Critique of Meetings

If this were a normal brethren Sunday (sorry, Lord's day), I would have four separate occasions of gathering to attend, instead of trying to find out why my washing machine leaves powder residue on the clothes after washing. On the whole, I know which I prefer.

Actually, I never much minded the meetings themselves. In the usual way they are kind of restful and make no demands. But the fact that one must rush from occasion to occasion is stressful, and the shortage of people willing to make intelligent conversation afterwards is also trying, given that there is often more standing around than sitting in the meeting itself. As an aunt of mine once memorably said about her dislike of special meetings (three-days, and the like - see the non-existent glossary): "I don't mind the meetings, it's the playtimes I can't stand". And we agreed on that, as on much else.

When asked, as I have been more than once, "what do you think about in meetings?", I struggle to answer. I don't really remember. I do know that I never had much success with planning and working out problems, as the atmosphere was always wrong for serious thinking. On the other hand, if I had the structure of something in my head, it was a good time for refining details.

Mostly, though, I treated the meetings as a spectator sport. I never really tired of approaching them as a critic would and giving them my skeptical attention. That starts with giving notional marks out of ten to the various speakers for their contributions, divided up into general effectiveness, originality, luminosity of illustration, quality of phrasing and, of course, the all-important consistency. Then that widens out to the general occasion itself, as the overall effect of the team effort is often quite different to the quality of the contributions.

I don't see why anyone wouldn't find this an interesting occupation. It's a bit like a jazz form of theatre in which the players, while amateur and improvising, are committed to the result, and therefore the whole thing is intense with intended meaning. You don't need to believe in any of it to enjoy the study.

As I said, consistency is the first thing to watch. Is a comment consistent with the current theme? Does it match with what the person themselves has said before? Do they believe it enough to live in accordance with what they're saying? Then, as part of the general study, is it something that fits with current teaching, and if so, is that itself consistent with previous teaching? To gain high marks in this, the statement must be both relevant and fit neatly into the pattern of brethren beliefs, and, usually, be an unchanged belief. However, the highest marks are reserved for new items of teaching that make more sense than what went before, as I was always keen on correcting earlier inconsistencies. I might add in passing that long-term watching of this is very effective in building up a picture of what the brethren really believe and what is subject to pragmatic change, and the real structure of what they know as "the truth".

Originality is obviously harder to come by. Safety is always first for contributions. Yet if someone can manage, within the strictures, to say something which sounds fresh, they deserve a bit of applause, even if it's in my head. Some do actually do quite well with this, sometimes by having deep thoughts of their own instead of rabbiting whatever's going around at the time, sometimes by having a way with words so that they can say something perfectly normal in an original way.

Quality of phrasing and illustration is closely linked to that. It's definitely not done to use complicated words, but some are good at creating images with simple talk, and I admire that.

Lastly is the effectiveness. That's not only a subjective judgment, which counts for a little, but mainly a measurement of the audience atmosphere. There have been times when I've been left entirely cold by somebody's performance, yet the rest of the listeners have appeared to be greatly affected. In which case, all credit to the man concerned, and I need to study closer to see what it is that is having that result. The ultimate sign of effectiveness is when somebody is quoted afterwards, and in some cases the quotations will continue for years.

The latter element doesn't really apply to special meetings, as they are supposed to be effective and influential, and therefore are assumed to be so unless all the preceeding aspects are direly deficient. Which can happen, and then I pity the poor people who are supposed to relay it all to their congregations back home.

And now I'm spared all that, and have my critical capacity available for more profitable tasks. Though hopefully it has been useful to exercise it.