Orbiting the Giant Hairball

This post is from the defunct blog "Dying Church"

I picked up an interesting book over the weekend called Orbiting the Giant Hairball. The author, Gordon MacKenzie, worked for Hallmark for 30 years. The hairball is a mildly disgusting term that represents what institutions (like Hallmark) become:

Well, two hairs unite. Then they're joined by another. And another. And another. Before long, where there was once nothing, this tangled, impenetrable mass has begun to form.

The result is that the hairball becomes huge, with an equally huge gravitational pull (a hairball with a gravitational pull? don't think about it for too long) that sucks "everything into its mass" and establishes guidelines, techniques, methodologies, systems, and equations. What once started as fluid and creative becomes rigid and inflexible. A hairball is a "tangled, impenetrable mess of rules and systems, based on what worked in the past and which can lead to mediocrity in the present." You can leave the hairball altogether. You can get sucked into the hairball. Or there's a third option - you can orbit the giant hairball:

Orbiting is responsible creativity: vigorously exploring and operating beyond the Hairball of the corporate mind set, beyond "accepted models, patterns, and standards" - all the while remaining connected to the spirit of the corporate mission. To find Orbit around a corporate Hairball is to find a place of balance where you can benefit from the physical, intellectual and philosophical resources of the organization without becoming entombed in the bureaucracy of the institution.

You probably see where I'm going with this. You can leave the established or institutional church, because you're frustrated with its rigidness and inflexibility. You can get sucked in to its gravity and become absorbed with its maintenance and standards. Or you can orbit the established church: connected to its mission, benefiting from its resources, but free of the bureaucracy of the institution. I never thought I'd find a metaphor for what I'm trying to do in a hairball, but this metaphor fits well. Orbit on.

Comments

[George]

Thanks Darryl, that makes it much more clear for a simpleton like myself. In your number 3 how can I do that?

[Darryl]

Man, George, I wish I had an easy answer to that one. I suspect it has to do with keeping the mission central and more important than anything else, since budgets and programs tend to want to take over. Practically speaking, it would probably mean attending a lot less meetings, spending a lot more time with those outside of the church, and being a lot more willing to risk everything the church has to stay on mission rather than to keep the saints comfortable.

[Michael Gallaugher]

Darryl, I used to go to a large Church that could be described as a massive tangled hairball. I didn't learn much, but it was a nice social experience. Now I go to a reformed Baptist Church that is fabulous, but not quite as large. I also have a rather small group of kids I teach Sunday school to, I have a fairly small house that's easy to manage, and work for a small company where we are all friends. Methinks the problem you describe in churches today have a lot to do with their size, here's a thought: find a smaller church, and you might be surprised to uncover a tiny piece of Gods Kingdom in this world... what do you think?

[Darryl]

Michael, I think you're on to something. Smaller churches do have less of an institution to manage. I've pastored a small church and a medium sized church now. I've found a pull to go off-mission in both. Different sizes, different challenges.

[Rev. Mike]

Speaking as a classic hairball orbiter, I think what you describe is disingenuous and hypocritical. And yet, here I stand, moving back and forth from apogee to perigee for nearly 15 years now.

[George]

Darryl, can you break all that down into lay man's terms?

[Darryl]

Sure, George. When it comes to the church, we have three options: 1. To get discouraged and leave the church 2. To get sucked into the institutional church and become an institution-maintainer. Most start off on mission and end up in maintenance. 3. To stay connected with the institutional church and its mission without tying yourself to institutional maintenance and preservation. I'm arguing for the third as a good option.

[bill]

Interesting. Church. Hairball.

[Trish]

Thing is that hairballs are an important part of a cat's digestive system according ot my sister who's a veternarian. They clean out the upper digestive system on the way out. So being unafraid to cough up the hairballs of institutionalism while not despising it at the same time makes sense.

[gb]

Wow. Great analogy here. Even tho' I'm not clergy, I do function in my home parish as one of the cantor/instrumentalists. And I've had that same struggle myself. Option 3 is the hardest, but imho the best way to go.

[Steve]

Have you seen any of the trailer's for Shrek 2? There's a hilarious scene when Antonio Banderas' character (a Zorro-like cat) kacks up a hairball - is that a viable option for us?

[Trish]

LOL Is "kack" a verb?