PRESSING ISSUES Clive Richards Ever wondered why you don't hear much, or indeed anyining, about SOF in the wider world ? Why don't the people who 'run' SOF do something about it ?
Lighting the Back Burner The policy and task-setting meeting that inaugurated the SOF Network in October 1989 discussed having a press release and one participant very gamely offered to compose a short statement. This subsequently occasioned deep debate within the then existing Conference Committee, some of whom felt very strongly that the draft press release didn't mesh with what they felt to be an appropriate characterization of 'radicalism' or SOF. No-one questioned the legitimacy of the view in the draft as such, as being part of a wider SOF debate - indeed it was rewritten in part and appeared in the first issue of this magazine - but the problematic nature of any press release was brought home sharply to the Committee and the matter slid onto the back burner.
The stark fact was that the then Committee, a self-selected group with its own views and agenda, and other people had different conceptions of SOF.
The very real problem was "could a consensus SOF view be articulated ?". As time wore on, I certainly felt more and more that such articulation was unlikely since SOF wasn't a 'movement' with defined goals and aims, a//hough it had, still has, within it people with defined goals and aims. For example, some of the latter have an appetite for some kind of institutional church reform, others the development of a platform for a re-statement of Christianity in a manner acceptable to the 'secular mindset', others digging-in before the perceived onslaught of fundamentalism.
Individuals contribute their own utopias and obsessions - in my own case, the promotion of some common ground, freed of metaphysics, where those on the thoughtful margins of both church and secular society might have some fruitful interchange. I wouldn't claim, however, that to be SOFs purpose much as I might like it to be.
SOF and the Media Faced with the multiplicity of aims, expectations and anxieties that people bring to SOF, I am inclined to think that a 'consensus' view is neither possible nor, perhaps, desirable. We are left with the option of attempting a portrait of SOF that somehow reflects the various tendencies within it. The blurb on the 1991 Network Membership Form is at least an attempt at this descriptive approach. It was approved by the enlarged Steering Committee but readers can judge for themselves how successfully it 'captures' SOF at the present time. But is there anything there to really catch hold of, to engage the attention of the wider world of my first paragraph? In catering to all the differing sensibilities within SOF, hence the lists and qualifications, how can one ever hope to go to the media with anything remotely coherent?
Where would the media angle lie ? Assuming we could garner some attention, much, I fear, would quickly zoom in on the vexed notion of 'integrity' - of accepting a collective name (in most cases "Christian") yet rejecting the basis of the collective ideology that both believers and unbelievers associate with it.
Popular understanding doesn't get much beyond a club/association view of church membership and I can't readily see how the radical attitude can be portrayed without being put on trial for subversion or self-regarding egoism. (I can't believe that, so the church/religion must change ...) How can a sensitive and adequate exposition of radical non-realism breach the walls of Three Minute Culture ?
What Are We Playing At?
This whole 'media thing' cuts to the very heart of any understanding of what SOF represents as a phenomenon. Publicising something demands two things SOF lacks (and whose absence is much prized by many within SOF), definition and clarity of purpose.
On the promotional front, however, fuzziness and division are seldom attractive - just ask the Labour Party of the 80s or the Tories over Europe now I It seems to me that most Network members are most comfortable as 'explorers' and have yet to find a religious position that matches exactly with the most persuasive elements of their own experience. This i fair enough but does lead us into a bit of an impass publicity-wise where the exploratory angle inhibits 'conviction' radicals who, in line with their faith, seek to work up anything with an emphasis on clea statement and advocacy to promote that faith. "This sounds like a prelude to schism." You mOt think that, leadet; / coutentooss04/ say.
CLIVE RICHARDS works at home in Bristol where he edits SOF Magazine. He is a Steering Committee member and helps to organise SOF's South West 'local' group.