A New Support Group

I have been on this learning curve for awhile now - can I learn to love without fixing? It is a huge challenge, driven by my desire to see the gospel bring life to everyone, no matter how big the brokenness...and to learn how to be consistent and authentic, not always jumping in and out to help and to recover, not giving out of religious duty but out of love and humanness.

I am starting a support group for anyone interested in this, to get together once a month in order to re-focus, to affirm each other, ask questions and maybe learn a thing or two as well - a bit like a water stop in the middle of a marathon. If you are accompanying someone (see quote below), or want to do this, you are invited to this support group. We will be meeting once a month, first Meeting Wed. April 29th, 7:00-9:00 p.m. in the Fireside Room at the Cambridge Vineyard...(The next meeting date will be decided based on everyone's availability.)

"When we honestly ask which persons in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving much advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not-knowing, not-curing, not-healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness...makes it clear that whatever happens in the external world, being present to each other is what really matters." -Henri J.M.Nouwen

"Accompaniment is necessary at every stage of our lives, but particularly in moments of crisis when we feel lost, engulfed in grief or in feelings of inadequacy. The accompanier is there to give support, to reassure, to confirm, and to open new doors. The accompanier is not there to judge us or to tell us what to do, but to reveal what is most beautiful and valuable in us, as well as to point towards the meaning of our inner pain. In this way, an accompanier helps us advance to greater freedom by helping us to be reconciled to our past and to accept ourselves as we are, with our gifts and our limits. (p. 129 Becoming Human by Jean Vanier)

Talk to Shelley Maw for more info.