What is in Kelvin's Head?

The Bishop of St Davids and the Archbishop of Canterbury

19/06/2021

The Rt Rev Dr Joanna Penberthy is the 129th Bishop of St Davids. In tweets that came to light recently, she exhibited an antipathy to members of the Conservative Party which did not sit well with her position. “Never, never, never trust a Tory” is not what people expect to see a bishop tweeting.

Once these tweets came to light, there was a considerable brouhaha which seemed to die down when she apologised and deleted her twitter account.

Now, I happen to think that Bishop Joanna’s tweets were not compatible with her role. I work in a congregation which has political activists in it from time to time of all persuasions and I have had no trouble working and worshipping with them all. I think that she was right to apologise and to make sure that the tweets in question were removed from view.

One does not need to go very far to realise that I do not have much truck with the policies of the Conservative Party. I have, after all, stood against Tory candidates in several elections. I am fairly obviously of the view that engagement with public political discourse is appropriate (if indeed not sometimes necessary) for those who hold prominent positions within the churches. As it happens, I am now a floating voter and not a member of a political party though I do strongly encourage others who are members of political parties to engage fully with them.

One of my frustrations about the manner in which Bishop Joanna has expressed herself is that she will now find it very difficult to comment negatively on that which should legitimately be criticised about government policy.

Policy is the key to the nature of appropriate political discourse I think. For my money, it is generally fair enough to criticise policy and generally not OK to criticise someone’s personality or core identity.

So, for example, my view is that it is legitimate to criticise this government’s manufactured hostile environment towards refugees (and now, it seems, all those trying to settle in this country). That policy is cruel. I would go so far as to say it is unchristian. Indeed, I have gone so far as to say such things, from the pulpit, in the newspapers and online.

I have little doubt that Bishop Joanna would agree with me. However, she is now so far on the back-foot that she will struggle to be able to articulate any coherent opposition to wicked government policies for a very long time.

Bishop Joanna did get it wrong. However, she did apologise and sought to make amends. Though I think it will be hard for her to do so, I hope that she is back on social media soon and that she will be able to make her points in ways that hit home and which do not lead to her being silenced.

Now, all this would have been fading away, had not the Archbishop of Canterbury interfered in the matter. It is reported today that he has written to the Secretary of State for Wales expressing the view that he was “truly sorry” for Bishop Joanna’s comments.

This has now led, very rightly, to outrage being expressed online about the Archbishop of Canterbury interfering in a matter about which he has no jurisdiction. He has no business apologising for what bishops in Wales say in public.

Apart from anything else, no archbishop is going to survive the mental gymnastics required if they hold themselves responsible for what every bishop in the Anglican world thinks or says.

The complaint will now be made by some that people are focussing on Archbishop Justin’s comments and forgetting about the “offence” of Bishop Joanna’s comments.

And that is, quite rightly, exactly what people are doing.

Bishop Joanna and the Archbishop of Canterbury have both made statements which are incompatible with their office.

Bishop Joanna has apologised and those who do have jurisdiction in this matter seem to think that her apology is sincere. Her twitter sins should be forgiven. Archbishop Justin has not apologised for his comments.

The more he intervenes in the running of other provinces, the more difficult his job becomes.

The Archbishop of Canterbury hath, as the badge says, no jurisdiction in this Realm of Scotland. The Archbishop of Canterbury hath no jurisdiction in this matter in the Realm of Wales either.

7 responses to “Twitter and the Church”

Justin

18/06/2009

First, congratulations Kelvin on your appointment as I&C Board convenor, and thanks to you and all who contributed to the SEC’s Synod Twitter coverage, which worked really well.

Some thoughts:

Next year, as was suggested by some of the Synod ‘Twitterarti’ we should have a proper Synod 2009 Twitter account, like that set up by the Church of Scotland for their Assembly. And it needs to be integrated into the Synod pages on the Provincial website from the outset.

It would also be good to integrate the #pisky Twitter stream into the Provincial site on a permanent basis, or to set up an SEC account for that purpose. I would also suggest making the site’s SEC blogroll more prominent. And the SEC Flickr streams.

I understand the concerns some have about the impossibility of monitoring what’s said on Twitter and the blogosphere, and its undeniable that sometimes people will say insensitive and daft things that will offend and hurt.

But that is part of the very nature of online communication. The days when organisations could manage their channels of communication through press releases and a limited number of printed publications are gone. The web has democratised communications media, offering a low cost platform for all members of an organisation: the concept of gatekeepers at the top approving and filtering information is redundant.

Like all organisations the SEC needs to embrace and engage with things like Twitter, blogs and other social networking tools, or people will simply bypass the ‘official’ channels and jump straight to where the real conversation is happening, like your blog.

It’s not just Twitter we need to embrace, but the existing web platforms we’ve already got in place. I’ve been honoured to be asked to develop a number of websites for the SEC over the past couple of years, including the Provincial site and a few diocesan sites.

Some good use has been made of these – Kennedy in particular has been doing some great stuff on the Glasgow site over the past few weeks. But my perception is that the web still plays a very muted second fiddle to print as a means of communication within our church.

