When I worked with young people in an evangelical church I came to learn that the job carried with it projections from people in the church. What did someone like me, in a pastoral role owe to the kids whose families attended the church? Sometimes I felt a pressure to build a fantastic programme that would attract kids who were otherwise uninterested in church and faith. At other times I felt as if it was expected that I was to be a support to whatever views the parents in the family held of the world and the church; a kind of proxy for the parents. There was also the expectation that perhaps I would consistently give the kids good advice, advice that would back up what was being said in the home.
I still remember an occasion when a parent came to me somewhat upset that I had apparently not spoken against a particular popular movie and that, worse than that, I may have said something that people could interpret as supportive of such a movie. I remember that after outlining their frustration with me in general the parent then said that their real problem was another youth leader, a volunteer who, “can you believe it?” told the kids that they had actually SEEN the movie and thought it was good.
The parent then began speaking as if the two of us were in total agreement on the problem - “It’s so hard these days to know what we should allow kids to watch and to decide what to watch ourselves.” They then offered what they clearly felt was a helpful suggestion, a positive idea to address this terrible problem (that I thought was neither terrible, nor a problem). “Since you are employed by the church to work with the young people, you could produce a binder and keep it updated. The binder would keep track of popular movies and television shows and offer some advice on what was acceptable and what was unacceptable.”
Needless to say, I never produced such a binder. I think that I said something about how the trouble with that would be that the most rigid, fearful view of things would dominate and that such a binder would lead to more people being more frustrated with youth leaders and with me. The fact that the parent asked demonstrated a concept of the church and of faith leadership that has to do with telling people what to do and what to think.
There was another occasion, this time when I was senior minister that someone who I felt was quite a lovely person, came to me and told me that they were leaving the church. I was somewhat sad about this and asked why. They responded by telling me that I just didn’t tell them what to do enough. They had been to another church, not far away and at that church the minister was much more willing to tell people what to do. I think that the person actually tried a bit of a self-deprecating joke by saying, “I don’t want to have to think too much. Just tell me what I should do.”
The thing is, even then, I didn’t. If I had done so I would have said, “You shouldn’t leave the church. You need to think more, not less, and your willingness to listen to people who just tell you what to do spiritually and morally means that you are susceptible to manipulation. I don’t ever want to do that so I won’t just tell you what to do.”
I didn’t give that advice, though - they didn’t ask.
This week there have been a few articles, mostly in the UK on a paper published in the Oxford Academic Journal called, “Transformative Experience and the Right to Revelatory Autonomy.” The author of the paper is Cambridge philosopher Farbod Akhlaghi. The gist of Akhlaghi’s paper is that we shouldn’t give our friends advice, at least not in most cases. Of course, the paper does not offer this as advise, it states instead that the practice of advice giving, over say, whether to change jobs or not, takes away autonomy from another person. Taking away such autonomy hurts more than helps.
Do you like to tell people what to do? Maybe you don’t, but I know that you know a person or two who does. I am not referring here to having an opinion. I am referring to those people that we all know who seem to be eager, all the time, with everyone, to say - “You should do this”, or “You should not have done that”. I know people who are willing to tell others just what they should do, about education, about work, about relationships, about big purchases, about everything, really. What is even more curious is that at times the most vociferous advice givers are the ones who seem to not themselves do well in the very areas over which they are advising. Either that or, they are people for whom things have worked out largely out of no doing of their own, but they seem eager to speak as if they are now expert on how to achieve the success and status that was handed to them.
In Christian faith, this talk of advice, and not giving it, brings up a consideration and challenge. Are we not supposed to advise and tell people what we think that they should do? I would say, no. We are not. I then consider how Jesus spoke and taught. Find me five places in the gospels when Jesus gave clear advice? I have always found it troubling that the church can so often act as if our job is to take stances when I see Jesus taking virtually no stances. He is always confounding people and siding with people that self-appointed advisors deem as unacceptable or dangerous.
When the advice brigade manages to codify scripture and revelation into a series of clear statements, Jesus actually blows the whole thing apart. Shouldn’t Jesus be backing up the religious law and advising people to follow it as the leaders of the day would have? Instead, Jesus says things like “You have heard it said … but I say to you.” in a manner that stretches us past an easily digestible piece of advice (example, “is it okay to get a divorce?) to a much higher calling and to discernment on the part of those listening, to more thinking, not less.
The Oxford Academic Journal paper, in an academic kind of way, says something that Jesus apparently knew in his teaching long before the paper was written. Counsel and guidance and care does not mean erasing autonomy. Sometimes it turns out that the advice givers are the ones who are actually acting out of neediness. Jesus was able to be more present with people than that.
Maybe you wish that sometimes he would just tell you what to do.
He’s better than that.
The other issue with giving advice is if the person takes it and then things don't turn out well and they blame you! On the movies: when I was growing up the Catholic Church gave a grade to movies. A was a movie for everyone. B was one best not to see and below that....well, I guess it would take you to hell! I always wondered who watched the movies in order to grade them.....