At a fairly fundamental level I know I like to be right. I mention this because I suspect that even while I try to acknowledge this I know little about the power or origin of this impulse. Furthermore, I recognise that I have also developed strategies to conceal this ego-centricism, in order to project an image of someone who is able to approach debate and analysis in a politically correct manner – open to difference, dis-interested rather than self-interested, empathetic, compassionate and so on. Despite this confession, I also acknowledge that these are postmodern values I hold dear and try to live by them and I trust that they do influence the way I do ministry. I am trying to articulate something of the complexity and paradox of even a simple and cursory disclosure of self. I present the self-righteous part of what I am for other reasons also. Given that this is a pervasive psychological drive it is important to continually examine its force and influence that prejudices our analysis of other viewpoints and voices and try to show how it might work to colour or force outcomes in our favour. It is only as we struggle for intellectual honesty, that like anyone, we are fallible, limited beings who are products of an infinite range of influences from localised micro cultures to over-arching macro cultural forces, can we begin the process of entering into a measure of self aware dialogue with the concerns, questions, ethics, experiences, philosophies and worldviews of others who have been formed by different cultural confluences. The way I perceive reality is exactly that. It is a perception. It is not an objective platform to assess what is valid or invalid, truthful or less truthful in other cultures or systems of thought. To continue to reflect upon this is perhaps the most important step towards a liberated dialogical criticism and ethics.

What has shaped my ministry? Everything. I am a product of all the advantages and limitations of a white, Anglo-Saxon, middle class, tertiary educated, male living in Australia – a first world country (as long as you are white), with a liberal democratic governance and a largely Western Enlightenment heritage. I bring all of this cultural, economic, political and social baggage (frames of reference, assumptions and biases) to any interpretation(s) I make of anything. Yet even as I articulate this production of self, it remains a production. Furthermore, I am likely to be more conscious of some influences than others. There are the historical and global influences upon me. Then there are an infinite number of formative influences upon me at the micro level that create my reality of the world. The shape of my ministry is formed most profoundly by the fact that my belly is full every night compared to most of the world’s population. I am part of the wealthiest, most powerful minority the world has ever seen.

To compound the influence of a Western liberal education, I realise more than ever the significant influence of my father who was a deeply independent, rationalist thinker, with an interesting mix of conservative and liberal ethics, idealism and pragmatism, and all with a keen sense of justice. But of course this is a perception of my father, he died many years ago. This is a valid critique, but it is this perception, this re-creation of him, particularly in the many years after his death, that constitutes signification and motivation for me. This critique of perception is equally valid for all the other localised or particular forces in the construction of my self.

In my articulation of self, my commitment to Christianity occupies some considerable space. My sense of what it means to be a Christian plays an important role in the way I structure my life and reflect upon the meaning of life. As a Christian minister of a local parish my Christian commitment takes on a complex web of implications in my construction of self and my view of the world and reality. To some extent I bring particular questions, assumptions, and interests to formal study of the Bible, history and theology because of my role as a local pastor. I bring the baggage of my theological formation within Churches of Christ, my ecumenical experience and education outside this denomination and particularly my induction of methods and personalities of specific mentors. I owe an enormous debt to the ordinary people of Churches of Christ who will, like most of us, go unsung in the annals of history. Without the faithfulness of the “little ones” I would never have had the opportunities to be trained as a Churches of Christ minister.

I owe an incalculable debt to such mentors for ministry as: Ian and Curly Corlett, Jeff May, Graeme Chapman, Mike Esbensen, Paul and Christine Hammat, Athol Gill, Keith Dyer, Greg Elsdon, Ashly and Anji Barker, Craig Townsend, Heather Thoday and many others. These ones have taught me to live the life of the Gospel in an uncompromising way. They show me that being a Christian is about an adventure of constructing a self that is always becoming ……. like Jesus. This is a Jesus-centred adventure of resisting this world of principalities and powers and embracing this world of compassion and grace. An adventure of becoming intoxicatingly human – living for a vision of humanity that celebrates: humour, sexuality (after-all, God is the consummate practical joker in having created sex), our capacity to love unconditionally, intellect, courage and integrity. It is because of this vision that I will continue to resist, to the best of my ability, the orgiastic triumphalism of the corporatist protagonists within our denomination. If I have at all been able to see the horizon of what the self can be it is (in the words of Isaac Newton) because I stand on the shoulders of giants.

Grace and Peace,

KIM THODAY 2003

http://www.hewett.org.au