There is an air of expectancy from the 14 persons gathered in the Upper Room of the St. Joan’s Parish Center on a Saturday morning before the minds begin to work. This is especially evident among the ones new to the process. Marie Manthey chairs the meeting with apologies that Bea Bleedorn can’t be present. Her daughters have taken her, as has become their tradition, to a birding weekend near Red Wing for their Mother’s Day outing. Marie explains that Bea is the driving force behind these meetings. In fact, Meeting of Minds can’t really be understood without first talking about Bea Bleedorn.

Bea Bleedorn

A flyer from Scarecrow Education touting one of Bea’s books, An Education Track for Creativity and Other Quality Thinking Processes, describes her this way: “Berenice Bleedorn is a semi-retired educationist and consultant for Creative Development Initiatives. She has initiated and taught courses in Creative Studies and Future Studies for more than thirty years in university education and business departments.” She is currently working on an article to be published in Futurist Magazine.

In other words, Bea is an extraordinarily gifted person who is eager to share her gifts with others, especially in the realm of creative education for the good of society at large.

Meeting of Minds was Bea’s brainchild that grew out of her involvement with the American Creativity Association and is, in fact, the Twin Cities Chapter of that association.

Here’s how it worked on this particular Saturday morning: Manthey explains the order of the meeting. It is modeled after what is called the Socrates Cafe, which she explains is a format for discussing topics of major interest and importance. First, there is a quick check in, then comes an in-depth discussion of the topic, followed by the check out: what do you think now?

The goal, as stated in the Meeting of Minds brochure is “creating new information, new knowledge, something that none of us had when we arrived.” Today’s subject is Sustainability. Every one has a chance to offer their thoughts, and each one is listened to respectfully. The result is an amazing potpourri of ideas. Below are some of them:

• Shirley: Sustain what? It gets down to love.
• Mavis: Today there is less manufacturing in this country, fewer family farms. What about people who can’t support themselves through technology?
• Rita: We need to rethink our idea of waste.
• Cynthia C: Earth and the American Dream. How have our values led to some of our problems today?
• Gail: I’m thinking on the global level. So many jobs are moved out of this country. We don’t want to pay the price for a clean environment.. We are not providing jobs for our own people. There are ways (to correct this) wind, solar power, yet we continue to use fuel sources that pollute.
• Brian: We are trying to teach the idea that we have enough and we are enough. This is the lesson behind the story of the Loaves and Fishes in the Gospel. Kids get it. If everyone lived like we do in the U.S., we’d need five and a half planets to support us all.
• Cynthia A: There is a security consciousness in this country. See the documentary, Bowling For Columbine. This is perpetuated by commercials on TV - I”m not good enough. I need more. We are sold the American Dream instead of the Statue of Liberty. It’s all about having more.
• Marie: I am moving and in the process of getting rid of stuff. Still, I suffer from the idea of joy of acquiring and ownership. There is a book, Strategy of Dolphins that speaks of sharks, carp, and dolphins. Dolphins find elegant solutions to resource problems. Can we actually believe there’s enough to go around?
• Jane: The Sierra Club puts out an environmental checklist that is useful. I buy used stuff and recycle it. Time, however, is the big issue. We are all moving so fast.
• Norm: You have to be careful these days. The people holding signs saying Will Work For Food aren’t always what they appear to be. In fact they’re well organized and do pretty well at these jobs.
• Michael: I am buying the concept of “enough.” Choosing to trust and find a way to share. It’s a matter of knowing I have resources and finding a way to share them.
• Tracy: I was tremendously energized at a recent environmental conference and thought I had found a new way of living. But when I came back home I found it scary to try to implement some of the concepts. I find myself getting overwhelmed.
• Maria: It’s a matter of changing the way we think and act.
• Jo: When asked, Jesus told the rich young man to sell what he had and follow him. The man turned away, sorrowful, the story says. Sustainability scares me. I wonder how much of my comfortable life I’m willing to let go of. At the same time I am deeply moved by reports of what is happening world wide to the environment by our excesses. How to balance these conflicting emotions?

Finally, check out time brought these kind of responses: If each person does what he/she can, it will help. Jesus said give up your belongings. He didn’t say persuade the whole world to do that. The greatest way change can come about is to dialogue with others on the subject. Native Americans don’t cling to the idea of ownership. There are many lessons to be learned from that culture. We need to learn to think out of the box. There are additional choices despite what we might think. Finding this out allows us to get in touch with the innate goodness of people.

Jo Welch-Youngren worked with Harvey Egan in the early days of St. Joan of Arc. At that time she, Cy and Joan Speltz, Nancy Anderson, Darlene Arbuckle, Ferry Deslauriers, and John McGowan made up the staff. We all pitched in and did everything that needed doing and had a ball every day. Jo’s first husband, Jack Welch, was buried from St. Joan’s in 1980. Later she married Dave Youngren, moved to New Mexico, then returned to her roots. Now she and Dave sit on the left side center at the 9:00 o’clock Mass on Sundays and love every minute of it. Jo can be reached at .

Bea Bleedorn would no doubt agree that once this is discovered, it seems we are well on the way to a better world, which then in turn would be ready to show the feasibility of a sustainable society.

Manthey points out that the title of the group purposely doesn’t include the word “The” Minds; this, in order to show its universality. So everyone is invited to these meetings, which are scheduled for the second Saturday of each month from 9:30 am to 11:30 am in the Upper Room of the St. Joan Parish Center.

Next month’s topic is the Future of the World: Possible, Probable, Preferable. Consider joining us on Saturday, June 14th.

For further information, or to receive a brochure, contact Marie Manthey at mmanthey@chcm.com.