SPIRIT OF LIFE
A Tapestry of Faith Program for Adults
WORKSHOP 3: THE STIRRINGS OF COMPASSION: CARING FOR ONE ANOTHER
REVISED
BY REVEREND BARBARA HAMILTON-HOLWAY
© Copyright 2010 Unitarian Universalist Association.
Published to the Web on 9/29/2014 9:23:42 PM PST.
This program and additional resources are available on the UUA.org web site at
www.uua.org/religiouseducation/curricula/tapestryfaith.
WORKSHOP OVERVIEW
INTRODUCTION
We covenant to affirm and promote... Justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.
The living tradition we share draws from... Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love. — Principles of the Unitarian Universalist Association
This workshop engages participants in experiencing and reflecting on spiritual moments connected with giving, receiving care, and compassion. Discussion helps participants identify and articulate the aspects of life on Earth that call out for their caring attention to others. The activities help participants recognize, practice, and claim their ability to exchange compassionate spiritual support with others.
GOALS
This workshop will:
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Participants will:
WORKSHOP-AT-A-GLANCE
Activity | Minutes |
Welcoming and Entering | 0 |
Opening | 15 |
Activity 1: Story — A Hospital Blessing | 20 |
Activity 2: Creating Blessings | 25 |
Activity 3: Sharing the Blessings | 30 |
Faith in Action: Reaching out with Compassion | |
Closing | 5 |
Alternate Activity 1: Care and Compassion | 10 |
Alternate Activity 2: Creating a Meditation or Prayer | 30 |
Alternate Activity 3: Healing Circle | 30 |
SPIRITUAL PREPARATION
Reflection. You may wish to set aside some time to reflect on your personal experiences and understanding of spiritual care and compassion. Either individually or together, co-leaders can use the workshop activities to spark and structure your reflection. Doing so will prepare you to explain and lead the activities.
Practice. Setting aside some moments to pray, to meditate, or to envision your good intentions for the workshop can help you to center yourself before you begin leading. A centered leader who is present and responsive while facilitating is likely to lead an effective workshop.
Review Workshop 1, Leader Resource 1, Accessibility Guidelines for Workshop Presenters, for general tips to make your workshop welcoming to people with physical disabilities and sensitivities.
WORKSHOP PLAN
WELCOMING AND ENTERING
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
As participants enter, invite them to sign in and create nametags.
OPENING (5 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Offer these, or similar, words of welcome:
Welcome to this program on Unitarian Universalist spirituality as expressed in our congregation's compassion and care for one another. Caring is an expression of our spirituality and our spiritual life can sustain us in our caring.
This workshop asks, "How can we grow to experience hope and healing in the midst of life's challenges?" I'm so glad you are here to explore this question with us today.
Distribute Handout 1 and indicate the unison chalice-lighting words. Invite a participant to light the chalice while you lead the group in reciting the unison chalice-lighting words. Invite participants to read silently along with you as you read aloud the Unitarian Universalist Principle and Source that this workshop highlights.
Introduce the workshop with these or similar words:
Please speak your name into the gathering. As we listen to one another's names, let us remember that each person has so much to deal with in life—pressures, anxieties, grief, and struggles. Let us hold each person in our compassion and care.
Invite participants to take turns saying their names clearly.
Explain that this workshop focuses on the line "all the stirrings of compassion."
Invite participants to rise in body or spirit and sing "Spirit of Life," by Carolyn McDade, Hymn 123 in Singing the Living Tradition.
If your congregation has a tradition of using body movement or sign language to accompany this song, you may invite participants to share in this movement while they sing together.
ACTIVITY 1: STORY — A HOSPITAL BLESSING (20 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Invite participants to sit comfortably and listen to the story as you read aloud. You may wish to use a pulpit or podium and/or a cordless microphone to ensure that all participants can hear you. Pause at the conclusion. Then comment on the story, with these or similar words:
There is something so powerful about having the deep and sacred aspects of your work and your relations with people named. There is something sacred about having someone pay attention to you, hold your hands, honor what you do, and ask for your healing.
You may wish to share an example of such honoring from your own experience.
