9. Interview with Gwen Riedl (Part 1)

Interview with Gwen Riedl, Chairperson of Avenues Executive Committee
7/12/01 - 5pm @ Children's Hospital
Hal, Greg, AmyG
Hal led, Amy scribed

Hal intro-ed.

FF: Tell us about you and when your life interfaced with the BSM how your involvement came about…

[clarified Hal's question]. I've been attending mass for five years and didn't join until a couple years ago. Started attending because I was dating a member of the Basilica. We broke up but I continued because I like the diversity, the mass, and of course the building is beautiful. The break up was significant so I got involved in Avenues as a way to meet people…then three years ago I got this wild hair to start a cooking club. I went to the Avenues board to propose the idea of starting a small group, 3 men and women who would gather in each other's houses and cook meals with each other. The board really grilled me about it because they wanted groups that were open to anyone and this seemed exclusive. My rationale was that I wanted people to get to know one another and my house so they'd know where the pots and pans are so they can cook.

FF: So they were concerned about the closed group and they wanted it to be open?

Yes. Finally they said, "You can do a cooking club as long as you find a club for everyone to be a part of that wants to." The first people that called made a happy group - 3 men, 4 women. Then people kept calling, about 20 total - so I would ask, why are you interested, what do you like to eat? I started out asking what people liked on their pizza because that was the menu for the first event, but I kept asking people about their food interests. Their responses were interesting to me. For many people, their interest in cooking came out of their own food sensitivities - kosher (and I thought these were Catholics!), food allergies, i.e. couldn't eat garlic, onion, tomatoes, etc. By the time I put together this whole group there was no one food we could all eat, and I was really nervous. The first group met and we made an appetizer together and sat down in the living room and I said, "A funny thing has happened - we have people with all kinds of food issues and I'm kind of wondering how we're going to do this." One guy said, "Why would anyone be in a cooking group who didn't like onions?" And the person next to him said, "That would be me" - thinking she was the only one with food issues. Then several people realized they had food issues and that started a discussion about what people really wanted out of the cooking club - fellowship, a place to meet people and develop relationships. Some came to the cooking club because they enjoyed cooking or the joy of dining in a group, but as a single person it's hard to create that. They talked about how they could either accommodate one another or those who had sensitivities were willing to skip over certain food items so as not to impede the group - there was a genuine display of compassion. That's when it became a ministry and not just a social group. While the cooking club was going, I was frequently tending to individual needs, I learned how people in this group were dealing with their own brand of suffering; either a personal crisis or some feeling of inadequacy. I often found myself coaching people back into the group who had reservations that "their home wasn't right for hosting" or a similar issue. I tried to constantly remind people that they were always welcome and encouraged them to strive to contribute by hosting. It became a huge lesson for me in being "guest" and "host."

So I cooked with one group and then enough people were interested for another group so the two groups would do stuff together every once in awhile. I had a friend who was a chef who gave a cooking lesson. After awhile I was looking for someone to take over the reins and no one did so the group petered out after a couple years - which is long running for an Avenues event.

As a result of this cooking group and seeing the needs of this population (mirrored by my own needs) I felt an advocacy need for this population. For the most part, many of us have resources such as jobs, but there are struggles and suffering of a certain kind in this population that needs ministry. I started developing this concept of hospitality and George asked me to create hospitality training for people who host Avenues events. "The Christ in me meets the Christ in you" Hospitality Training covers two things: 1. What Christ's lessons around hospitality are for us, 2. Miss manners - a complete social interaction; i.e. how to greet people, how to introduce people to one another, how to leave a conversation gracefully, how to handle people who are acting out. When you have events that serve alcohol like we do you need to be prepared to deal with that.

FF: Training takes two hours? How fun is that? Out of this year and a half experience with the cooking class came this model that has been used in different venues.

I had been in an intense spiritual training program and I needed to do a service project and asked them (the cooking class group) to help me. I thought we'd serve a meal for the homeless people or something - a one-time deal. They said, "Let's teach kids how to cook." Then divine intervention - Acension church school (sister parish to the Basilica) just finished renovation of a kitchen/cafeteria and wanted programming to teach kids about careers. So the cooking club taught in there once a month in the evening with kids who are 11-12 yrs old. We did very simple meals, table manners, food safety and handling and cooking skills - it was really fun - cooking with kids is more fun than cooking with adults! We did apples and cheese, Mexican foods, lasagna, pizza. I didn't have any trouble finding people to help me do it but I couldn't find another leader, and when I took over the chair of Avenues I couldn't find anyone to take leadership. So that died. It's really hard to find leaders. You need to really define stuff for them - what needs to get done how many hours a week - hard to get people to commit long term

FF: How about now?

For the past 6 months I've been chairing Avenues - I've been involved with the board peripherally for several years heading up the spiritual development and faith formation committee - bringing in speakers once a month and attendance wasn't very good - up to half a dozen. We did have a retreat on the Enneagram, and another retreat - those seemed to go well. This March we reorganized the board from play (events) and pray (service, spirituality) committees. Now my intent is to bridge the two with the concept of Christian hospitality so that people see all of Avenues as ministry, as all connected. During First Friday we have people who are greeters and minglers to make sure people are talking and getting to know each other. We hope to develop that even more so that it will be an avenue into the BSM. Now we have 6 subcommittees instead of just 2. First Friday, Restaurant of the Month (20-30 people) and other seasonally dependent - sports and outdoor activities -ex. camping event once a month all year round, lots of sports teams, running club, soccer, broomball, volleyball, softball, an Avenues member volunteers to be the captain and they participate in leagues in the Cities. We have a social/service committee hoping to connect that to Habitat for Humanity - but finding leadership for that is a struggle. Another committee for big events like the boogie boat cruise (100 people last year).

FF: Sounds like you're involved in the programmatic side?

Continue to Gwen Part 2