Interesting article! Can we really expect anything less? Most folk actually WANT to see their leaders and WANT them to express something of the celebrity culture with which the world we all live in seems obsessed. We cannot be simply `against` it all the time. The `down with this sort of thing` approach leaves the church either laughed out of town or simply ignored. Humanity has always delighted in the `personality` for heavens sake - Jesus himself had bags of it and the people around him knew it and responded to it (for good or ill). The problem is that the leaders we have seem to be largely `personality-less` especially when faced with the public arena. They come across as dull! Folk will say of s/he is wonderful one-to one which may be but how are they 300-1 or 1000-1 and how would they come across at the Brits (that`s Brit awards) where 6 million plus watched? Complete non-starters I would suggest. Nowadays it is up to the whole church to help our leaders grow into this particular ministry by training them to express themselves in ways that allow people to see them as the `humble servants` we value AND the personalities we crave. I read this week that many of the Brit winners Leona and crew have been trained at `Brit School` (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7250569.stm) which has helped them in their `success`. What help do we, the church, give our nominated leaders? Training seems to exist of a period in circuit (Methodist terms) or in institution (even worse) then we shove them centre stage so we can poke fun at their bumbling and often ill-thought through and poorly timed attempts at `engaging` with the very people who put them there and others. Let`s not pretend that we don`t want `celebrity` leaders with charismatic personality - we do. People such as Desmond T. and the `other` Archbishop (John - not Rowan - poor, poor Rowan) seem to connect better with people because they have either an innate gift to do so not found in many folk or have `trained` to make the most of the personalities God has given them. Sadly not all the leaders we have, especially at present, have been able to do so. So they are elected, put on a pedestal that demands `big` personality and we find them ill prepared and frankly boring, so we chuck `stuff` at them. Oh the woes of celebrity! The people cried Hosanna! one day and `chucked stuff` at Jesus the next finally they crucified him. So it shall ever be......
Thanks Othello! Just want to pick up on what you say about being against things all the time. Let`s make sure nothing sacred does not just become a whinging website (therapeutic and cathartic as whinging often is). Whilst those of us who feel on the margins of mainstream church can find plenty to criticise, we also have lots of creativity and imagination to offer original ways forward with things. Lets hope we have plenty of this.....
Celebrity Culture is an interesting question for the church. We have in the past had celebrities who have done much to serve the life of the church as well as the whole world community - Martin Luther King, Desmond Tutu, Trevor Huddleston and Donald Soper to name a few.
Such people had a reason for their celebrity status. They earned it.
What structures do we have in Methodism to release people with vision and to enable them to be the kind of mavericks that can speak out with originality and insight?
Is it possible that we our so afraid of offence that we have succumbed to Millbank-like sensorship of original ideas. (I was once told by Methodist Publishing House that I couldn`t use the word `altar` in a publication because it would cause complaints!)
If we are to manage by committee, how will we release the kind of celebrities we can be proud to stand behind?
Have we reached a point where lack of resources cause us to be so cautious that we stifle imagination? Oh that we could blow our last pennies on one last gloriously bad idea! At least we would have tried!
