“General Bond felt it was vital that we serve the world by uniting in common mission as one Army, sharing the same message of transformation. She has inspired many salvationists around the world in her call to be One Army with one Mission and One Message, serving with a caring attitude and a love of God.
She led with all the spirit and fire of The Army and her passion for Jesus and for mission was clearly evident. She will be missed.” Commissioner Adams said.
Over the past 44 years of fulltime ministry, the General has diligently and faithfully served Jesus Christ in various appointments within The Salvation Army, both locally in corps appointments as well as more senior leadership positions, including her appointment as Commander of The Salvation Army Australia Eastern Territory in 2008 up until her election as General in 2011."
Commissioner Clive Adams Leader of The Salvation Army UK & Republic of Ireland
" YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!"
‘Miss Bond’s sudden departure will likely have little effect on the day-to-day operations of the Salvation Army, either globally or in the United States. That said, the army’s church members, clergy and many of its employees might well seek more in the way of an answer than the catch-all of “personal reasons.”
The Washington
Times, June 22, 2013
Mark Kellner,
(former Salvationist and married to a former officer)
Have we been led to “terra incognita” -- Latin
for “unknown ground”?
__________________
Even if you haven’t seen the movie, A Few Good
Men, Jack Nicholson’s response to the ‘in your face’ demands of the young inquisitor
bellowing, "I want the truth!" The unyielding colonel with forehead
and neck veins ready to burst blared back - "You want answers?" And then, one of the most quoted
lines in modern movie history: "You
can't handle the truth!"
It’s a line that’s become a colloquialism used in
office politics and as a discussion and debate stopper everywhere! The truth
has a way of setting people back on their heels, especially when it forces us
to rethink what we once took for granted.
"You
can't handle the truth!" Was this what
prompted the brief, terse, non-gracious message issued from the IHQ inner
sanctum?
The USA
recently celebrated National Honesty Day. While honesty is a great practice,
it’s not always practical. In fact, sometimes telling the whole truth can do
more harm than good. And it’s said that, ‘truth is one of
those things that is best viewed from a personal perspective’. But when the truth filters out to
almost two million Salvationist believers, it can no longer be the sole
perspective of a handful of seniors locked away in a glass walled office
building in central London.
The Army family due our forced but willing conformity
in music, dress, lifestyle and doctrinal beliefs makes us a unique lot. Ours is
a global village of the very best family kind; we love each other instinctively
with a God inspired compassion. It’s a compelling far-reaching love crossing
borders and cultures; One Army, One Mission, One Message. From the Australian
outback, to Papua New Guinean highland jungles, to Russia’s Taganka prospect,
and Manhattan’s Bowery, to central Kowloon and Stockholm’s Soder; we are one. Granted,
not equal perhaps in sophistication or intelligence; some of us really can't
handle the truth, but that’s no reason to dismiss it. Truth tinged with grace
would have been the appropriate family sentiment. The British Commissioner spoke
for us when those who should have didn’t!
Colossians
3:9-10 Do not lie to one
another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have
put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its
creator.
Honesty and truthfulness are life skills taught and
practiced in every SA center, or so we thought. An authentic commitment to
truth involves and requires both orthodoxy (right belief)
and orthopraxy (right action) Expressed slightly differently, truthfulness involves and requires moral and rational reasoning. With reference to the CoS’s
news release, no doubt a team creation, offered up the dilemma of full truth versus loyalty. And it’s in this clash that grace was trumped by accuracy.
We don’t need the whole truth and nothing but the truth. We expected loyalty to
a person to be reflected – we got loyalty to the organization.
It is said that to know history is to know all;
it is the base on which all sequence rests. No one knows the General’s sequence
better than those who composed the news release. And, it’s incomprehensible to
fathom how anyone could disengage the episodes of 44 years of gracious
Christian living and giving. We expected the fabric of truth reaching out to
all 1.7 million of us to reflect at the very least a smattering of the debt of
gratitude due General Linda Bond.