Talk with the group about rituals and blessings. Lead discussion with these or similar questions:
Some participants may struggle to find an understanding of "blessing" that fits with their Unitarian Universalist beliefs and values. They may associate the notion of "blessing" with a god they no longer believe in, or with the hierarchy of their childhood religion. If you see the group getting stuck on their understanding of blessing, you can encourage them to think creatively about what blessing one another could mean in our democratic, theologically diverse community of faith. One way of thinking about "blessing" is as a recognition and sharing of abundance. The word berakah means "blessing" in both Arabic and Hebrew. Its ancient root word barak also means "liberal" and "pool." Pools of water, generous liberality, blessings—each of these things is an expression of abundance. We can think of blessing as recognizing and sharing abundance in the midst of scarcity; naming and expressing the abundance of spirit, abundance of compassion, and abundance of love that surrounds us, even when we or others cannot feel it.
ACTIVITY 2: CREATING BLESSINGS (25 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Introduce this activity with these or similar words:
Just as the Rev. Jurgen Schwing worked with his team to create a blessing of the hands, we are going to work in small groups to create blessings. Rather than bless each of us individually, we will bless ourselves together, as a group.
We'll create a blessing of our hands, a blessing of our minds, a blessing of our hearts, a blessing of our spirits, and a blessing of our community. We'll create and conduct these blessings to support ourselves as a community in responding with our care to the ways that the hurts of the world affects each of us.
In your groups, use a combination of words, movements, and gestures to create the blessing you're assigned. When we share with our whole group the blessing each group has created, we will present in this order: blessing our minds, hearts, hands, spirits, and community.
Invite participants to count off to form five groups. If you prefer, invite participants to choose their own small groups, being careful to keep groups nearly equal in size.
Distribute the instruction slips for creating the five different blessings that you cut out from Leader Resource 1. Explain that groups will have twenty minutes to create a blessing based on their assignment. Each blessing should take no more than two minutes to conduct. Ring the bell to begin the group work. Make yourself available as a resource, answering questions and offering ideas where needed. Ring the bell again when the twenty minutes are up.
Adaptations for more than 30 participants: If you have a large group, you can create up to ten small groups. Keep in mind that later, when participants share their blessings with the entire group, each group will need at least two minutes. If you find you need to form many small groups now, be prepared to adapt Activity 3, Sharing the Blessings. You may wish to extend the time for the activity; reconvene participants into two, separate groups so that all have time to conduct their blessings; or, decide how you will select just some of the small groups to conduct their blessings.
Adaptations for fewer than ten participants: With fewer than ten participants, form two or three groups. Assign one, two, or three blessings to each group, so that participants will generate all five blessings.
Including All Participants
Encourage groups to be sensitive to variations in living situation, physical ability, gender identity, country of origin, or other aspects of life that may exist among participants, and to create blessings that include all.
ACTIVITY 3: SHARING THE BLESSINGS (30 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Gather participants together to enact the blessings. Remind participants that the blessings will flow in this order: Blessing of our minds, our hearts, our hands, our spirits, and our community. Ask participants to maintain silence between the blessings. Invite them to pay attention to the flow of the blessings as a whole, as well as to the role of their small group's work in shaping the overall experience.
Invite participants to get comfortable in their chairs, take some deep breaths, and prepare to receive the blessings. Signal the first small group to begin.
After the groups have conducted their blessings, guide a discussion with these questions:
CLOSING (5 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Gather the group around the altar or centering table. Affirm the good work that participants have done in this workshop. Hand out the Taking It Home handout you have prepared. Explain the activities, as needed.
Invite everyone to join hands, and offer this blessing:
We give thanks for our minds, hearts, hands, spirits, and this community.
May we bless one another and bless the world with our caring.
What we do matters more than we know.
May you go home at the end of the day feeling blessed
And feeling you have contributed to the healing of the world.
Go in peace. Go in love.
Extinguish the chalice.
Including All Participants
Be sure to be inclusive of people with a variety of living situations—living alone, with a significant other, in a family, with housemates, etc.—in the way you explain the Taking It Home activities.
