Churchy - Puppet on a String

 Puppet on a String 

Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. Romans 12:2 (the Message)

The image of being a puppet on a string has been stuck in my head for the last wee while. Some of you reading this might be old enough to remember Sandy Shaw singing about being a puppet on a string. To be fair the song went in her favour as she won the 1967 Eurovision song concert.  Feeling like I am dancing to another’s tune part of me wants to cut the strings rather than be someone else’s puppet.  Each move I make seems to fankle the strings and the more I twist and turn the more tied up I feel.  

It is the relentlessness of bureaucracy (still a word I struggle to spell!).  Not just in the Church but in the wider world as well.  Chatting on a pastoral visit yesterday we were discussing young people having very few spaces just to hang out.  He remembered the ad hoc sports clubs - not the formal ones with competitions and dress codes and fees - but the ones that just happened.  In fact the Mormons ran the best one in his neck of the woods. He wasn’t bothered who did it.  He was just happy to get to play football.  Nowadays, understandably, it is risk assessments, safeguarding, ratios, insurance, allergies and more. And this is reflective of where we are as a church. The paperwork bounces around and my head hurts trying to keep up with it all.  Especially that which is returned with minor errors or with deadlines that make me wonder when I can actually do my day job.  Again not exclusive to the Church but we have certainly been swept up into the orbit of the puppet master of bureaucracy.

We have people working together to try and make arbitrary numbers fit plans that might work on paper but in reality will set us on a course of unmitigated disaster, though the optimist in me knows there will be wonderful silver linings and blessings too.  It’s so not their fault.  They have been given instructions.  The budget line has been set.  They are puppets on a string and they feel the noose tighten.  The rest of us, the audience wait with bated breath for the grand finale. Will it be a standing ovation?  Somehow I think not.  Yet we would be so very naive to think that we don’t need to adapt and change.  But a paper based exercise will always be fraught with danger for people who don’t know the area they are reconfiguring can only hope to produce something that makes sense on paper.  

We pull together presbyteries and make these wonderfully geographical large entities.  It was a great exercise in team work, pulling together for the greater good (the greater good! Shaun of the Dead fans will get that one!). Honestly though is this another puppet on the string moment?  Yes we are larger but are we better off?  Three Presbytery Clerks to one in our case, admittedly only one out of 3 was full time.  We had one Mission Officer for one presbytery.  Guess what? We have one Mission Officer for our new 3-in-1 presbytery.  We still expect to do everything we did before just with less people but over a greater geographical area.  And don’t get me started on the fact there is no unity of purpose or style or set-up across the presbyteries.  We are quite the cast of puppets…but are we even in the same story or are we all on separate stages?  

I hear again and again that decisions are made behind closed doors.  That we should worry about optics more than reality.  Are we that embarrassed by our reality and airbrushing where possible?  I recently got to see the new ‘values’ for the Church of Scotland on their image boards.  Boy was I disappointed.  The values which are the usual ones are not that bad but the images were awful.  Irrelevant to the values or the organisation they could have come straight from an online images search of corporate-life.  Are we not able to articulate who we are?  An image speaks a 1000 words.  Those images told me we are embarrassed to be ourselves. 

I’ll be honest with you.  I am not sure how I feel about the current situation.  I don’t envy those doing mission planning - I have been involved before.  And now sitting firmly on the sidelines, relying on papers filled in and a team who don’t know my area (because of conflict of interest), I wonder what will happen.  The last surprise…a jack in a box perhaps. Presbytery feels more distant and anonymous than ever before and I have a job title! And well sitting on the Assembly Business Committee was another uncomfortable glimpse into the abyss of institutional church.  

Perhaps, at least with being a puppet on a string, I should be grateful there is someone holding the strings.  It is a drama being played out with much ad-libbing and prayer that it will be alright on the night.  Kind of like Sunday Club leaders on the morning of the Nativity where the live version somehow comes together wonderfully but they are never quite sure how.  Maybe it is truly trusting in Jesus himself who came to cut the strings and set us free to live life in all its fullness that will restore our sense of identity and purpose.  Perhaps if/when we stop conforming to the ways of this bureaucratic/business world and remember that we are the alternative we might find ourselves freer to let go, to try new things, to close buildings and head out into the world to heal the sick and free the captives.  I do believe it will be alright on the night but it feels a long way off at the moment! 

