agonyaunt | Dear Abby: Preventing sermonizing at a class reunion

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Dear Abby: Preventing sermonizing at a class reunion

DEAR ABBY: I have a class reunion coming up and want some advice on how to stop a fellow classmate from giving a religious sermon. I don't want to hurt his feelings, but after the last reunion, several people complained about his lengthy preaching. I'm afraid if it happens again, some people may choose not to attend. How can I tactfully handle this issue? Any help is appreciated. -- WANTS TO HAVE A GOOD TIME

DEAR WANTS: Unfortunately, some people don't know how to let go of a microphone once they have one and aren't able to sense they have lost their audience. Handle this uncomfortable situation by advising all the speakers that their remarks must be limited to no more than three minutes. Of course, if the sermon runs long, you will have to step forward and call a halt to it by asking the audience to give the person a big hand to show their appreciation. (If that doesn't do the trick, you may have to resort to a hook.)

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I'm always a little struck by questions that come down to, "I don't want to make this one person uncomfortable, so I'm going to let them make a bunch of other people uncomfortable as well." I'm pretty allergic to in-person conflict (which is why I would handle at least the first salvo via email), but if you accept a leadership position in much of any context, you are accepting the possibility of (and responsibility for) engaging in conflict. I think Abby's advice is as good as any. Maybe have someone there timing the speeches and holding up signs. But be ready to wrest the mike away.

Screw tact, buy an airhorn.

Amen.

I'm for it.

I'm one of the people who just wouldn't bother to show up if I had any expectation of receiving a sermon for my trouble. At some point, it becomes a numbers game. Do you alienate the one guy who loves giving sermons, or do you alienate the portion of the audience who don't want a sermon?

I am stuck coming up with a reason why it would be difficult to stop a classmate from giving a long religious sermon at a class reunion where nobody wants to hear a long religious sermon.

It's going to depend on what has happened before and how many people attend (the several hundred at a large venue mine, vs. the ~ a dozen on somebody's porch at my uncle's) but you have many options!

--if it's traditional to have an "open mike", follow Abby's advice (which you should have been doing anyway.)
--if it's traditional to invite him/have him volunteer to speak, invite someone else (preferably someone who will give a very different kind of speech! Or even, like, a skit! Or music!) and then when he asks, tell him you'd taken an opportunity to go with something different this year, but thanks so much for all the work he'd done in the past, you knew he'd be glad to just enjoy attending this year.
--if you don't usually have speakers and he grabs the mike anyway, deputize somebody to head him off on the day
--if it's a small group and he's just, like, insisting on saying grace before the meal, ask the most assertive of the annoyed people to prepare a short blessing and be ready to volunteer over him on a hair-trigger.
--arrange events so there is no point at which anybody would feel obligated to listen to a speech.

The real difficulty I can see is if half your audience actually looks forward to the sermons. But it sounds like this is a case where even the religious sorts probably aren't looking forward to that particular guy's sermons, and as long as you're tactful about it you should be fine.

Edited 2021-10-08 15:32 (UTC)