At Provincial level I don’t see why all the good news material should be kept for inspires magazine. I think it should go straight onto the website as soon as it becomes available. If it’s kept in inspires nobody outside the church can see what’s going on. I don’t think subscription rates to the magazine would be affected at all if inspires material also appeared online: most commercial magazines have found that putting selected material online serves to promote rather than threaten their presence on the newstands. There are now more printed magazines than ever, and they all have websites.

I think we should allow the boards and committees to post their material direct to the SEC News section. That would, I think, encourage far more of them to contribute their material to the website.

The same applies at diocesan level: nearly all the good news is kept back for the diocesan magazines, and almost none of it makes its way to the website (again, I know Kennedy is doing his best for the Glasgow site).

News and events functionality, RSS feeds, photo galleries: they are all there on the diocesan websites waiting to be used. I have to be frank and say that communicating our diocesan news through rather poorly designed newsletters (where the Comic-Sans wars are still taking place) received only by insiders, makes us look very old-fashioned and insular.

I realise that sounds rather harsh, and that people are volunteering their time to put together the magazines. But I don’t see why we are spending so much time and money doing it that way when the web is there waiting to be used. I love the church and want it to grow, not continue to decline. The web is our friend, offering so many exciting possibilities, and its importance as a means of communication will not be grasped unless we keep banging on about it!

My tuppenceworth. Very interested to hear what others think. Congrats again and best wishes in the new post.

Reply
gaielle

19/06/2009

Congrats and Best Wishes indeed, Kelvin. A most demanding role and requirement.

Encouraged by Justin, I shall add a penny-ha’pennies-worth.

Communication in the world of today is a serious and complex undertaking, isn’t it, not least because there are so many across-generation and accessibilty issues involved, leaving the ‘non-tech’ community disenfranchised if the ‘old fashioned’ hard copy approach is neglected – or perceived to be neglected. Hard copy will continue to be an essential medium for a while yet – and rightly so.

But equally important, and especially for reaching, including and empowering the youngest generations in the SEC, is the recognition and inclusion of new and newest technologies. Perhaps the teenagers in our midst have some useful insights to offer us for Developing Mission Outreach. The Good News was given to us to share – with everyone.

Good – effective – communication is a great thing when you encounter it. Rare Creature tho it be. Fully – and clearly intended to BE – fully inclusive, and therefore encompassing and using ALL practical and available methods of communication.

Problems in achieving Good Communication so often seem to be due to omission, oversight and a lack of appreciation of The Need To Try.

So, for instance, I Receive Information From Other, I process this internally with every intention that my Final Response will then be shared comprehensively – but I first neglected to Assure The Other that I had Actually Understood What They Were Saying. In consequence the Information I have Taken On Board may be incomplete or flawed – hence I have (inadvertently no doubt) neglected that very important step of Ensuring My Understanding Of Information Matched what Was Being Said…….

“What Is Said”, what is “Intended To Be Heard”, “What Is Heard” and “What Is Understood” are frequently 4 different things. However, effective/”good” communication requires a thorough appreciation of such likely mis-match, and also requires enormous strategic endeavour (until the skill becomes second nature) to outwit the intervention of MisUnderstanding.

As with anything in life, a little digging, hoeing, watering, general nurture and attention will reap a fine result. It takes time, and it takes effort. Such, however, are well worth investment.

But you will know these things. There is no need for me to be teaching you to suck eggs. I was just mulling out loud.

All Very Best Wishes for balancing the new hat. (I assume the new post includes a hat ?)

Reply
gaielle

19/06/2009

PS. If there is currently no hat, maybe we could invent one…………..

Reply
Kennedy

22/06/2009

Perhaps one of our issues is that in the absence of any centrally provided forums for discussion – eg. we don’t normally have a letters page in Inspires – then the blogs and other social media just step in and provide the forum for the sort of discussion that people obviously seek.

If staff at GSO aren’t involved then the discussion is the poorer for that.

Reply
jaye richards

23/06/2009

Just a little point, and I’m curious as to your thoughts on this, but how would you feel about someone tweeting during , say, one of your sermons or during a particularly uplifting piece of music ? is there a time and a place for this kind of communication, and might this include a religious service

Reply
Kelvin

23/06/2009

I’d be bothered if someone was disturbing others with their tweeting. However, I was chastened a couple of years ago when I became a little distracted by someone near the front apparently unable to sit still and seeming to send lots of text messages.

It turned out however that he had the whole bible on his mobile phone and was simply looking up the passages as they were being talked about.

So, I’m not bothered about discreet twittering, I don’t think, though someone might well choose not to twitter in order to be able to concentrate more on what was going on. Part of a spiritual life in most traditions is about learning not to be distracted sometimes, and choosing not to be distracted during worship would be an admirable path to try to follow.

Reply
jaye richards

24/06/2009

I have to admit to being disturbed sometimes during conference presentations by those around me twittering, although I do it myself so perhaps I shouldn’t complain ! I do think there’s a time and a place though, and for me, anyway, a sacred service is not the place to tweet from.

Reply