You may (or may not) have seen that Gerry Adams is currently undergoing a civil court case. It is being brought by three victims of IRA bombing attacks on the British mainland who are seeking a ruling that Adams is personally liable for decisions to plant car bombs in London and Manchester in 1973 and 1996. Gerry Adams maintains his longstanding claim that he was never in the IRA nor sat on its ruling Army Council. It seems the jury remains out on whether the Pope is, indeed, Catholic.
The court case seems incredible in many ways. Not least, I am not aware of a single credible, independent journalist or academic that believes Gerry Adams was not very much in the IRA and a member of the ruling IRA Council. Adams has been named repeatedly by respected journalists, consistently named by academic historians and sociologists and directly named by numerous known and self-professed IRA members – including members of the ruling council – as being an IRA member on the ruling army council. It is amazing that this is even a case really.
We, of course, await the outcome with bated breath. It is impossible to imagine, particularly on the civil court balance of probabilities, that it will not find exactly what we all know to be true already. The biggest problem for Adams will be the damage to Sinn Fein. Amazingly, despite the world knowing the nature of his involvement in the IRA, he has nevertheless managed to create a reputation of being a peacemaker. A reputation that will be on the line formally, though it is a wonder how it ever quite came to be.
It is interesting that, despite reputation and almost universal agreement on the fact of the matter, Adams can nevertheless persist in his claim that he was never a member of the IRA nor on the ruling council. What this court case will do will remove any ability for him to live in a world where it has not been formally proven, despite being universally acknowledged. We are about to see formalised what is already known.
I wonder if there is a parallel here for us in the church. Whatever our formal positions, whatever our overt claims about ourselves, reputation has a habit of overtaking. There are no end of churches that assert they are ‘welcoming’ whilst visitors who show up struggle to find it to be so. Churches frequently talk about ‘community’ whilst seeming to have little more than a midweek meeting and a Sunday service. There are lots of other potential examples. But I wonder whether, a little like Gerry Adams, many of our churches make claims about themselves that are not reflected in their reputation or, dare I say, reality.
It is certainly true that churches need to keep a watch on their welcoming, community involvement and other important matters. However, the parallel drawn with Jerry Adams and his IRA involvement is not credible.
The function (purpose) of a church is radically different from that of the IRA and the way churches function procedurally in their activities again has no serious parallel with the IRA. Very significant functional differences also apply to church leadership compared with Adams and the IRA.
The link is just between reputation overtaking claimed values/stance
Yes, there is a link or parallel between reputation overtaking claimed values/stance. But the two examples you give are also functionally different, and sometimes the difference can be so gross that any link is obscured and replaced by an offensive insinuation. I think that is the case with your example of the IRA and some churches.
I am interested in what it is your find offensive or what you think I am insinuating?
I find the parallel between the IRA and the church offensive. The cruelty and violence of the IRA compared with failures in a church’s community relations is too gross. You explicitly draw that parallel. The analogy that you derive from this parallel then loses its effect and is replaced by something more ‘offensive’.
I am not saying you are deliberately insinuating something or being offensive, but your wording conveys or ‘insinuates’ that impression to this reader. Which is a pity since your point is legitimate but is undermined by a poorly chosen analogy.
Let me put this differently. Any author, writer or prolific blogger needs to consider not only the point they wish to make, but how their words come across to the reader. You chose the IRA-church analogy and it came across poorly to this reader in the way I described. The difference is too great to sustain a credible analogy or parallel, in my view.
You may wish to consider how your words impact the reader more carefully in future. Legitimate thoughts may be undermined by poorly chosen words, analogies, parallels, metaphors and other comparative devices.
Hope that is a little clearer. I have made the point I feel needs to be made, so will draw my side of this discussion to a close.