FAITH IN ACTION: REACHING OUT WITH COMPASSION
Description of Activity
Find out from your parish minister, your pastoral care team, or other appropriate congregational group about the ways in which assistance is needed. Ask about opportunities that require a small time commitment as well as a substantial one. Invite participants as a group or as individuals to assist with the congregation's pastoral ministry, involving participants in on-going projects or offering to initiate an activity. Possible projects include:
LEADER REFLECTION AND PLANNING
After the workshop, co-facilitators should make time to get together to evaluate the workshop and plan future workshops. Use these questions to guide your shared reflection and planning:
TAKING IT HOME
We covenant to affirm and promote... Justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.
The living tradition we share draws from... Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love. — Principles of the Unitarian Universalist Association
Bring a blessing you've created home to a partner, a family member, or a friend. Conduct your blessing for and with your family, a group you belong to, or some of the people with whom you work or volunteer.
Hold on to the themes of compassion and care throughout the coming week. Discuss with friends, loved ones, and colleagues ways to recognize one another's struggles and efforts against the world's hurts.
ALTERNATE ACTIVITY 1: CARE AND COMPASSION (10 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Explain that the topic for this activity is care and compassion. Invite participants to take some deep breaths and seek inside themselves their truest answers to these questions:
Repeat the questions. Invite people to call out some of their answers. Take a few minutes to hear some responses. Be sure to thank each participant for his/her response.
ALTERNATE ACTIVITY 2: CREATING A MEDITATION OR PRAYER (30 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Share with participants:
There is so much that calls out for our care and compassion.
You are invited to create your own centering in meditation and prayer that names your experiences, feelings, and hopes as you try to live compassionately.
Distribute Handout 2. Explain that participants are welcome to use the phrases on the worksheet in their own meditation or prayer, use meditations or prayers that speak to them from any resources you have provided, or write their own from scratch. Provide writing paper and pens or pencils. Tell participants they will have fifteen minutes to write, and then an opportunity to share their writings in pairs, preferably with a partner they do not know well. If you have an odd number of participants, create a triad.
Explain that pairs will have five minutes for sharing. Partners should give one another the opportunity to speak or read aloud uninterruptedly, and should listen with care and attention.
Say:
These are moments of precious sharing and confiding. We offer one another our mutual trust and regard as we share with another the words we wrote for our centering in meditation and prayer.
Suggest that when speakers have finished reading a prayer or meditation, listeners might affirm by saying "Amen" or "Thank you." Allow five or six minutes for pairs to complete sharing. Let the group know when two or three minutes have passed and remind pairs to switch the speaker and listener roles.
Gather the large group and lead a discussion with these questions:
Including All Participants
Learning or cognitive disabilities can make on-the-spot composition very difficult for some people. Have a few books of prayers and meditations available, so that participants who do not want to write their own can choose a piece to share. The Find Out More section of this workshop suggests some books well suited to this purpose.
ALTERNATE ACTIVITY 3: HEALING CIRCLE (30 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
This activity works well in a group with a high level of trust. It is not recommended for groups that are just getting to know one another.
Distribute hymnbooks. Invite participants into a time of quiet. When the group is settled, invite participants to join you in singing Hymn 352, "Find a Stillness," or Hymn 391, "Voice Still and Small," both from Singing the Living Tradition, or another song you have chosen.
Teach the group Hymn 1002 from Singing the Journey, "Comfort Me." Explain that the group will sing the first verse of this hymn to affirm each participant who brings his/her joys, sorrows, or concerns into the healing circle.
Gather participants into a circle. Ask each person who shares to wait until many others have shared before sharing again. Invite participants to call out joys, sorrows, or concerns as they feel moved. After each sharing, sing the first verse of "Comfort Me."
Allow enough silence to ensure that all have shared who would like to. Then, invite participants to sing the verse one more time for all the joys and sorrows spoken and unspoken.
If the group is comfortable with touch, you can invite participants in the circle to rise as they are willing and able. Invite all who want to receive the touch of hands on their shoulders and the singing of the group to come to the center of the group. Direct the participants remaining in the circle to place their right hands on the shoulder of the person standing next to them, and gently place their left hands on the shoulders of people in the center. Repeat the first verse of "Comfort Me," or lead the group in another song you have chosen.
