Reflection Paper 3

NOTE: This is a reading reflection, so it's highly informal. I promise that I write far more formally on a regular basis. I had to stay around 3 pages, so it's pretty to the point. The first paragraph also had to be a summary of my readings. Finally, I am writing this for a religious university, so things are labeled as "religious" and "secular", please don't take offense to this. This is the language used in our readings, and it fits the audience this is written for, which in this case is my professor not my friends. Enjoy, and let me know if you see any major boo-boos! :) 

Stewart discusses how social workers can utilize Social Justice in their practice, and the ways in which it can actually be the core value for their practice (Stewart 2013). While social workers seek for social justice, so do individuals in their daily lives. This desire to achieve social justice, among other reasons, results in the human desire to be something bigger than themselves and be members of a community. These communities can take on several forms. There are religious and secular communities. People join a community to feel a connected to one another, to celebrate and mourn together, and to have a group of people that encourage one another. Religious congregations often provide a sense of community, and they develop the ability to provide informal human services to one another. Practitioners can use their roles to encourage and support the use of informal human services that are provided by congregations. These services are typically administered through friends, families, neighbors, and others within the organization, so practitioners must ask questions and attempt to understand what informal resources might be available and how their clients may utilize them. Religious organizations may also provide more formal services that the practitioner can utilize. These services can vary, as can their funding sources. Their goal is to provide people with services that align with their religious beliefs. Much like in informal systems practitioners should understand how these services are provided, and how they can effectively assist their clients in utilizing them. Ellor, Netting, and Thibault (1999) stress the importance of community and the importance that practitioners encourage community connections. They also discuss that the culture of the United States is becoming highly individualistic and is not encouraging people to participate in communities, though people still crave and need community.  (Ellor, Netting, & Thibault 1999).

I completely agree with Ellor, Netting, and Thibault that communities enhance the lives of others in one way or another. Even as I watch juveniles in my own practice, all too often they are simply seeking acceptance, support, and love. They often find that in communities of people, unfortunately the communities they choose are not always what we would define as positive influences. Many times the parents are living independently of any supports. They do not want to ask for help, they do not want to seek guidance, they simply want to raise their children on their own. Some choose the path because they seek to be individuals, free of the confines of group or community norms. Others seem to have chosen this path, because their path in life has not displayed any other options to them. These situations can be highly discouraging to watch, especially when you as a social worker recognize the need that the family has to be connected to others or the need they have for help from others. Regardless of these situations, however, my experience have shown me that there is still hope for our future as a nation and that people still seek and benefit from connected ness.

I not only believe that there is hope that we can build families and communities through connectedness, but that we can connect on one level while still valuing individuality on several other levels. Though they may not all reflect traditional religious models. In the last two years I have experienced two communities that not only fit Ellor, Netting, and Thibault’s (1999) description of community, but also encourage individuality. One of these communities was formed within the religious community and the other would be considered secular.  Both were organized very differently than anything I had experienced before, and encouraged individuality.

The religious experience was with a church called the North End Collective Church. This church illustrated the small group movement discussed by Ellor, Netting, and Thibault (1999). The church was composed of several house churches that would meet individually once a week and as a large congregation once a week. These house churches were held a variety of people from several different walks of life. In many cases the primary commonality between all the members was that they all wanted to serve their God in the best ways they knew how. Beyond that commonality each person was individual and unique and was loved for being so. Due to a move I am no longer an active member of that church, but I will never forget the beauty of the relationships in that church, there was honest communication, they supported one another through tough times, celebrated with others during good times, and always were willing to help one another out when needed.

The secular experience is my involvement with The Pack Crossfit. Though many would not consider this a community, I would argue that it fits the definition of community perfectly, and has provided a sense of belonging for a wide variety of people. Though we all entered The Pack to pursue fitness goals and many of us had no prior connections, we quickly learned that this was a community of much more than that. According to Peck the word community refers to (as cited by Ellor, Netting, and Thibault 1999) “a group of individuals who have learned how to communicate honestly with each other, whose relationships go deeper than their mask of composure, and who have developed some significant commitment to rejoice tougher, mourn together, and to delight in each other.” Though we all are very unique and individual, we exemplify this definition. Crossfit provides a forum in which we initially join each other in our successes and failures athletically, and that transfers into the successes and failures that happen in our day to day lives. We seek guidance and support from one another, and know that others in the community will give honest and wise input. We provide help to one another when needed, whether it means giving each other a ride to a car at the shop or helping to move entire families from once house to another. We also love to celebrate each other’s accomplishments and achievements in and out of the gym. We came for a fitness program, but many of us stayed because we found the community that we did not know we were searching for.

            Though these communities have come to being from two different perspectives and situations, they both give me hope that our society can build families and communities while also being individuals.  Despite what our culture says about the value of individuality, people continue to search for community. As social workers we can effectively utilize both religious and secular communities to help our clients, as long as we are willing to be open-minded regarding what a community may look like or how a community may show support to one another.  

References

Ellor, J. W., Netting, F. E., & Thibault, J. M. (1999). Religious and spiritual aspects of human service practice. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press.

Peck, S. 1987. The different drum. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Stewart, C. (2013). Resolving Social Work Value Conflict: Social Justice as the Primary

Organizing Value for Social Work. Journal Of Religion & Spirituality in Social Work, 32(2), 160-176.