A Wrecked Church!

[ILG]

Originally Posted by HeavenBound

I like that idea if any would do this we would love to hear from them.

I think you would have to get an official or some outside unbiased party involved to see if they would do this. Any official will be somewhat biased because he will be related to the friend of the friend and on and on. If you could find an official who could just administrate and let both sides speak and have an unbiased jury decide the matter (possibly very hard to find one) that might work but it might not.

There are Christian mediation groups that specialize in this and they would be completely unbiased.

[ILG]

I have been reading the book Confessions of Surgeon by Paul A. Ruggieri. Last night I read a part where he talks about being sued. Early in his career, he rushed to the aid of an aging surgeon whose license should have been pulled as he kept messing up. However, the hospital was afraid to touch the old surgeon. He helped this surgeon who had made a huge mistake and left the room. The old surgeon then accidentally left a sponge in the person. The person sued. The old physician pretty much threw Dr. Ruggieri to the wolves in an attempt to keep his job. Here is what Dr. Ruggieri writes about having gone through it:

"The main truth is often irrelevant. The final truth ends up originating from an economic decision.....this (old) surgeon created his own problems. I don't blame the woman for suing....."

"Any patient, at any time, regardless of the quality of care given, can file a frivolous malpractice lawsuit, oblivious to the implications to those involved."

"As a result of two opening sentences in a legal letter, I was initiated into a secret club rarely spoken about. It is a club that brands you with a scarlet letter. A letter you spend the rest of your life trying to hide. I soon would journey through a process that swallows you whole, takes a few bites, and then regurgitates you. In the end, it leaves you alone to clean the emotional vomit off your white coat before getting back into the operating room. Living through a malpractice lawsuit forever changed me....the day I received that letter was the day I lost my professional virginity. I was young. It hurt like hell. I wanted it to be over quickly, and I would never speak about it again.....as the lawsuit unfolded, the very foundation of my professional altruism was shaken."

"As a defendant, I was embarrassed, shocked, %&$@ off, humbled and confused. I was embarrassed because the process made me feel as if I was part of some unspeakable evil. It made me feel as if I had purposely planned to cause harm, schemed to be negligent. I was shocked because nothing had prepared me to deal with the emotional baggage with being named in a lawsuit."

"As the suit ran it's slow course, it felt like I was emotionally bleeding every time I had to devote energy to defending myself. During the long, uninvolved gaps, I did my best to scab over the wounds until the next meeting or deposition. Then, the bleeding would start all over again.

"Three years later....the case was dropped. Yes, that was good news, but it was not over for me. For the next ten years, this black mark is on my record, even though I've been dropped from the case. Every time I apply for hospital privileges or renew my license, I have to explain it."

Wow. Could I ever relate to that! I had a hard time sleeping last night. My husband and I were never vindicated aside from the fact that the lawsuit(s) were finally dropped. Every friend that the previous pastor had ever had believed we were evil church destroyers. Many of the church members believed that. Far and wide, anywhere I go, if I were to walk into a UPC church and people found out who I was, there would be whispers and gossip. We had moved here from another state and no one here knew us when we took the church. We were both first generation Pentecostals.

When my husband decided to disafilliate the church, we had pretty much lost all confidence and hope in the district superintendent and presbyter. Of course, the presbyter had to show up for the disaffiliation meeting. He basically told the people that if there was a vote to disafilliate that we would take any money left. The district was there to protect them from that, from evil people like us! HA! Hogwash.

[ILG]

Anyway, lawsuits are so horrible. They suck the life out of you and drag on.....and on......and on......just when you think you are going to get a resolution, there is another reason to go back and back and back.

Just remember, the church building is a building. It is not God, it is not the church. It is not worth sweating great drops of blood over.

We were the defendants. We had no choice. If you have a choice, don't walk, RUN to the nearest exit. You may feel right, but you can take that rightness in your soul with you wherever you go. When we disaffiliated the church we could have pulled the church OUT of the organization. Why didn't we? We did not want to hurt the people who had supported us in any way. We quietly disappeared. Records in tact.

