Leaders Seeking God's Will - David's Defence

It is finished. On August 18, 2014 I successfully defended my PhD dissertation before an examining committee of seven, and a great cheering squad in the gallery.  It was a long defence taking nearly the full three hours, but in the end I passed without corrections.

The process for Interdisciplinary PhDs at Dalhousie University is to have an examining committee comprised of my supervisor, my three committee members, a representative from the ID PhD program, a chair appointed by the Faculty of Graduate Studies, and an External Examiner.  My External was Dr. Gregory Grieve from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.  The candidate (me) gives a short presentation of less than 25 minutes.  Then beginning with the External, the committee members each take turns asking questions.  There can be a break mid way through (though not in mine) and then a second round of questions.  This will continue for 1-2 hours and then the gallery and candidate leave the room while the committee deliberates.  I then wait impatiently for the chair to invite hopefully Dr. David Michels back into the room.

So I am a doctor now.  Convocation on October 7, 2014 is merely the formality, but my wife says I have to go. :-)  I was privileged to have a great supervisor and committee.  I learned a lot from each of you.  I still feel like a poser calling myself "Doctor" but I'll get there.

For those interested, please find below a re-recording of my presentation.  A little too formal and rushed for my liking but I was trying to cram 7 years of work into 25 minutes.  Enjoy the pictures - I don't like lots of text in a powerpoint.

Next week I will share some of my experiences at the Information Seeking In Context Conference ISIC 2014 in Leeds, UK.

Good to be done (Take us out Cool and the Gang.)

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The Theology of Information Seeking II

Question: "Do online information sources undermine traditional religious authorities?"

I had the opportunity to present one facet of my doctrinal research in poster form at the most recent APLA conference in beautiful Wolfville, Nova Scotia.  Not my usual kind of venue, but a fun conference.  The Internet is having a negative impact on congregational life and faith building some clergy tell me.  Google et al. bring a cornucopia of ideas and beliefs into our daily lives, that previous generations may never have wrestled with. 

So I explored that a bit through my interviews with church leaders (clergy, ordained or unordained lay leaders).  What sources are they choosing, how do they choose them, and what is the role these sources play in their roles as leaders and in their personal faith building?

I've turned the 48"x36" poster into a prezi for your viewing so the format/fonts are a little wonky.  (You can click the "More" link at the bottom right corner of the prezi to go to full screen mode, and use the arrows to advance the prezi.)  For those with shorter attention spans, my conclusion is below.

 http://prezi.com/4kunszqpfy1i/the-theology-of-information-seeking/

Answer: There appears to be little evidence in church leaders' information seeking that online sources are undermining traditional religious authorities.  This conclusion supports earlier research on religious bloggers who tended to support traditional authorities.  The role of these authorities is changing from key information source for information for religious purposes to a source of discernment of good or useful information.

Implications: If the sources and even the nature of information for faith building are changing, do churches then have an obligation to equip their members to be effective seekers and consumers of information?  Is there a place for information literacy in the local church?

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The Theology of Information Seeking I

I'm off to the Atlantic Provinces Library Association conference this week and will be presenting a poster on the Theology of Information Seeking. You can check out the APLA schedule (and my abstract below). More about the presentation to come...

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Digital Religion

Now I've done it. My paper proposal has been accepted for the 2012 Digital Religion Conference. Held at the Center for Media, Religion and Culture in Boulder, Colorado, the conference will draw together scholars of religion and media with producers of religious media.

Boulder, Colorado...in January. No, I don't ski. I am told there is a great Sherpa restaurant in Boulder so that's on the itinerary.

So my proposal: The Theology of Information Seeking: Understanding Church Leaders’ Source Selection in a Digital World. I will argue that leaders cite theological orthodoxy as an important criterion for selection of information sources, but will then frequently cite materials outside of their own religious tradition. Baptist might use a Nazarene study guide online, or a Pentecostal a Mennonite video. This is certainly the case with online sources due to their convenience. Is there a contradiction here? And is there also a risk that these theologically diverse online media will undermine traditional authorities and create a hodge-podge stitched together faith? Bapta-costals and Menno-renes?

