserably and I left the meeting feeling like our advisory group adds no value.  If the Pastor will always side with the staff and the staff does not listen to the advisory group, then what does the advisory group have to contribute?  I don’t blame the Pastor for necessarily feeling that way, but does he really have to vocalize it in front of the advisory groups?  Basically what I heard is "If you disagree with us – the Pastor and staff – then you don’t matter."

Why do I keep going to these meetings is beyond me…  I’m not sure how this group will contribute to the bottom line University Ministry at John XXIII, right now I don’t think those contributions offered by this group are welcomed, which ultimately makes me feel unwelcome.  With the group possibly being obsolete, what gifts do I have to offer to this group?