On Visiting Teaching

In our church, we have a couple different programs (for the women, it's called "visiting teaching" and that's what I'll be focusing on here) designed to get members out visiting each other.  Ideally, each person in the congregation would be visited every month by two other people, and they'd have a chance to sit down and chat, get to know one another, discuss spiritual things, and, if there is some sort of need, make it known so that the bishop or the relief society president, or the people doing the visiting can help them.  It's a really nice idea, but like most ideas, it can sometimes go terribly wrong.  And even in the best of circumstances, it certainly isn't easy.

Anyway, in Manassas I spent many many hours doing visiting teaching.  And it wasn't always fun or easy, but I always felt it was worthwhile.  Here, I have not had much opportunity to do it, and that makes me a little sad.  I was assigned to visit one lady who lives in my neighborhood who promptly explained to me that she hates the visiting teaching program, she finds it very phony to assign people to be your friends and she hates how awkward it is to come by with a "spiritual message" to share.  She said I was welcome to be her friend, but not because of this program.  Fair enough.

But I've thought about what she said.  Because in many ways, she's totally right: it can be a bit phony.  And showing up on someone's doorstep and then sharing a spiritual message usually does feel completely awkward.

So why do we do it?

And all I can think of is, it's still better than NOT doing it.

Let's address this concept of "assigned friendship" first.  Yes, I'd rather go visit the people who are already my friends.  I'd rather my actual friends come and see me, too, for that matter.  But what about the person who doesn't have friends in the congregation?  Or what about the new person who hasn't met anyone yet?  How are you supposed to make friends without ever visiting someone?  You have to get out of your comfortable space sometimes to meet new people, and this seems like as good a way as any to accomplish that.

And, most of the people I've been assigned to visit have become my friends through this process.  (Even this neighbor lady, who I haven't seen much of, is someone I genuinely like.  We discussed things to do in Charlottesville, which led to us talking about opera and her pointing me in the direction of the Met Opera Live Broadcasts!  So, yeah, how can I not like someone who helped me with my love of opera?)  It doesn't always work out-- there have been a few people I've visit taught who I didn't like and I was relieved when they got re-assigned to someone else.  But that's terribly uncharitable and un-Christlike of me, so let's not dwell on those stories.

What about this spiritual message bit?  Couldn't we just hang out with someone without having this weird forced conversation about religion?  I have at times been in favor of this myself, so this neighbor's argument certainly made sense to me.

But just now it hit me (and this is why I'm suddenly blogging about it, even though that conversation happened nearly a year ago), that it's also INCREDIBLY awkward to ask for help.  No matter how desperate your situation may feel, asking for help feels terrible.  Even from your friends.  But especially from someone who's been "assigned" to be your friend.  Perhaps discussing something as potentially awkward as your very personal beliefs helps open the door to other awkward things that might need to be discussed.  Like how you don't have the money to buy food next week.  Or that your husband and you are experiencing problems that could ruin your marriage and you don't know what to do about them. 

I visit taught one woman for over four years.  At first, there was nothing particularly noteworthy about our visits.  It took over a year before she opened up to us and divulged that she and her mother weren't on speaking terms, even though her mother lived close by.  It was a long and complicated story and she hadn't told anyone except her husband.  But she desperately needed friends who she could talk about this with and try to make sense of her emotions and how she should proceed.  It took a year for us to develop a trusting enough relationship that she felt comfortable talking to us about this huge scary thing that was going on in her life. 

So, yes, I'm a big believer in the visiting teaching program.  For all its flaws, for all it can be a little weird and challenging and sometimes leads to your neighbor chewing you out on her front porch, I think that the only thing worse than the visiting teaching program would be NOT having it.