Perhaps not. When I look at the sources they cite closely, and how they use them, I am seeing a pattern. Leaders may not feel inhibited to "borrow" from those outside their faith community, as long as the borrowed bits still "fit" their church's teaching. So Pentecostals can borrow from Baptists the bits that fit Baptist doctrines, in part because they are both part of the same evangelical theological traditions. What I am not seeing is evangelicals borrowing from mainstream protestant or catholic traditions. These are outside of their theological family. Do those boundaries exist for other traditions? I am also fascinated when diverse religious groups use the same secular materials. Are these safe because they are non-theological?

So things to do: finish the paper, get my air ticket, and buy wooly socks.

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Making Leaders

Who do leaders turn to when they want to grow their leadership?

On September 29-30 I had attended the Global Leadership Summit, a webcast conference on Christian leadership, hosted by the Willowcreek Community Church, an evangelical mega-church of 24,000 attendees. The conference was attended by 165,000 leaders meeting at sites in 70 countries. I met with the several hundred leaders at a Canadian site at Stoneridge Fellowship.

The conference was about Christian leadership, though not necessarily church leadership; many of the speakers and attendees were from the business world; and not all were Christians. One central idea is that wisdom can be found in many places. Consider the panel of speakers:

Bill Hybels, pastor of Willowcreek Church
Dr. Henry Cloud, psychologist and author
Hon. Cory Booker, Mayor of Newark
Seth Godin, author and marketing blogger
Michelle Rhee, CEO, Studentsfirst.org
Erwin McManus, artist and film maker
Mother Maggie Gobran, founder, Stephen's Children Ministry and Nobel Peace prize nominee
Dr. Wesley Stafford, Pres. Compassion International
Patrick Lencioni, author and founder of Table Group management consultants
John Dickson, Director, Centre for Public Christianity
Steven Furtick, Lead Pastor of Elevation Church.
Tim Schroeder, National Pastor, Leadership Centre, Willowcreek Canada
Dr. Reg Bibby, author and Canadian sociologist.

From the boardrooms of Fortune 500 companies to the garbage heaps of Cairo. Pastors and politicians; academics and bloggers. There was such a wealth of knowledge and experience in just two days, that I will take some time to process it all. I found some leaders impacted me emotionally like Mother Maggie, who lives and serves among the poorest peoples. Seth Godin for instance inspired my imagination.

Let's go back to that earlier premise: wisdom can be found in many places, or "all truth is God's truth." The theological foundation is natural theology: we can discern truths about God and human beings through an understanding of the natural created order. Dating back to Thomas Aquinas, this was a fundamental motivation for medieval western science. So we can enrich ministry through insights from psychology, sociology, business, marketing and the arts. But don't think for a minute that this was happening uncritically. Attenders come with theological filters that will determine what information that will take and integrate into their worldview. Bibby's observation that Canadian evangelicals should be engaging with Canadian Catholics might have had sound sociological support, but ran up against deep theological prejudices (enough so that the session chair first warned us that "we might not all agree with everything the next speaker will share.") McManus' plea for the arts and the revival of storytelling would fall flat for those whose theology rejects such things as frivolous. McManus' film group created one of the winning Doritos superbowl ads, but faced criticism for not using the opportunity for a Christian message (McManus' response: "But it was a Doritos commercial!") Some speakers made conscience attempts to correlate their teaching with the Bible like Dr. Cloud, while others like Seth Godin did not, even though the idea of faith was there.

My personal theology allows me to learn from wise leaders inside the church and outside. The Bible will remain my final authority on what I adopt and integrate into my faith. And whether I engage with my Catholic neighbours. But that's next week's post....

