There was a big birthday yesterday. The Pope turned 85.
He's 85 and he's leading the largest religious movement in history.
Adiwunoto ('27), Anzeze, Asano ('27), Baillie, Banks, Bassett, Baxendale, Bimwala, Bird, van Boven, Braun, Burger, Busby, Calvert, Chang, Charlet, Chianghnuna, Chun, Clausen, Clinch, Cooper, Cutmore, Davis, Devavaram, Dunster, DuPlessis, Dwyer, Edwards, Eliasen, Feener, Forsyth, Francis, Frans, Frei, Fullarton, Gaither, Gulliksen, Hannevik (E), Harita, Harris, Hedberg, Hinson, Hodder, Hood, Houghton, Howe, Hughes, Huguenin, Irwin, Israel, Kang, Kellner, Kendrew, Kerr, Kjellgren, Lalthanngura, Lang, Lee, Lim, Ludiazo, Luttrell, Lydholm, Mabena, Mailler, Makoumbou, Masih, Maxwell, McKenzie, Morgan, Moretz, Mungate, Mutewera, Needham, Nelson, Nilson, Noland, Odegaard, Olckers, Ord, Osborne ('27), Patras, Pearce, Pobjie, Poke, Rangel, Refstie, Rivers ('27), Roos, Ruth, Saunders, Schurink ('27), Shipe, Shoults, Skinner, Strong, Sundaram, Sutherland, Swinfen, Swyers, Swyers, Taylor, Thompson, Thomson, Tuck, Vander Harst, Waghela, Waters, Watilete, Watson, Yohannan.
Who are these people? Well, if you look closely you will know them as retired commissioners of The Salvation Army who are as old as the Pope (those with '27 after their name), or younger - in most cases, much younger (this list omits names for which no birthday is given in the year book).
That is 109 senior officers (plus many spouses).
And it doesn't count the international leaders younger than the Pope:
Clifton, Larsson, Gowans, Rader, Tillsley, Burrows.
This is a list of 115 senior leaders (plus many spouses for whom no birthdate is given in the year book) who, if they were Catholic, would still be in active service.
----
The kingdom of God is at hand.
----
How would the Army be different if most of those people were still leading in The Salvation Army? Well, for starters, General Burrows would be rounding out her 26th year as international leader! But there's more...
There are only 62 territories/ commands/ and regions. There are another dozen commissioner couples attached to IHQ. We could have more experienced leadership in all of those spots and still have a couple of dozen left over. They could command the invasion of the remaining countries still resisting Salvation Army influence.
Think about it. This is just the senior officers. There are 9174 retired officers, too! And it's likely that at least 7000 of them are younger than the Pope.
They say we have an officer shortage.
Well, we've just sorted it simply, in one armybarmy blog. That's more than 40% increase in active officership overnight.
Wait, some are sick and unable, you say? Fine, let's say only 5000 can be re-activated. That's a 29% increase in active officer corps overnight.
----
Holy. now.
----
Ah, but you say, that's the Catholics.
Yes, its the Catholics. They are huge. There are about 1.196 billion of them. (There are 1.516172 million Salvationists - put another way, there are 788 TIMES as many catholics as salvationists).
And the Catholics are growing in members and priests pretty much everywhere (a couple of places they are not shrinking; http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=23018).
So, having lots of old leaders - the pope isn't the only old man / they don't seem to retire there - doesn't seem to stop growth.
Ah, but you say, with all of those old people leading us we'd be stuck in the past.
Really? More than now? The order of meeting from one corps this week featured all SASB songs with some emphasis on Gowans/Larsson musical hits. Those hits are from the same era as when most of the names listed above were 'in their prime'. So, it's not like retiring them off made us more modern across the board.
Nor has it proven to make room for 'across-the-board' 'correction' of 'old fashioned' ('50s and '60s, not 1880s and '90s) views of the world and the salvation war regarding the following:
- married women (yes, they have their own ranks now instead of 'Mrs Colonel' but they don't, with a few exceptions, have command appointments to match, still);
- spiritual warfare (goes without explanation);
- music (the biggest event in the 2012 year book was a brass band festival);
- officer training (we continue with an obsolete model from the '60s/'70s, that, in many cases, has REMOVED the BEST parts of it);
- holiness (the 'old-fashioned' in this context is Coutts, who has been cleaned up in the handbook of doctrine a bit but still holds sway in most holiness discussions against Brengle...);
etc.
So, there is no reason to believe that the retirees would keep us 'back' anymore than we currently keep ourselves back.
You might even imagine scenarios in which innovative leaders on that list (and I don't know the whole list but suggest names) like Rader, Noland, Larsson, Clifton, Burrows, Mungate, Anzeze, Gaither, Edwards, Ruth, Schurink, Howe, Irwin, McKenzie, Poke, and Cutmore, among many others might actually propel us forward into new great exploits.
Much grace,
sec
posted by Stephen Court
He's 85 and he's leading the largest religious movement in history.