More than 5,000 visitors have keenly followed
our blog updates on General Bond’s departure, and our ‘take’ on the exit
history circulated depends in full on the language used and not used. And it’s in the words not used where so many of us feel
disillusioned and disheartened. Tell us, “You
can’t handle the truth”, but don’t ask us to dismiss our loyalty. Loyalty
by contrast with the terse announcement focuses not on statements of fact but on
perceptions of the sequences built one upon the other over a 44 year period of
officership. Although the sequences speak for themselves, you had a duty to speak
for us all. Or as Josiah Royce said – “the willing and complete identification
of her whole self with her cause” would have been a start.
Yours was instead a novel and commonly used reporting
technique seen in the secular business world. But even they adopt a synergy
with at least a hint of grace. Your memo, if submitted to me in any of the many MBA business
ethics classes I taught in USA universities would have been returned with ‘Little
breath and little depth’ scribbled in the margin. Another commonly used tweak
was ‘we think too much and feel to little’; contrived insensitivity.
Here’s more from my teaching days - I ran across
this in a paper found in my files on ‘management’: The "suppression of the
truth" simply boils down to the issue of morality. Human beings fail to
realize that morality is not needed for those in power… So, when it comes to the matter of
dispensing the truth, the ruling elite elect not to tell the masses the real
truth about reality because they have absolutely no reason, motivation, or
obligation to do so… “
The muddied messaging and the intended opacity
are not acceptable. And we expect our leaders to turn up the pressure on all to
improve the IHQ communication techniques. At the Fed, for example, following
the ‘You can’t handle the Truth’
headlines, Bernanke learned that continuing communication with its shareholders
is the only key to maintain trust.
Salvation Army stakeholders, shareholders,
investors and converts alike expect nothing less. Understand and empathize with
what is really troubling the troops.
PhD Corporate Ethics
11 comments:
I know this is the last we'll read about General :inca Bond for some time. Thank you on behalf of many of us for pointing out to IHQ that their reporting of her retirement was reprehensible - have they no shame?
Soldier
America
Brilliant analysis!
UK Active
Excellent and well presented. Perhaps before the High Council thise Seniors who peddled this messy "status quo" approach; should have the grace to ensure that they are not put forward as candidates for General. That at this new Council at the outset a new maximum age to enter that sacred trust of general is set and a set term of office is also set with a review before further years are added. This review being carried out by a mix of officers and soldiery members who are not at thst point in time serving High Council delegates.
Furthermore, a small appraisal team is appointed to annually review performance. To be led by at least one former general and spouces. They would then be the focus point for any additional years.
.
Also as retiring approaches this team steers the transition to include press statement salute arrangements. Where in the current case ensures that the office holder is respectfully pastorally and professionally given a fitting tribute publically.
The conclave of shrouded secrecy needs to a thing of the past.
In the case of General Bond respecting her decision is one good thing but, exciting her from office withiut any due respect and public acknowledgement is reprehensible and if found to be contrived all involved should be retired with immediate affect.
Future high councils should have a lay and lower ranks element that scrutineers any resume and clears there candidacy. This team also ensures that a candidate has at least a clear goal centre strategy beforehand.
As for Linda Bond she had her strategy .. one army .. prayer focus we are better people for this visionary's leadership. TSA Leadership you have reprehensibly failed. Listen to the volume of disquiet in the ranks dont fade out this noise its going to be louder as HC approaches.
A woefully poorly worded press release - It's no surprise that people are disappointed!
Canada
Soldier
I am tempted to honor the General (R)'s wish for privacy. However, as the international leader of a spiritual organization, she would have given up certain expectations of privacy. I could write a variety of speculated reasons for her decision, but such streams of consciousness should not be published without evidence. Surely it was not a financial scandal. Being General offers enviable international travel, but no officer of any rank becomes wealthy. I suppose the General owes everyone an explanation just because she was a General.
Someone else commented that they were glad to be a "former." It sounded a little negative. Part of me regrets not having been equal to the personality demands of the work; part of me celebrates what was accomplished during my ten years as an officer; and part of me credits the Army for having equipped me to survive after leaving and to make somehow "Army-ish" contributions to the world since then.
Whatever the General's reasons, she was once a "former" for a period of time, thus she is welcome in our fellowship of former officers. With us she can find supportive comrades who respect privacy and who can help her with the challenges of this emotion-laden and socially difficult transition.
