Conference Meetings

Alternate Second Meetings

By Mike Syslo, Senior Director of Governance

Conference meeting frequency has always been a sensitive issue within the Society. Up to this point, under The Rule approved and in place since 2003, the expectation is that all Conferences worldwide are to “meet regularly and consistently, usually weekly, but at least every fort night.” Although “fort night” means two weeks, we have accepted twice monthly as its equivalent. The Council General International has regularly rejected Aggregation applications of Conferences that meet monthly or less often.

In Part III of The Rule, Statute 7 defines the format of the Conference meeting and we require at least two of those meetings to be held each month. However, David Williams (Member of the Permanent Section, In charge of Aggregations/Institutions) has provided a possible alternative meeting format. Excerpts from David Williams’ letter are shown at the end of this article. Here is the new possibility.

At least one meeting during each month must fulfill the normal meeting requirements including following an agenda similar to what is shown in Statute 7. There are some key things to keep in mind when deciding to use the alternate format as a second, third or fourth meeting:

  1. Meetings are supposed to be regular and consistent. Just meeting on occasion does not fulfill this. It has to be a time and day when the Conference consistently gets together every month.
  2. The President (or Vice President in the absence of the President) must be present to run the meeting.
  3. In order to fulfill the meeting requirement, a quorum must be present. The quorum consists of a majority of the Active (Full) Members of the Conference. For example, if you have 15 Active (Full) Members in your Conference, all should be invited to the meeting and at least eight (8) must be present.
  4. In order to fulfill the spiritual dimension, opening and closing prayers must be said as well as providing the spiritual reading/discussion portion of a typical meeting.
  5. The fraternal, community, fellowship dimension must be fulfilled. This can be accomplished through discussion related to activities of the Conference, mutual decisions related to service to be provided, and possibly sharing a meal or snack together.
  6. Service is the third dimension that must be fulfilled during the meeting. The members may leave from the meeting to perform their works of service or they may discuss their works of service during the meeting.
  7. It is essential that all three dimensions (spirituality, fellowship, service) are fulfilled during the meeting.

As can be seen above, it is possible to have an alternative format meeting as one of your Conference meetings during each month; but, it must be regularly scheduled and fulfill the three dimensions of the Society.


Excerpts from David Williams’ Letter

The following are excerpts from a letter from David Williams regarding the lack of meeting at least twice monthly:

We have noticed that your regular meetings are only once a month, instead of the minimum of fortnightly as explained below. We would like to aggregate the Conference because the dimension of Work for the Poor and the Supportive social dimension are both evidently happening even more frequently than fortnightly.

We have a suggestion to make which would ensure that the Spiritual dimension is also operative at least every two weeks. It is that one other time during the month (choosing a time when the more members are present at the Center than at other times), the members arrive, say 15 minutes earlier, and say the prayers, have a Spiritual reading or Reflection, if possible share some inspiring incident arising out of the work, and say closing prayers. Alternatively, have such a “brief spiritual meeting” sometime during that day, if that is more convenient.

Once you confirm that all three dimensions are present at least every two weeks, Council General will be able to Aggregate the Conference…

"3.3.1. Frequency of the meetings

The Conferences meet regularly and consistently, usually weekly, but at least every fort night."

Commentary

The Rule (3.3.1.) specifies meetings "usually weekly but at least every fortnight". There are three essential dimensions of membership of our Society.

- the horizontal dimension - towards the poor whom we seek and visit (Rule 1.2 to 1.12)

- the vertical dimension - towards God - the spiritual development of members (Rule 2.1 to 2.6)

- the support dimension and fraternal community - towards one another - unity and friendship between the members and mutual support in discerning the best way to help (Rule (3.1 to 3.15).

This description only expresses an emphasis, as all three dimensions are always present in all truly Vincentian activities.

A weekly meeting enables all three dimensions to be constantly developed. To halve the opportunities for spiritual development etc. by meeting only every two weeks, is sad indeed. If one meeting is then missed, it will be four weeks since the last meeting attended, which also adversely affects our service to the poor and that unity and friendship which we treasure. It will often be found that where the weekly meeting is not respected, there is a misunderstanding that visiting the poor is all membership involves, with a very inadequate understanding of the importance of the spiritual dimension and support dimension - the essential community spirit, which in reality make a marvellous difference to the effectiveness of our love for the poor.

Only those who love one another, who understand one another, those who are deeply concerned about other members of the fraternal community - the Conference - , sharing both their sorrows and their joys, attain the fullest expression of a communal commitment to the poor and are a 'sign of contraction' for the world' (Lk 2:34).