Mixed Purposes

One of those moments of revelation happened recently. I was looking online for material about writing definitions and ran into some material about defining small groups (from a sociological perspective). Here's what they had:

• A primary group is a small group of people whom we associate with by living together with them.
• A casual group is a small group of people whom we associate with for companionship and friendship.
• A therapeutic group is a small group of people who are interested in changing their behavior, values, and attitudes.
• A problem-solving group is a small group of people who have a specific goal of finding a solution to a specific problem.
• An educational group is a small group of people who are interested in becoming educated on a certain topic.

And suddenly it all came together! The church small groups I've been in (men's and mixed) have tried to be almost all of these, usually in the same evening. We say we're a group of friends (casual group), but the main purpose of the beginning of the meeting is worship (probably some group classification such as "task-oriented"), then we switch to educational, and finally to therapeutic as people pour out their griefs and pains.

In my experience, the one definition that gets short-changed is the "casual group"—of the many groups I've been in, I can't think of more than one former group member I'd seek out at a church coffee hour. For the most part, we came together to get something done, and when it was finished, we went our ways.