*Process does not overtake
progress
Rules of Engagement
What OCP has been to its members - negatives
Rules of Engagement
- Too much Ron at times? Maybe someone else can take the lead; shared responsibility
- Concrete goals to track actual progress
- Time keeper/Vibe keeper – Jonathan
- Life-changing experiences
- A place to live, love and grow
- A place to be accepted, no matter what
- A place to come when you have nowhere else to go, open doors to all
- Socializing, fun, building interpersonal relationships
- Broaden horizons
- A safe place
- Resourceful; provides some basic needs (i.e., food, shelter, clothes, receive mail)
What OCP has been to its members - negatives
- Challenging to mediate all the diversity -> conflict
- Lack of order; chaos
- Staff
- Grounds
- Programming
- Community
- Boundaries
- Rules
- Our positive characteristics end up becoming our pitfalls; want rules, but not too many or too stringent ones; moderation
- Growth oriented; more learning
- Promote personal growth
- Intellectual growth
- Life skills
- Practical skills
- Spiritual growth
- More Activities
Now let’s reflect on the original objectives of OCP… “A
Christian organization that seeks:”
- To accommodate, foster and provide activities and programs related to personal growth and community well-being
- To be a resource in the community for individuals seeking information or services already provided by other organizations
- To educate and empower individuals toward self-sufficiency, thus crating social capital for the community at large
- To nurture a community that appreciated diversity and sees differences and conflict as opportunities for spiritual growth
- Pretty similar in its overall undertone to what we have come up with
- Wordiness?
- Ambiguity of definitions
- Barriers – will be different for everyone
- Is self-sufficiency really our ultimate goal? Or is it community cooperation
- It’s probably to achieve self-sufficiency for each individual through community efforts…
What has been said about OCP:
“OCP seeks to build an atmosphere of love, safety,
education, spiritual awareness, healing and fun in which anyone in the world is
welcome to help and/or participate. OCP is dedicated to breaking down barriers
that tend to separate humans from the joys to be experiences in loving
communities and particularly dedicated to including in its activities those
struggling with poverty and difficult life experiences.”
- Fairness – unfortunately, not everyone is equal but, everyone should be treated fairly
- Justice is blind…
- Expectations – should there be rewards for living up to certain expectations?
- Consistency; again with the fairness (vs. equality)
- Paradigm is flexible
- WHY do we want to be all of the above?
- WHAT > HOW > WHY? (vision)
- Is there some underlying purpose for all of this?
- We want to be a certain “atmosphere”, but why? Is there a lack of it?
- Is there a particular problem that we are trying to tackle?
- Major social problems that we as a community can actually address?
- Homelessness
- Who are these people and why aren’t they going anywhere?
- Pre-existence of a difficult life
- Lack of knowledge and compassion within the community
Conceivable answers to the big “BUT WHY…?”
- We want to give people an opportunity for a better life
- As a Christian Organization
- Follow Christ
- Seek the kingdom of God
- To do God’s Will
- But if the “whys” are the above mentioned, then the “what” is no longer the community center but rather, the monastery
- We want a neutral space
For next time: deliverables – markers for progress
No comments:
Post a Comment