Invite participants to join hands to form one large circle. Offer closing words that express thanks for this time together, for the sharing, for the healing thoughts and care. You may wish to close by leading the group in singing Hymn 413 in Singing the Living Tradition, "Go Now in Peace."
SPIRIT OF LIFE: WORKSHOP 3:
STORY: A HOSPITAL BLESSING
As human knowledge has grown, we have come to know the immensity of the universe. The universe is big and we human beings can seem infinitesimally small. The hurting in the world, our community, and our families seems huge, and we can feel as though there is little we can do. There's so much that needs care and compassion, so much pain and suffering, and so much hurting and injustice.
It's a lot to wrap our brains around, to think about, to try to understand and work to solve. It's a lot for our hearts to feel, to keep open and sensitive and responding. It's a lot for our hands to try to do. It's more than any of us can do on our own.
How do we keep ourselves from being overwhelmed? How do we keep our spirits from sinking into the pain and staying there? How do we keep ourselves going? How do we link with others in our efforts?
Ritual can be a powerful tool for raising our spirits and building our capacity for compassion. A story from one of our congregations offers an example; The Rev. Jurgen Schwing is an ordained United Church of Christ minister who is a member of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley in California. He works at a nearby hospital, where members of the congregation also volunteer, offering spiritual care to patients. As they worked with patients, they noticed something: the patients and their families weren't the only ones needing spiritual care. The hospital's doctors, nurses, social workers, and other health care staff were often looking weary and stretched. Rev. Schwing could see how the constant care of patients was draining the staff, both emotionally and spiritually. He talked with the Unitarian Universalist volunteers and decided to offer a ritual for the staff: a ritual blessing of their hands.
It is a secular hospital. Many of the staff have no religious affiliation. The hospital administration initially had concerns about having a "blessing of the hands," even if it was designed to be both voluntary and interfaith. But they gave their consent, mostly because they didn't want to un-invite the clergy and volunteers whom Rev. Schwing had already invited!
The team thought thirty or forty participants might come to the ritual. Yet, when the day came, one hundred fifty nurses, doctors, and other staff lined up to receive a blessing of their hands.
Each participant was invited into the meditation room, where a member of the team spoke to them. "What is your name?" "What is your role in the hospital?" "May I hold and bless your hands?" The team member then held their hands and spoke words of blessing created for that individual.
For example, a phlebotomist, who takes a patient's blood, received this blessing:
Susan, may your hands be blessed. May they be calm and steady. May you be able to induce confidence in the people you serve. May you provide great health care, and may you also share of your heart and of your compassion. May your work contribute to the detection of diseases and in this way contribute to health.
Susan, may those who come here for healing be touched not just by your work, but by your being. May you find wholeness, and may you go home at the end of each day feeling blessed and feeling that you have contributed to the healing of the world.
Since that first day, Rev. Schwing, his staff, and volunteers have offered thousands of those blessings. Hospital staff arrive stressed out, with jaws set, and very much in "work mode." By the end of the blessing, there are tears or smiles or both. The staff are renewed, strengthened, and ready to bless their patients with attentive and compassionate care.
SPIRIT OF LIFE: WORKSHOP 3:
HANDOUT 1: THE STIRRINGS OF COMPASSION
UNISON CHALICE LIGHTING
We light this chalice in affirmation of compassion in human relations.
We gather to support each other in caring for one another
and in trusting in the transforming power of love.
We gather to explore our own experiences
and listen to the experiences of others,
to create and share and to bless one another.
May our time together renew our spirits, deepen our community,
and inspire us to lead lives of compassion and care
to build the common good.
We light this chalice for the Spirit of Life.
PRINCIPLE AND SOURCE
This workshop is grounded in the following Principle and Source from the Purposes and Principles of the Unitarian Universalist Association:
Justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.
Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love.
