One of the most irritating things I had to deal with as a pastor were congregants who came to me and said, “People are saying …” before lodging a complaint. When I asked who these people were, or how many there were, they’d typically say, “I can’t say because I promised to keep their identity confidential.”
What was I supposed to do with that? When there’s a potentially divisive or disruptive issue, the best thing to do is to have a conversation with the folks involved in an attempt to facilitate understanding. But you can’t have that conversation when you don’t know who the other party is and the person serving as their mouthpiece isn’t willing to divulge that information. And … when you don’t know who the other party is or how many there are, you can’t hatch a plan to address the situation and head off any ensuing unrest or turmoil.
At the end of the day, to come to the pastor and say, “People are saying …” is a very cowardly thing to do. One of ways I tried to deal with this situation would be to say to the person who served as the mouthpiece, “Listen, since you know who these people are, reach out and set up a time when we can come together and I can hear their hearts firsthand?” In a little over three decades of pastoral ministry, I don’t recall attending any such meeting. Which led me to conclude the original rationale for their concerns wasn’t so understanding could be hammered out or a mutually agreeable solution could be forged. It was often because the person serving as a mouthpiece enjoyed being a “sniper.” Just as a military sniper’s objective is to hit a target without the individual ever knowing where the bullet came from, so the verbal sniper’s goal is to distract the pastor with criticism from an undisclosed source so he/she will be distracted from the vision and mission. The fact they stay in the shadows lets you know there’s a conspiracy going on, or that someone’s trying to orchestrate a power play. By remaining anonymous, they’re trying to create an impression that they’re either more numerous or influential than they actually are.
One of the things I recall was a pastor who said to me early in my ministry, “John—some wheels squeak because they need a little oil, and some squeak because it’s their nature to squeak and there’s no amount of oil you can give them that’ll stop ‘em from squeaking. If it’s the former, give ‘em a little bit of oil. But if it’s the latter, just let ‘em squeak and love ‘em anyway.”
I’m convinced anonymous critics fit the latter profile—they squeak because it’s their nature to squeak. Which means that, as a leader, while I should love and care for them as I would anyone, I shouldn’t give any time and attention to their concerns. If people aren’t willing to own their concerns and put their name to the issues, then it isn’t worth my time and energy to try and solve the problem or see if we can arrive at a win/win solution.
In one of the churches I pastored, this pattern of communication had become institutionalized. There was a segment of the board known as the Stewards who believed it their job to bring to me, as the pastor, people’s concerns. What had happened, over time, is this group had become a garbage dump—people who had an issue could speak to one of them who’d, in turn, raise the matter in our meetings. It was a very unhealthy communication pattern, and our meetings became largely ineffective. We spent much of our time wrestling with petty grievances and complaints from anonymous sources rather than talking about how God was leading or where we were headed and how we could get there.
After experiencing this problem for way too long, I decided to implement what I came to refer to as “the ‘they’ rule”—that we would no longer deal with complaints that congregants were not willing to personally own. No longer would I allow a board member to say, “They believe …” or “they feel …” without knowing who “they” were. If people had issues but were not willing to own them and put their names to them, then it shouldn’t be worth my time as a pastor, and our time as a board, to deal with them. If they couldn’t trust us as leaders (who’d been placed in this role by the congregation based on their belief in our ability to hear the voice and discern the leading of God) with their identity, then it didn’t make sense for us to waste our time and emotional energy trying to address their concerns. If they weren’t willing to trust us with their concerns by attaching their names to them, then we shouldn’t invest our time on them. We shouldn’t give any effort to concerns or issues if we didn’t know who “they” were.
During the coming months, we came to learn who “they” were … because, for the most part, “they” left the church. And my pastor friend was right … those who left were, by and large, not wheels who squeaked because they needed a little bit of oil. They were those whose nature it was to squeak and there was no amount of oil that could be given them that would cause their squeaking to subside or diminish. The only way to eliminate the squeak would be to cede control to them.
If I was pastoring today, one of the first things I would do with my leadership team is implement a “they” rule. If people are not willing to own their criticisms and if those who engage in advocacy on their behalf are not willing to identify them, then I shouldn’t own or feel responsible for trying to address them and/or forge a solution.