On Mentoring
a sermon by Alan Taylor
March 5, 2000
Woodinville Unitarian Universalist Church
Several years ago, I took a writing course. My friend, Rick, was the teacher. It was a rigorous 15 weeks where each week, I did my darnedest to craft two pages of flawless writing. I was there to learn how to write with clarity, force, and grace. During the course, I felt my writing was getting stodgy and disjointed. It just didn’t flow. And I worried that my writing samples were not very impressive and were getting worse. One week, the topic was to write on what we appreciated about another piece of writing. This assignment simply seemed beyond me. I don’t know why, but it intimidated me. I didn’t want to disappoint my teacher and not turn something in, and I didn’t want to attempt something that would make me look like a fool. So I chose Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address which is a great piece of writing. I chose it because I knew of books written on this great address. I used other people’s ideas but didn’t attribute them.
Now, if I wanted to cheat, it should have occurred to me that my teacher, a lawyer, would likely be aware of popular work on Lincoln’s famous address. Sure enough, Rick guessed right away that I had taken ideas from another writer without attributing them. He called me up, and said, “Alan, I am concerned about your last assignment. Let’s meet for lunch.”
I was mortified. My attempt to avoid looking like a fool failed miserably. At this time, Rick was more than twice my age. He had taken an interest in me, and wanted to help me improve my writing. And here I had just done what young burgeoning writers are never supposed to do. Worse, it was the very writer whom I wanted to impress that called me on it. The mere thought of someone I admired identifying me as negligent or immature filled me with dread. I was sure my life was ruined now that someone discovered that I am capable of making mistakes. How could I ever save face? Then finally that dreaded lunch came.
Over pastrami sandwiches
Rick and I talked for over an hour. The conversation began with Rick telling me
that he was concerned that my lack of intellectual honesty was a sign that I
was really stressed. He told me of a time when he had acted similarly and that
it was a sign that he was in trouble. He asked me, “What’s going on?” and “What
can you learn from this?” This was not the conversation I expected to have.
Direct but not derisive, Rick approached me out of concern for my well-being,
not as an outside authority figure accusing me of wrongdoing. Although
embarrassed, I didn’t feel condemned. The only person who was condemning me was
my own self.
I share this story because it was a powerful experience of mine of being mentored. Rick didn’t need to take the time to talk with me. He could have simply looked the other way and said nothing. He could have written a letter expressing disappointment. Instead he opened up the space to ask me what I could learn from this situation. And what a lesson I gained from this encounter--that writing is not about impressing others, but instead about finding one’s own voice. What a lesson about so much in life!
A good mentor teaches us to let go of the fear of making mistakes and instead embrace the opportunity of moving forward into the realm of the uncomfortable. Being a mentor means much more than simply modeling good behavior or being a cheerleader for someone. It means taking an active interest in the intellectual or emotional development of another human being, and that sometimes means wading into the water—indeed its calling to our youth, “Wade in the water, children, and God will trouble the water!”
I looked up the word ‘mentor’ in my dictionary. It comes from the Greek. Mentor was a friend and advisor of Odysseus entrusted with the education of Odysseus’ son, Telemachus. Today a mentor is known as a trusted guide. What surprised me was that the word ‘mentor’ was listed only in the noun form. And yet, it is now often used as a verb, such as in ‘it is an honor and privilege to mentor another human being.’
The word mentor comes up a lot in our culture. And being a mentor certainly is an important role here in this church. In our Coming of Age program, we have 13 junior high age children participating. Each of these youth has an adult mentor. That means more than 10% of our congregation right now formally serves in a mentoring role. It wouldn’t surprise me if there were far more of you who serve as mentors in your own lives.
When I was a young child, my favorite television show was The Super Friends. My favorite of the Super Friends was Superman. I wanted to be just like him. And as grew older, I found myself seeking to bring forth a big S on my chest—unconsciously I wanted to be Super Alan! I wanted to be invincible. I wanted to always know what the right thing was to do. Perhaps that is where I developed that sticky assumption that I shouldn’t make mistakes. Well, I was talking with my high school English teacher, Mr. Scruggs one day shortly after I graduated from college. I didn’t know what to do with my life. And I wasn’t making any decision very quickly. Mr. Scruggs, who by then I called Jim, said, “Are you a saint? Then why don’t you come down and join the rest of us?” Once I followed that advice, I was able to become more my own self, and thus much more capable of being a mentor to others.
I am guessing that many of our youth are a lot like me when I was younger. They are terrified that anybody might learn that they are capable of making mistakes, that they are vulnerable, that they have feelings other than the ones they display to others, that they have private thoughts and hopes which often remain hidden. It is a gift to provide to youth, indeed to one another, the space for honest and candid sharing. And I mean a gift in two senses, not only a gift to the youth, but it is a special skill that must be developed that gives us the ability to relate so effectively.
When our youth are together, it is like pulling teeth to get them to talk about what is on their hearts and in their minds. Instead they are so easily distracted by the desire to be liked and appreciated by their peers. I know, I have met with them! The boys can be quite obnoxious; the girls quiet and passive. Fortunately, we have an excellent group of leaders who run the Coming of Age program. Stan, Linda and Aggie are adept at getting our kids to talk and listen to one another. At this moment they are next door at the Lion’s Hall. For a six hour stretch they are engaging one another about what is important to them. Our adults are giving the youth an ethical framework in which they can develop their own morals. And that is the foundation of our children’s religious education program.