By the way, when we left, we didn't want any chance of revisionist history happening. My husband just happened to work for a printing company at the time and he took sheafs of paper with him to work every day. We took copies of the vast majority of the records with us, so, if anyone destroyed those other records there are more......but I will never say where.

[HeavenBound]

Originally Posted by ILG

I think you would have to get an official or some outside unbiased party involved to see if they would do this. Any official will be somewhat biased because he will be related to the friend of the friend and on and on. If you could find an official who could just administrate and let both sides speak and have an unbiased jury decide the matter (possibly very hard to find one) that might work but it might not.

There are Christian mediation groups that specialize in this and they would be completely unbiased.

Please could you tell me how to contact them. I'm sure we all would like to talk to them.

[ILG]

Originally Posted by HeavenBound

Please could you tell me how to contact them. I'm sure we all would like to talk to them.

I can't recommend or not recommend any of these groups but I found these online when I did a google search for Christian mediation. We were going to use one of these groups for our issues but the people who sued would not put up the money and pick anyone although they at first agreed to use mediation (and told everyone we refused to use it). I am sure the use of the term "Christian" will be the wider usage in our culture and some may not feel these people are "Christians" that can be used for mediation purposes. (The plaintiffs in our situation refused to go before the district board.) However, I feel they would be much more unbiased than anyone closer to the issue.

http://christianmediationservicesllc.com/

http://www.christianmediation.org/

http://justpeaceumc.org/2010/02/fait...ian-mediation/

http://christianmediate.com/

You can also do mediation/binding arbitration with a group of your choosing that both parties agree upon to use. You just have to make sure it is legally binding.

I wish you all well.

[ILG]

I also can't testify to what the process of mediation with any mediation group is like since we never got that far. However, I can say that lawsuits can drag on for years and it is like a slow bleed that goes on and on.

I would hope that mediation or binding arbitration could be quicker. You might still need lawyers on each side but how I think it works is that you get your lawyers to guide you both through presenting your sides and you meet once and get it over with, but I can't say that for sure.

[Praxeas]

As much as it might hurt, maybe it's just better to move on, find or start another church and leave those others to their own devices and pray God intervene in the lives of all to heal and correct?

[ILG]

Originally Posted by Praxeas

As much as it might hurt, maybe it's just better to move on, find or start another church and leave those others to their own devices and pray God intervene in the lives of all to heal and correct?

I could see how people might feel either way. I guess the main thing to do is count the cost of how horrific it could be before you step in. Of course, being the plaintiffs in the case, you could drop it at any time.

This may sound terrible to your ears at the moment, but it may help. Think about the woman and what she may be thinking. Her Daddy died. She is in grief. She believes that her Daddy's proclamation of this man being pastor is law or should be recognized. She believes that those that voted against this man are against God or at the very least are against the loyalty of her father's memory.

Rather than force the issue, maybe some time and space for all is best. Maybe instead of believing she is a bad person, maybe she is just trying to hold up her father's memory.

If you look this all over and think it all over and are convinced otherwise, that she is maliciously and negligently running roughshod over people, maybe you should go for mediation.

Maybe you should go for mediation anyway. Maybe she would see her fault and the church could find healing and come together.

Or maybe she is evil and the present pastor is evil. If so, you can fight it and you may win, but just know and be forewarned that fighting a spiritual war is a real war. It is ugly. It is mean. It is horrific.

Sometimes wars are just and need to be fought. But you might have war wounds for the rest of your life.

If you pray and are convinced you should fight, then fight. Otherwise, run for your life.

[ILG]

(My belief is that emotions are running high on all sides and mistakes are being made. But I am not sure that there is gross negligence. There is an abuse of power going on but I think they feel justified because of Daddy's memory. That doesn't make it right but I don't necessarily think it is based on evil motives. But this is not my battle and not my war so I would stay out of any decisions made.)