Lately reading: A Failure of Nerve

A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of Quick Fix, by Edwin H. Friedman

In this little passage Friedman hits a homer identifying what we experience in our Reformed and conservative denominations – manifesting as well known and proverbially expressed affectations of certain prominent nationalities in our churches.  Two people have an open conflict or there is a disagreement between them, and rather than implement a biblical reconciliation process, shepherding elders and pastors allow the use of “cultural camouflage “to excuse the behavior: she’s just one those thrifty “Van whose-its” or he’s one of those stubborn “Mac whatevers.” But this phenomenon is just another clever way of excusing sins like harshness, stinginess and grudge-holding. To quote Bob Newhart, “Just stop it.”

 (I agree with Friedman’s message here, even though his use of the terms ‘therapist’ and “patient” indicate a that therapeutic view of counseling to which I do not subscribe.) 

Excerpt from pp.110-111

“The notion that one has to be able to understand the background of people in order to help them is ad hominem thinking in reverse. While such information can be useful on a macro scale to help various groups preserve their traditions or benefit from government entitlements, the bottom line in efforts to help people grow is still that patients cannot rise above the maturity level of their therapist, no matter what the form of therapy. What the focus on the data of cultural differences does is to permit the patient not to take responsibility for their own behavior and responses, and to enable the therapist not to have to focus on their own personal struggles of growth. 

I first noticed this kind of cultural camouflage within my own ethnic community when I heard Jewish people inadvertently attribute a broad array of factors in their life to the Jewish background. Examples of such comments were “boating is a Gentile sport” or “Jews think distance is fundamentally a non-Jewish concept,” “Jews don’t live near forests – like contemporary homes” – “they allow their kids to sit in the living room” or “Jewish women don’t tell their ages… are dirty fighters… can’t keep secrets… don’t tell secrets… are built small on top and big on the bottom.”

Then I began to see how universal this process was:

My husband has a typical Syrian temper

That’s a typical Prussian way of distancing

German men are pushy

if you’re Catholic you’ll carry your cross till you die

It is my English reserve one doesn’t wear dirty linen in public

My parents were Methodists, they always paid cash 

The Irish don’t bring up divorce at a wake