Adiwunoto ('27), Anzeze, Asano ('27), Baillie, Banks, Bassett, Baxendale, Bimwala, Bird, van Boven, Braun, Burger, Busby, Calvert, Chang, Charlet, Chianghnuna, Chun, Clausen, Clinch, Cooper, Cutmore, Davis, Devavaram, Dunster, DuPlessis, Dwyer, Edwards, Eliasen, Feener, Forsyth, Francis, Frans, Frei, Fullarton, Gaither, Gulliksen, Hannevik (E), Harita, Harris, Hedberg, Hinson, Hodder, Hood, Houghton, Howe, Hughes, Huguenin, Irwin, Israel, Kang, Kellner, Kendrew, Kerr, Kjellgren, Lalthanngura, Lang, Lee, Lim, Ludiazo, Luttrell, Lydholm, Mabena, Mailler, Makoumbou, Masih, Maxwell, McKenzie, Morgan, Moretz, Mungate, Mutewera, Needham, Nelson, Nilson, Noland, Odegaard, Olckers, Ord, Osborne ('27), Patras, Pearce, Pobjie, Poke, Rangel, Refstie, Rivers ('27), Roos, Ruth, Saunders, Schurink ('27), Shipe, Shoults, Skinner, Strong, Sundaram, Sutherland, Swinfen, Swyers, Swyers, Taylor, Thompson, Thomson, Tuck, Vander Harst, Waghela, Waters, Watilete, Watson, Yohannan.
Who are these people? Well, if you look closely you will know them as retired commissioners of The Salvation Army who are as old as the Pope (those with '27 after their name), or younger - in most cases, much younger (this list omits names for which no birthday is given in the year book).
That is 109 senior officers (plus many spouses).
And it doesn't count the international leaders younger than the Pope:
Clifton, Larsson, Gowans, Rader, Tillsley, Burrows.
This is a list of 115 senior leaders (plus many spouses for whom no birthdate is given in the year book) who, if they were Catholic, would still be in active service.
----
The kingdom of God is at hand.
----
How would the Army be different if most of those people were still leading in The Salvation Army? Well, for starters, General Burrows would be rounding out her 26th year as international leader! But there's more...
There are only 62 territories/ commands/ and regions. There are another dozen commissioner couples attached to IHQ. We could have more experienced leadership in all of those spots and still have a couple of dozen left over. They could command the invasion of the remaining countries still resisting Salvation Army influence.
Think about it. This is just the senior officers. There are 9174 retired officers, too! And it's likely that at least 7000 of them are younger than the Pope.
They say we have an officer shortage.
Well, we've just sorted it simply, in one armybarmy blog. That's more than 40% increase in active officership overnight.
Wait, some are sick and unable, you say? Fine, let's say only 5000 can be re-activated. That's a 29% increase in active officer corps overnight.
----
Holy. now.
----
Ah, but you say, that's the Catholics.
Yes, its the Catholics. They are huge. There are about 1.196 billion of them. (There are 1.516172 million Salvationists - put another way, there are 788 TIMES as many catholics as salvationists).
And the Catholics are growing in members and priests pretty much everywhere (a couple of places they are not shrinking; http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=23018).
So, having lots of old leaders - the pope isn't the only old man / they don't seem to retire there - doesn't seem to stop growth.
Ah, but you say, with all of those old people leading us we'd be stuck in the past.
Really? More than now? The order of meeting from one corps this week featured all SASB songs with some emphasis on Gowans/Larsson musical hits. Those hits are from the same era as when most of the names listed above were 'in their prime'. So, it's not like retiring them off made us more modern across the board.
Nor has it proven to make room for 'across-the-board' 'correction' of 'old fashioned' ('50s and '60s, not 1880s and '90s) views of the world and the salvation war regarding the following:
- married women (yes, they have their own ranks now instead of 'Mrs Colonel' but they don't, with a few exceptions, have command appointments to match, still);
- spiritual warfare (goes without explanation);
- music (the biggest event in the 2012 year book was a brass band festival);
- officer training (we continue with an obsolete model from the '60s/'70s, that, in many cases, has REMOVED the BEST parts of it);
- holiness (the 'old-fashioned' in this context is Coutts, who has been cleaned up in the handbook of doctrine a bit but still holds sway in most holiness discussions against Brengle...);
etc.
So, there is no reason to believe that the retirees would keep us 'back' anymore than we currently keep ourselves back.
You might even imagine scenarios in which innovative leaders on that list (and I don't know the whole list but suggest names) like Rader, Noland, Larsson, Clifton, Burrows, Mungate, Anzeze, Gaither, Edwards, Ruth, Schurink, Howe, Irwin, McKenzie, Poke, and Cutmore, among many others might actually propel us forward into new great exploits.
Much grace,
sec
posted by Stephen Court
2 comments:
Ahhhh! But!
Catholic Priests are not married, and don't have the same family commitments as other denominations.
AND! Catholic Priests don't do nearly as much work as Salvation Army leaders - and so don't suffer the same burnout issues that Salvationist leaders do. Catholic Priests don't do the same welfare work Officers do, or the Emergency Services Work etc. They have more local leaders that look after sections, budgets etc. than most Corps do (if they don't, they generally either appoint a number of Priests so one Priest looks after one thing etc, or they merge the congregation with another). AND they usually have a house keeper/cook that looks after all the cleaning, washing, cooking etc. Most Catholic Priests wouldn't know how to boil a kettle to make a cup of tea. If Officers all had a permanent house keeper/cook to look after them, I'm sure there would be many retired's who would continue to serve.
We can't really compare ourselves with the Catholics. And besides - they do have their own problems.
Just my thoughts.
Yours in Christ,
Graeme Randall
Former Australian East in London.
"Retired and restless" said an officer friend of mine who wasn´t wanted when she reached retirement age. Then she found employment as assistant chief of HR dept. in a retail store chain.
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