"I don't need a response and I have no interest in another email correspondence that doesn't go anywhere helpful."
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These are words contained in an email I received not so long ago from someone who, by any definition of the term, would be considered to be a "mountaintopper" in the broad CGGC community.
Please don't attempt to figure out who. More about that later.
The email I received, as is clear from the quoted sentence, was intended to be a one-way rant,...
...and, earlier on it says, "It's come to my attention..."
By the mountaintoppers' admission, then, it's based on gossip and second hand knowledge.
I considered carefully if I should address the issues this email illustrates and, if I do address it, how to address it.
Here's what I'm coming up with:
1. This isn't the first time I've received this sort of comment from the CGGC mountaintop.
It's been going on for a while. I'm no longer startled. And, therefore, it's become possible for me to see these things from 40,000 feet.
The reason I hope you don't attempt to figure out who the author of the email is, precisely, because this isn't the first note of this sort that I've received from on high, CGGC speaking, over the years.
(It is the first, though, that STARTED OUT telling me the conversation is already over. It's also the first that I can recall that was based on what someone else told the mountaintopper about me.)
To be fair, when I say these notes are fairly common I'm, perhaps, overstating. Over the last decade or so, I've seen comments similar to this several times.
CGGC Mountaintoppers seem to feel empowered to make this sort of statement within the CGGC community. More about that later.
And, I think there's something noteworthy there.
2. As many of the readers of this blog know, there was a time, decades ago, when I was on staff at Winebrenner and that Evie was on General Conference staff as the Director of Denominational Communications during the Draper and Boyer regimes.
I'd never suggest that I was an insider in Findlay and I'd certainly never suggest that I was a mountaintopper.
But, as difficult as it is for me to even think about it, even in passing, Evie was a mountaintopper.
Evie's extremely bright. And, she's unbelievably likable. She held a Director level position on General Conference staff. Her position as a leader of the denomination was embraced and accepted unquestionably during those days.
And, as a CGGCer on staff at Winebrenner, and as her spouse, I rubbed elbows with the people who were the movers and shakers of the CGGC world at the time.
And,...
...at that time, I was also a CGGC good guy, attempting to fit in, fully and enthusiastically supporting the 35,000 X 2000 initiative and doing everything in my power to contribute to its success.
As a good guy, if not a mountaintopper, I'd hear dismissive comments spoken by various mountaintoppers of that day about the people who didn't kowtow to the wisdom and authority of the mountaintop.
"Don't even talk to him. You'll never convince him."
The point there was that anyone out of sync with the vision on the top of the CGGC could and should be dismissed, disrespected, even.
The point of that attitude being that the mountaintoppers know, for certain, that they are the spiritual end all and be all in the CGGC world. They're not to be challenged, even questioned.
And, as a point of history that can't be denied:
Remember, looking back nearly three decades, that, in the end, 35,000 X 2000 has proved to be a monumental disaster that continues to this day to threaten the CGGC's future existence!
And, that the people shunned and dismissed by the mountaintoppers turned out to be exactly correct!
And, the mountaintoppers exactly, precisely and entirely and disastrously wrong!
Here's the absolute truth. The same attitude that produced the sentence that opens this post goes back at least as far as our days in Findlay.
Our leadership problems come from cultural values embraced by the mountaintoppers for many decades.
The attitude that generated that sentence was rampant when the person who wrote the sentence to me was active in the CGYA.
3.The sentence I quoted to begin this post has particular meaning in light the the eNews posts Lance invited Brent to write on having difficult conversations.
The sort of difficult, important conversation these guys advocate doesn't happen in five minute's time, chatting with a stranger whilst chewing on a Snickers bar.
Brent makes that precise point in declaring that, in order to have important conversations, you must take time.
Those conversations do, indeed, take time to develop. And, while the hope is that, over the passage of time, they will end well,...
...they begin in the context of passionate and vehement difference. That's what makes them difficult.
They require the establishment of some kind of common ground and the building of trust...
...and of mutual respect.
They, frequently, involve the overcoming of a difficult history.
More than that, they may make it necessary for prejudices to be set aside, often by both parties...as Brent also makes clear.
It seems to me, a person who could write the sentence that begins this post may not capable of the patience and longsuffering and respect for a person who thinks and feels differently that difficult conversation requires.
I am absolutely certain, however, that the person who wrote the sentence supports, intellectually and theoretically and hypothetically, the concept of CGGC people engaging in the rigorous spiritual and emotional demands placed on someone engaged in difficult conversation.
But, I can't see that happening, for him, at least...
...at least until he repents.
In my opinion, the sentence, and the attitude it is fruit of, leads the people of the CGGC back to the...
...FOLLOWERSHIP CRISIS...
...we've been in for at least a decade.
We don't lack for people who think of themselves as leaders.
What we lack, from mountaintoppers, is action to follow.
As I often mention, I gave up life as a CGGC pastor/parish priest. I'm working full-time in the world and live intentionally as an ambassador of Christ's Way.
A goal of my daily life, as a result of my own act of repentance, is to create the opportunity for me to have precisely the difficult and important conversations Lance and Brent advocate.
I'm DOING it,...
...certainly not perfectly...
...But, I'm DOING it.
I've created a walk which came before my talk.
But, all I'm getting, so far, from the mountaintop, is talk.
It may be that a description of the walk is planned for future eNews articles. That would be a blessing.
But, in recent years, we've had more than enough talk, about an uncountable number of good ideas, unaccompanied by action.
As Eliza Doolittle sang, "Show me."
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