As a young girl, during my week-long Camp Fire Girls camping adventure away from home (the best part!), we learned a little song that preceded every announcement. It went like this, “Announcements, Announcements, Annou-ou-ou-ncements. A horrible death to die… A horrible death to be talked to death… ” And so over the years, having been required to attend endless (often frustrating or inefficiently run) committee meetings—from corporate meetings to conference calls, to parish council meetings and more, I admit that the little catchy camp tune has often rumbled through my head.
I’m sure I’m not alone in this experience. And having read many books by, and learned some delightful things about, England’s pithy author C.S. Lewis, I know he is a like-minded commisserator regarding such experiences.
A similar reality — much more frustrating I’d say — is the “let’s create a committee” cry, and the typically frustrating results. A friend just forwarded an article that artfully not only paints the picture, but more importantly portrays the devastating results of not addressing real issues squarely, including issues of faith and ethics.
Here’s the piece, written by Anthony Esolen, appearing in Crisis magazine entitled “Committees, World Without End”—
C. S. Lewis was a university professor, and knew about the wheels within wheels of committees, with their informal “rings” that use the official bodies and their meetings to get done what they want, but that accomplish very little of the real work of the university, which is intellectual and spiritual. So it is in That Hideous Strength, that the bluff scientist William Hingest, “one of the ….Read more>>