Author: Glen

Things Which Interested Glen Last Week

Things I bookmarked last week on del.icio.us.

Disclaimer: these links are posted automatically using the excellent yawd hack and are merely things that were interesting enough to bookmark for future reference–I may or may not agree with the views expressed by the linked pages. In fact, I may not have even read them yet.

Footnotes Are Infinitely Superior To Endnotes

I hate endnotes. In fact, I loathe them. They force me to read with two bookmarks and for no good reason. Footnotes are a fundamentally superior way to attribute information and are even better for digressing without interrupting an argument.

Yet more books use endnotes than footnotes. Why?

Turning A Phrase

Our neighbor is applying for a job as a professor and part of her job interview will involve lecturing to a class, so last night a bunch of us got together and listened to her practice her Salem Witch Hunt lecture (her expertise is in colonial history). It was quite good. She’s got a lot of knowledge and presents it well.

At one point she mentioned how the confessing witches described in lurid detail their covenant with the Devil which, along with several other intriguing details, involved kissing his butt. Literally. To make a deal with the Evil One they believed you had to apply your lips to his posterior.

And they described this in lurid detail. Lurid.

Being a lover of words, I immediately began to think of ways to allude to the act of kissing demon tush that would fall short of lurid but would nonetheless be evocative. I came up with three:

  • giving the Enemy of All Flesh a hiney hickey
  • kissing the heinous anus
  • smooching the sulfurous sphincter (alternate ending: Satanic sphincter)

Coming soon to a sermon near you…

update: my neighbor has blogged about the evening as well. With a photo. And yes, I am the one who remains nameless. Also, I edited one of my wordplays because I felt a verb that I had chosen for variety was stronger than I had intended to be. There’s a distinction between humor and vulgarity, and I think my original verb was too crass.

Neologisms

Two new words have bounced into my head recently, and I have graciously decided to bestow them upon the world.

  1. Gloth: gluttony plus sloth. Example: “Over the Christmas break many students are afflicted with a strong case of gloth.”
  2. Proctological: the adjectival form of proctologist. Example: “Q: How does this puppet work, anyway? A: You have to get proctological with it.”

Be the first on your block to use them–impress your neighbors!

Students Drive Me Crazy

Today I met with a frosh who is trying to choose between Chi Alpha and another ministry–we’ll call them Ministry X. A summary ensues:

“What I like best about Chi Alpha is the messages. Ministry X’s messages aren’t very good. And it isn’t clear what they believe. And I really don’t like their Bible study. Chi Alpha’s Bible study is much better. And I’ve found a place to serve at Chi Alpha–it would be much harder for me to find something to do at Ministry X because they’re so large. But I think I should choose Ministry X.”

That sound you hear is me slamming the door shut on my head repeatedly.

Federal Governance And Its Discontents

This is sort of random, but I find it fascinating so please bear with me:

Whenever power is split between one central and several regional authorities, we are talking about a federal system of governance. The most obvious American example is the federal government (Washington, D.C.) versus the state governments.

In a federal system of governance there is a built-in tendency towards tension between the central authority and the regional authorities.

Each side is trying to do the best they can from their perpective, yet each side keeps making decisions that don’t make sense from the other side’s perspective. This results in a lack of confidence in the other side. Most regional authorities probably have a 85–95% confidence factor in the national leadership (which is reciprocated by the national authority). This distrust centers on two areas: competence and character.

  • incomplete trust in competence: I believe that you mean well, but that you lack the necessary attention to detail/big picture perspective/fundraising knack/writing ability/knowledge of the issues/etc.
  • incomplete trust in character: I don’t think that you’re evil, but I do think that you’re operating with a different set of values than I am. You define honesty differently than I do, or you have a personal as well as an organizational agenda, or you lack the courage to disappoint people, etc.

I’m not talking about a complete lack of confidence, mind you. I’m merely talking about a lack of complete confidence. A complete lack of confidence calls for drastic action. A lack of complete confidence calls for mid-course adjustments.

Some specific examples of a lack of complete confidence:

  • “Will this really happen or is it just a big todo about nothing?” (character)
  • “This is what they say here and now, what will the emails say in three months?” (character)
  • “This is what they want to do, but can they really pull it off?” (competence)
  • “Are they willing to actually enforce this policy or it really going to be the same-old same-old?” (competence and character)

The Assemblies of God tends to use a federal system of governance:

  • Springfield, MO versus District Officials
  • District Officials versus Sectional Presbyters
  • the national youth department versus the district youth departments
  • Chi Alpha (see my notes on a Chi Alpha leadership team meeting)

Since we have a federal system of governance we shouldn’t be surprised when the same tensions emerge in our movement that we see in other federal organizations. But we are surprised. Not only are we surprised, we tend to diagnose it as a spiritual problem such as disunity, a failure to submit to authority, an example of unethical leadership, or the politicization of a spiritual organization.

While a spiritual problem may be present and exacerbating the situation, it’s not the causal factor. The tendency towards tension is produced by the structure itself.

Is the federal system a bad system of governance? No. It just provides us with challenges that we need to overcome: other systems provide other challenges and there is no panacea.

So what should we do if we realize that a lack of confidence is hindering our effectiveness?

A few things occur to me:

  1. Remember that this is a natural problem, not an intrinsically spiritual one.
  2. Remember that this is not evidence of a failing organization or failing leadership. This will recur over time regardless of the organization’s health or the leadership’s competence (although the frequency and duration of the cycles of mistrust will tell you something significant about the organization and its leaders).
  3. Realize that you would probably agree with the other side if you had their responsibilities and resources. You’ve seen it a million times: someone who previously agreed with you changed positions and all of a sudden became unreasonable. You would do the same thing.
  4. Be reluctant to criticize where you are not willing to help. I say “be reluctant” rather than “refuse” because sometimes you’re asked for feedback–giving it honestly is a matter of integrity.
  5. Be frank about the tensions and their reasons. Forthrightness is the long-term key to health. Pretending that they aren’t there exacerbates the tension.
  6. Focus on the issues and not the personalities (and most assuredly not on the history).
  7. Pray.

Visiting Prof Condemns Porn

A fascinating tidbit from today’s Stanford Daily: Texas prof condemns porn.

Invited speaker Robert Jensen, a journalism professor at the University of Texas, presented a fairly biting criticism of the medium, warning that the content of pornography is “increasingly cruel, degrading and hostile to women.”

What I found most interesting at the end of the article is that no one wanted to go on record as defending pornography. Every pro-porn quote is anonymous. Given that there’s no real persecution of pornography lovers, I can only assume the desire for anonymity is from shame. That says something pretty profound about the extent to which they have doubts about the cause they advocate for.