During a particularly difficult time in my dispute with my former colleagues I received the following perceptive comments in unsolicited letters from one of our readers:

I notice that how you are being treated is not new! You see, in every Organisation you will basically find two major types of people; the bureaucrat or "company man", and the one who does not compromise principles. The bureaucrat is primarily concerned that the integrity of the "company" is not compromised; and he will generally do what is required to protect its reputation; knowingly or otherwise. The other is concerned that everything done is open and above board, irrespective of any consequences for the Organisation.

You can tell which one is appreciat-ed and therefore "gets ahead". So its rather difficult to get what you may consider to be justice, from a bureaucrat or a bureaucracy! And every Organisation has a bureaucracy; regrettably, Christian included! If you don't conform, you can never be one of them.

And yet, as Christians, we should be the most capable of communicators! But the constraint here is that the immature are always threatened by openness, which stymies real communication.

This explanation may be a bit simplistic, but I think it identifies some key factors in your situation with the AOG. But the issues you are pursuing are far too significant in Christendom to be discouraged by such barriers. And we are talking about the Lord's Body; His Church. His purposes will definitely be fulfilled! So its good to recall that none of God's prophets were popular with the religious bureau-cracies of their day; you are in very good company indeed!

There's lots wrong with bureaucrats. For instance, they tend not to pass on bad news to bosses. It may affect their future prospects. They need to be seen as can-do people; normally at the expense of subordinates! They tend to hide errors, deny all wrong doing and never say sorry. Just part of the inherent Organisat-ion and self protection attitude; at any cost and irrespective of the damage done to others. And they are very good on rhetoric, saying all the 'right' things people want to hear. As you know, people are gullible and tend to interpret such rhetoric to suit their own (mostly self-oriented) purposes. But the rhetoric is normally totally inconsistent with the organisation's practice!

Finally, bureaucrats never bother to explain; they just generalise, ignore the issue, tell you how 'good' they are, but never respond to it specifically. What they do tell you is only related to what reflects well for them; the real part of the story is never addressed. You only have to listen to question time in Parliament to see this in action!

All this is especially true of Christian organisations, which have no real accountability and are not in fact open to scrutiny. In addition, there is the ever present mystic and 'God said' element which tends to intimidate most Christians.

Your CWM newsletter is a godsend and packs critical truths of the gospel and valuable insights into today's Church. Thanks very much for your efforts in keeping us informed

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Appeared in Volume 4.1 January/February 1998