Frankly - I think you're blowing this way out of proportion. I don't think the wording of the announcement was a big deal. And I would suggest we don't read too much into it and what it says about our movement. I've no doubt the message wasn't perfect but making the whole thing into some kind of scandal is not helpful for anyone as far as I can see.
Will Pearson
UK Lieutenant
Lt. Will Pearson, thank you for your comments and I appreciate your interest in the FSAOF blog.
I would point out that it was the lack of wording that disappointed us - too clinical.
blessings
I am a former officer only in the sense that I retired many years ago after serving both in the UK and abroad and at various levels of administration. I love the Army, have tried to be loyal throughout many years and have tried to serve with compassion and understanding, especially when faced with situations in which I saw people trapped within rules and regulations which seemed to me unreasonable. I have always tried to be visionary and adapt to the future, rather than clinging to the past for the sake of tradition. The failure of many Corps and many leaders to grasp the future and accept the need for radical change concerns me. The younger generation vote with their feet, and few citizens of our present age and culture are attracted to the way we 'do church'(pardon the phrase). I during my years of service I often met criticism, almost suggestions of being 'heretic' for suggesting changes which now, forty years later, circumstances have forced upon our movement. At the heart of the recent distressing events is a vital flaw in the way we operate. Autocracy has long been out of date, even thou in our early years it suited the age and the culture. When a soldier recently asked her CO 'what has happened to our General?' The reply was, 'Don't ask questions, it is nothing to do with the soldiers'. Yet it has everything to do with the soldiers. The Army is its soldiers - the wonderful people who commit their time, their gifts, and their money in maybe a far deeper way than many members of other churches. Yet they have no say! A totally unsuitable leader mightbe appointed to their Corps and they can do nothing about other than speak to or write to th DC, in which case they can be accused of disloyalty. Corps Councils are appointed by the CO. They do not truly represent the congregation. And how does the system if accountability work, or does it? In commerce and industry and social service staff at every level have to be accountable and if not capable or if careless they have to give appropriate account, with subsequent consequences. Many years ago it was decided that the General could no longer have totally autocratic authority - even the God-appointed leader could be fallible, but the democratisation of the Army never went very much further. The furthest we have moved is towards more 'consultation' but how successful is this. I am not sure whether there is sufficient vitality or vision to work towards a more democratic system. Autocracy places 'power' in the hands of people and once they have power ther very reluctantly surrender it. God bless our Army. Maybe the dramatic recent events which have left so many officers and soldiers absolutely confused and bewildered will pompt the forthcoming High Council to do much more than just find a successor. May God intervene in a really big way for His Army is precious to Him, and to us, and we are distressed and anxious at this time.
Well said! We, the soldiery, are only members of the 'priesthood of all believers' when the Army want our commitment - in matters like this, we are nobodies with no opinions. Someone said 'if the 50s were due to come back, the Salvation Army would be ready'. How true, sadly.
UK Territory
It is about time that Salvation Army Soldiers everywhere spoke with a loud voice to our leadership to remind them that this is the Soldiers' Army and they are leaders only because first of all soldiers. This is in modern cultural terms known as Peope's Power! How enlightening in the present crisis it would have been if IHQ had kept the officaial websites open in order to allow the soldiery to speak - it would have illuminated the thinking of the High Council and possibly ensured the election of a 'Soldiers' General' rather than an institutional one. I am too old nor have the physical strength to mount demonstrations but young Salvationists have the techniques and abilities to do so. What would be the effect, for instance, on the members of the anticipated High Council if a protest was staged outside the hotel where it will be meetin, demanding to know the cost of this High Council, and how the cost is being met. Perhaps a petition could be swiftly assembled and presented to the High Council making it clear the type of General the soldiers would like to see leading the Army and the fundamental changes required to assist the Army to adapt to the needs of this generation. Revolutionary? Maybe, bit when the Army commenced it was both radical and revolutionary, and my interpretAtion of Pentecost is that this is what happened at the beginning when Peope Power was strengthened by Holy Spirit power.
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