So I was reading something today that disturbed me. It said “we have become a church of marketers, not artists.” Now this in itself is disturbing. There are lots we could blog about the church selling out and selling short….but also the need to do more to make sure the best/only message of hope and life in the world is heard! But let me leave that one for a later day.
The article then went on to say “And the artists, feeling distrusted, lacking support and resources, are leaving the church to find the freedom and ability to explore imagination and answer God’s call.”
Church leaders have to read those words and ask some questions.
The words come from Jeffrey Overstreet’s blog “Looking Closer” where he is discussing The Golden Compass debate. A very helpful critique of the brewing controversy – check it out at http://lookingcloser.wordpress.com under “The Golden Compass – Questions I’ve been asked, answers I’ve given.” Don’t take this one off the radar screen ‘cos episodes two and three are just around the corner.
Returning to his comments about church and artists.
A few weeks ago I showed in church a part of Michelangelo’s classic work The Last Judgment. Michelangelo was commissioned by the Pope to do this work as part of his masterpiece on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Despite being commissioned, the Pope did not fully trust the artist’s discernment so he put in place an editor of his work. The editor was the then Vatican Master of Ceremonies called Biagio. Biagio did not only dislike some of the painting Michelangelo did, he disliked Michelangelo. He would often try to edit what he had painted.
Well, in The Last Judgment, Michelangelo gains his revenge because in this work he depicts a man descending down to hell. He is naked, with a serpent wrapped around his body – eating part of his sensitive area! Here’s the punch line ….the face of the man in the painting is the face of Biagio!!!!! Biago’s image remains today in the Sistine Chapel in a way I’m sure he never would have wanted!
But let’s return to the point. Here is Jeffrey Overstreet blogging that artists are feeling distrusted and hence they are leaving the church. What’s new. The Pope distrusted Michelangelo and many of the other church art painters – they were edited.
But they never left the church.
So what’s changed.
One of the books someone recommended me was A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future @ Daniel Pink. I love it. But if right-brainers just get up and quit because the struggle is too hard?? …..come on artists and dreamers and designers and poets and writers and counselors and inventors and symphonic musicians and storytellers and some right-brain pastors/preachers/leaders - you’ll only rule the future if you stop walking away.
But there is something happening. Some of us who in this “left-brain ruled world” for years suppressed our right-brain tendencies and indulged in masses of left- brain fodder to survive, some of us are now allowing our natural right-brain inclinations to rise and rule! The brakes are off and we are allowing our right-brains to energize and evolutionize our worlds. This sometimes makes us misunderstood and scoffed at BUT…….
Is this just the postmodern versus modern debate in new language? I don’t think so. Although there might be some mileage in that one for somebody to open up. This is not saying that left-brain thinking is defunct or outdated or held with an agenda. This is saying left-brain is not enough.
This is saying to lead well you need to employ left and right brain thinking.
This maybe why the old vision and 5 year strategy thinking is redundant. [See the last blog!]
Pink’s thesis is that in this conceptual era - if we are not offering something that satisfies the nonmaterial transcendent desires of an abundant age – we will lose.
So ‘The Church’ knows and holds the most satisfying nonmaterial transcendent reality there is.
Hello – to be missionally effective all we need now is a bunch of right-brainers bringing all they’ve got to help deliver it!
Right-brainers - whether artists, poets, writers, inventors …..and hopefully pastors and preachers - don’t walk away. Rise up.
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4 comments:
So....the right-brainers will envision the future and the left-brainers will execute it (like carry it out, not kill it).
At least in the contemporary church, I see that the strongest churches don't ignore the artists but engage them and use the arts to engage the people. It is that "love God with all you got" thing that Jesus said was kind of important. Heart, soul, mind and strength make up the whole person.
It also relates to Paul's teaching on gifts and the idea of the body. We really do need each other and need to appreciate and value one another.
Oh, and if artists weren't so flaky and emotional, maybe they we see more action and have more impact! :-)
Of course batmanforehead is showing his hand .....'if artists weren't so flaky and emotional'. A slightly biased opinion. Who says 'planning and strucrure and flat lined unemotion' is best. Maybe as Keirkegaard once said our Left brained, type A world is dying "not from disease but from lack of passion." Give me an emotional artist anyday over a boring left brainer.
Maybe you aren't thinking deeply enough about why these artistic people have left the church ... maybe it isn't because it is too hard. I think anyone who has lived past 30 understands that life is hard no matter who you are or what type of anything you are. Maybe they have a distrust of the church. Perhaps they believe that the church is not who they pretend to be. Maybe they are struggling with the notion that when they were in the church that they gave their life to something that wasn't real. Maybe they are looking outside of the church because they don't see any hope of finding the truth in the church. Or maybe that is just me.
Lots of maybes. Lots of assumptions. Not just by the handful of responses to this blog either.
A few years ago, I was introduced to the concept of "highly sensitive" people - rather than shy, introverted or right-brained, or a litany of other labels. It was an eye opener for me. The Western world has been, and still is, very much (not so) sensitive. Most cultures are actually.
It is true that the sensitive must, at some point, accept and embrace who they are. Not so easy in a world whose leaders profess - don't be so shy, emotional, etc.
I haven't mentioned that I have been living the struggle of accepting and being a sensitive man in a John Wayne world. And I did wear the mask, so much so that I came to believe it myself. I lost who God created it to be. I don't blame the Church for that, but it didn't help me realize and embrace my sensitive side.
Even those "Right-brainers - whether artists, poets, writers, inventors …..and hopefully pastors and preachers" who did have the benefit of someone who noticed and nurtured their gifts early on, have found it difficult to be themselves in a Western church that has left behind its mystic (sensitive) parts.
Gerald May, David Benner, Donald Miller and Henri Nouwen are just a few of the authors that have helped me to appreciate the sensitive side of myself and God and the Church.
So, to the charge for right-brainers to seize the day - I would like to add, be sensitive, be emotional, be. Tear out those rules that tell us how things "ought" to be and just be.
Gilbert, I haven't seen you jump back into many or the strings you started. Anything to add here? I'm sure you do. Here's an invitation, if you need one. Most of us sensitive types do.
I get your point. Nothing has changed. I'd like to think that the postmodern happenings have opened the door to the sensitive. But underneath the surface we're talking about a shift in power and power is rarely relinquished by those in power.
So, yeah, CARPE DIEM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ppqb0t_B0KY
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