Thank you for all the lovely messages and feedback from last week’s blog.  This is my thinking out loud place and it’s just the ponderings of my mind and heart as I try to makes sense of ministry, institution and faith.  

Every blessing to you

Love Sarah 

The Wounded Leaders of Church

 The Wounded Leader

It has been a strange week. I have been both a Supervisor and a supervisee. Admittedly I was just having lunch with one of my Supervisors. It was interesting though sitting in both places in one week asking and being asked challenging and thought provoking questions. 

I guess what struck me most was the fact all of three of us are wounded leaders. I hope they don’t mind me saying that. All wounded to varying degrees by the institution of Church, albeit in different scenarios. 

The key perhaps is in how we deal with the wounds. I know with the gift of hindsight that I have dealt poorly with some of mine. And in helping others reflect on theirs and reflecting on mine has brought a different perspective and allowed healing. 

I have run away from those who have wounded me and in the process wounded others. For this I truly apologise.

Other wounds have been too life altering to ignore and required professional support. Others required time to recover and then step into the fray once again, wiser, stronger and even optimistic that this time it will be different! In my opinion many of the advocates for change in the Church are wounded people. Indeed a key motivation for change is discontent and therefore the belief it can be better. 

Many of us within and outwith expect the Church to be different to other institutions. We speak of higher callings and the expectation to live to higher ideals.

In reality we are as flawed as any other institution, buffeted about by doubts and cultural norms. Technology and information overload take its toll. Competing voices clamour for the place of privilege and wounded leaders often retreat, no longer willing to face the condescending arrogance of those currently in favour.

We jump from well intentioned propositions to another like frogs in a lily pond. Yet rarely do we leave the lily pond to see what else is out there. Wounded leaders will often leave for a while and in doing so realise they are not alone. When Jesus died, disciples and others gathered in locked rooms. Others went off home to find safe haven in a broken reality and ponder their future.  Whether hidden in community, awaiting an unknown future, yet still convinced God wasn't done yet or high tailing it to safer climates God appeared. In that observation I find hope.  

This time of change that has arrived in the Church, which has often been handled with less grace and generosity than deserved, is not going to be painless. Argubly for some it is surgery without anesthetic. Those of us not nestled at the centre with clear lines of support have been told to behave, get on with it, suck it up, and tough cookie. Compassion has become a distant cousin of belligerence and stoicism, therefore rarely voiced or shown. 

The church, as an institution and as congregations will be full of wounded leaders. And that is a dangerous time for the Church. One that perhaps we pay lip service too.  However, we need to grasp the enormity of the problem. Wounded leaders need time to heal, time to be affirmed, time to be forgive and be forgiven,  time to reflect and grow. 

Wounds can be lessons-after all you wouldn't put your hand in the fire again after being burnt the first time. Yet as the Church we expect that!!

Wounds can be accidents-a the wrong place perhaps or just a mistake that does its damage.

Wounds can be self-inflicted-I have plenty of scars from those.

And others are at the hands of others-et tu Brute perhaps the worst.

Maybe in this hard time of change and likely conflict with the ensuing wounds it is timely to remember we follow a wounded leader. The head of the Church-Jesus Christ leads from a wounded place. Whether betrayal or faithlessness of his people, condemned by society and leadership, rejected by his religious community or ultimately his death as a criminal, his wounds are real and his leadership comes from the broken places of the human psyche. 

My wounds shape my leadership. They challenge me to do things better, to value relationship over status, collaboration over authority, gratitude over greed. They could just as easily make me bitter, cynical, arrogant or apathetic. If that happens please God-someone reset me.

Perhaps the Church is already full of wounded leaders. If she isn't, she soon will be. So let's be gentle with one another even whilst we enter the battle. And remember even Jesus carried his scars on his resurrected body. So try not to add to thr injuries of others or yourself.  

To all my wounded brothers  and sisters in Christ know God sees you and meets you wherever you are, whether in hiding, running away or stepping back into the fray.  And for that I thank God. Amen.