An Invitation to Go Off Script

One of the challenges we face as we encourage unity across disagreement is the challenge of and demand for clarity. A few weeks ago the Reformed Journal featured a piece on their daily blog written by a member of our Steering Team, Nate DeJong-McCarron. In this entry we are encouraged a more nuanced possibility - an improvisational ethic - for how we might consider moving forward in unity.

Going Off Script

By Nate DeJong-McCarron

On the heels of the height of the pandemic, the congregation I serve graciously provided an extended time of sabbath for me. The previous months of cobbling together live-streaming, wading through public health alerts, and caring for our community across masks had compounded upon the previous seven years of ministry. This Sabbatical provided a much needed step back.

I began my time away by enrolling in an improvisation class for clergy. Yes, it was for all of us: pastors, rabbis, priests, ministers, and more. While none of us in the group were comedians, we were comical. Each week we gathered across little Zoom boxes. Every Monday at 5:30pm we met to act out. Our agenda began with a warm up exercise, moved into an improv game, and we concluded with a time of reflection considering how the practice of improv could help us lead change, connect via empathy, navigate conflict, or improve relationships in our congregational contexts. The positive forward approach of improv (“Yes, and…”) really did lead to greater possibilities and helped untap hidden potential. 

Fast forward then to the context in which we find ourselves, in a context rife with strife and where division seems to be the soup du jour. Whether it’s in our congregations or in our counties, too many of us are exposed to too much disunity. Whether in our politics or in our pews, whether over sexuality or certainty, there is a growing sense that those who follow after Jesus are headed ever further toward a precipitous fall…