I have given considerable reflection to the role of mentor and have distinguished four aspects of mentoring:
Annie Dillard says of our role as human beings inhabiting this earth: “We are here to witness creation and to abet it. We are here to bring to consciousness the beauty and power that are all around us and to praise the people who are here with us.” Mentoring has a lot to do with affirming and encouraging. A little bit of praise goes a long ways. Scott Adams will attest to that, now that Dilbertville is a national sensation. But giving others encouragement and affirmation is much harder than it sounds. For it requires us giving of our time. Indeed, the most important part of mentoring is giving of our attention. Two months ago, I officiated at a memorial service for Don Peck. He had six children. Three of his own, and three from his wife’s previous marriage. Yet the families truly blended, and the step children saw Don as their father. His son, Scott, told me that he met Don when he was five years old. Don had brought with him a tie to give to the young Scott. During that first meeting, Don showed Scott how to tie the tie and talked with him. Scott says this was the first time any adult took time to really be with him. And thus, his step-father became his finest mentor.
It takes a lot of growing to learn that greatness comes with being oneself without pretensions. Benjamin Hoff expresses this so eloquently in the Te of Piglet, a profound set of reflections on Taoism and Winnie the Pooh. In a song for Piglet who worries about his stature, Pooh sings:
Animal so shy and small
Dreaming you were Bold and Tall—
You hesitate, all sensitive,
Waiting for a chance to Live.
Time is swift, it races by;
Opportunities are born and die …
Still you wait and will not try—
A bird with wings who dares not rise and fly.
But that You you want to see
Is not you, and will never be.
No one else will ever do
The special things that wait inside of you.
You can be a guiding star,
If you make the most of Who You Are.
And the sensitivity
That you’re now ashamed to see
Can be developed even more,
So you can find the hidden doors
Too places no one’s been before.
And the pride you’ll feel inside
Is not the kind that makes you fall—
It’s the kind that recognizes
The bigness found in being Small.
That means it is good if you are not doing what feeds your ego. That means I don’t have to be Super Alan. How important it is for both we and our youth to learn this!
One of the greatest ways to mentor young people is through telling stories that are important to you. Robert Coles, the child psychiatrist and sociologist, through his work with children, realized the extraordinary role stories play in human moral development. Much more than simple platitudes spoken over and over, stories have meanings that can apply to the nuances of everyday life. It has become clear to me that good sermons make use of stories. And all the world’s religions convey different truths through story form. It was Joseph Campbell that brought to light the power of myth. And is it any surprise that we pattern our own lives according to the stories we are familiar with?
Telling stories is one of the quickest ways of getting close to someone. If you have been on the dating scene, or sought to make new friends, you will know what I mean. Sharing one’s own stories brings people closer. By making oneself vulnerable, sharing a bit about yourself, the listener then has something to take away and in some sense, knows you on a level that goes deeper than mere conversation. The same goes for mentoring. And God knows our youth need stories that convey what is significant to us. So, I urge all of you to reflect on what stories about people in your life are significant to you, and share them!
Next week, several of my friends, family, colleagues, and mentors will join our congregation for our ordination and installation ceremony. My two greatest mentors, Barbara Merritt and Rob Eller-Isaacs, will be speaking in the service. I know not what they will say. Other mentors of mine will be here in person and others in spirit. I can easily say that I would not be nearly as confident a minister if I hadn’t had the mentoring that I have had. There are plenty of stories I could share, but allow me to end with just one.
It was probably my most embarrassing moment in ministry thus far. I was preparing to meet with the Ministerial Fellowship Committee, the denominational body that meets with every candidate to determine whether one is ready and capable of the demands of ministry. Sometimes they decide that a candidate needs more work or worse, that a candidate simply is not fit for the ministry. As you can imagine, there is anxiety going before this group who holds the keys to being recognized as a viable Unitarian Universalist minister. It was two weeks before my big interview. Five ministers met with me for a mock interview. I broke all the rules of good sermon-writing. I took a story from a sermon I wrote at school—the change in context took away much of the humor in the story. So, I added a couple quotes that sounded rather highfalutin. Then I modified it to be more neutral. By the time I gave this ten minute sermon to the ministers that came for my mock interview, it sounded like a dull, uninspiring lecture. In the height of my anxiety, I managed to produce the most god-awful sermon I have ever written. Talk about embarrassing, but this wasn’t the end. The ministers then asked me questions. I simply unable to answer about half of them, and I got pretty flustered over two of them.
How did these ministers respond? They were honest. They told me the sermon sucked. They also told me how each of my answers were flawed. Talk about humiliating. My internship mentor was there. She helped me save-face a bit by saying she never heard me do so poorly. That night I went home and cried, wondering how I’d get through the Ministerial Fellowship Committee.
I felt lost. Here I had devoted myself to preparing for ministry, and two weeks before seeing the Ministerial Fellowship Committee, I fell flat on my face. And then it occurred to me. I needed to preach on being lost. The result was perhaps the finest homily I have ever given. But it wouldn’t have happened if these ministers had not shown some tough love. They didn’t tell me that I sounded great, because I didn’t. They supported me by being honest and real.
Each of us has the capacity to be a mentor to others. It is a special relationship that demands time and attention. The rewards for paying that price are the depth of meaning and purpose which no amount of money can buy. May we be in the business of promoting such meaning and purpose.
Blessed be. Amen.