SPIRIT OF LIFE: WORKSHOP 3:
HANDOUT 2: CREATING A CENTERING MEDITATION OR PRAYER
Create your own centering meditation or prayer that names your experiences, feelings, and hopes as you try to respond with compassion to individuals, groups, or the world. Perhaps you'll be drawn to completing some of these sentences. Or, create your own sentences that name your experience of trying to live compassionately. If you are creating your own words, you might try writing as if you were writing a letter to someone you love and trust with whom you can share your experiences, feelings, and hopes.
Spirit of Life... | I find strength in... |
My heart goes out to... | I put my faith in... . |
So much calls out for my attention... . | I find joy in... |
I am overwhelmed when... . | I am grateful for... |
I am frustrated by... . | What matters now is... . |
I feel when weary when... | I hope to... . |
My own life is... . | One thing I can do is... |
I seek... | I will... |
I need... | I join with... . |
I am restored by... | May... |
SPIRIT OF LIFE: WORKSHOP 3:
LEADER RESOURCE 1: CREATING BLESSINGS
Cut sheet into 5 strips along dotted lines.
I. Blessing of Our Minds
The hurting in the world, our community, and our families seems huge, and we can feel as though there is little we can do. Every day, our minds process so much information. We learn of pain and suffering, we learn of hurting and injustice, in ourselves and in the word. It’s a lot for our minds to take in, to think about, to try to understand and work to solve.
With words, movements, and gestures, create a blessing of our minds.
II. Blessing of Our Hearts
The hurting in the world, our community, and our families seems huge, and we can feel as though there is little we can do. Every day, our hearts process so many emotions. So much in the world needs care and compassion. There is so much pain and suffering, and so much hurting and injustice. It’s a lot for our hearts to hold.
With words, movements, and gestures, create a blessing of our hearts.
III. Blessing of Our Hands
The hurting in the world, our community, and our families seems huge, and we can feel as though there is little we can do. There’s so much that needs care and compassion, so much pain and suffering, and so much hurting and injustice. There is so much work for our powerful yet tired hands.
With words, movements, and gestures, create a blessing of our hands.
IV. Blessing of Our Spirits
The hurting in the world, our community, and our families seems huge, and we can feel as though there is little we can do. Our spirits can feel the weight of all that needs care and compassion, all the pain and suffering, and all the hurting and injustice. How do we keep ourselves from being overwhelmed? How do we keep our spirits from sinking into the pain and staying there?
With words, movements, and gestures, create a blessing of our spirits.
V. Blessing of Our Community
The hurting in the world, our community, and our families seems huge, and we can feel as though there is little we can do. Our community recognizes so much that needs care and compassion. We see so much pain and suffering and so much hurting and injustice. It’s more than any of us can handle on our own. How do we keep ourselves going? How do we link our efforts with others?
With words, movements, and gestures, create a blessing of our community.
FIND OUT MORE
Books of Prayers and Meditations
Collections of meditations by Unitarian Universalists, compiled by Skinner House Books:
Listening for Our Song (at www.uuabookstore.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=595)
Day of Promise (at www.uuabookstore.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=548)
All the Gifts of Life (at ../Local%20Settings/Temporary%20Internet%20Files/Local%20Settings/Temporary%20Internet%20Files/OLK3/secure.uua.org/bookstore/product_info.php%3fcPath=&products_id=1103)
Singing in the Night
Prayers collected by Elizabeth Roberts and Elias Amidon, published by Harper Collins:
Earth Prayers from Around the World;
Life Prayers from Around the World;
Prayers for a Thousand Years: Blessings and Expressions of Hope for the New Millennium.
Prayers collected by Larry Dossey, published by Conari Press:
Prayers for Healing: 365 Blessings, Poems, and Meditations from Around the World.
Worship Web (at www.uua.org/spirituallife/worshipweb/), is an on-line resource that includes prayers and meditations by and for Unitarian Universalists.
Here are places for you to find out more about prayer shawl ministry:
Prayer Shawl Ministry (at www.shawlministry.com/)
The Knitting Way: A Guide to Spiritual Self-Discovery (at www.uuabookstore.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=358), by Janice MacDaniels and Linda Skolnik, published by Skylight Paths.