P.S. I bought the DVD if you want to borrow it. :-)

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Healthy in Body and Spirit

So I'm sitting in a session on Health information seeking in everyday life at the Canadian Association for Information Science conference. Not my usual topic, but I was interested in how the presenters, Jennie Abrahamson & Victoria Rubin and Shelagh Genuis were approaching their research. Abrahamson & Rubin's paper was "'Your Doctor Won’t Tell You This ...': Expert and Lay Perspectives in Health Communication Discourse," and Genuis' was "Constructing sense from uncertain and evolving health information."

Suddenly my ears perked up; I was hearing familiar themes. People are wrestling with health challenges, and are seeking information. They talk to health professionals, but also friends, neighbours, and "experts" on television and increasingly the internet. Seekers attribute authority to these non-professional sources (the "Oprah factor"), and that concerns health professionals. Tami Oliphant addressed related issues in her paper on alternative medicine at last year's conference.

More than a few pastors have expressed their views on Oprah's "theology", and their concerns about where their parishioners are looking for spiritual information. Whether health professionals or pastoral professionals, they are concerned for the well-being of those in their care. They want them to get "good" information. People are more open to considering different kinds of expertise. Whether doctor or minister, you are no longer the only source in town. Time to get past that and focus on the next task, equipping discerning information users. The information world is a big place.

I guess I need to talk to more health information researchers; I have much to learn from them! And now for something completely different: Trust me, I'm the Doctor.

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Dream, dream, dream...(What I want to be when I grow up.)

Let's face it, we all have to pay the bills (bobs, visas and BMOs). But what would I do if I was free of that obligation. What would a theologian / librarian / sociologist of religion do if he could do anything? I think I would build a Christian Resource Centre. Say what?! What the heck is that?

Well let's build one together.

I envision it has part of a local church, but open to the wider community: individuals, churches and organizations.

• It will have a library with resources for faith building, and christian living: books and DVDs on topics like ethics, parenting, dealing with divorce and grief; materials for theological and Bible study, for personal growth and for small groups.
  
• It will have a reference desk where visitors can get knowledgeable assistance to find resources to meet their spiritual information needs.
  
• It will have meeting space where workshops and seminars are held. Places for learning and teaching, directed by qualified instructors.
  
• The resource centre will use current technologies to reach out to its clients. People can browse the collection online, access full text christian literature and resources, and engage in online courses.
  
• The resource centre staff will guide you in finding the book, video, website that meets your need. We can even help you order than book online, if you'd like.

Sometimes churches need to do original research. They need to do locate community demographics, design and assess programs, or create and analyze surveys or focus groups. I see a resource centre offering those kinds of information skills.

Also a comfy chair to curl up in, and a rocker for someone else...that sounds familiar! So there is one of my dreams. Until then, time to get back to work.

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Scooped?!

I had a scare recently: I thought I was scooped. No, not hit by a shovel but it almost felt like it. I thought someone had already published my research. Let me explain. It might seem sometimes that academics spend a lot of time researching stuff topics that are obvious to the rest of us (e.g. "wearing a helmet while skiing or snowboarding reduces the risk of head injuries" - um, ok.) Or some research just seems plain silly (e.g. "pressures produced when penguins poop"- eww.) Good research however is intended to expand our understanding of the world (and its people). It is intended to be original unless it clarifies or confirms earlier research (how about no repeats on the penguin study, please.) Researchers take great care to determine what about their subject area has been researched and to build upon the previous work. No point reinventing a perfectly good wheel. And good researchers give credit where credit is due.

I took great care to review all the literature in my area and was certain that I had done a more than reasonable job of ferreting out anything relevant. So I was submitting and abstract for an upcoming conference and decided to check out last year's abstracts to use as a model. I noted an abstract submitted by an acquaintance of mine, Don Wicks. It wasn't on my topic but it was of interest. As I read the full paper, I discovered that the coauthor, Daniel Roland, like Don had written in the area of pastors' information seeking behaviour. It was his PhD dissertation in 2007. Uh-uh...how did I miss that one. As I read through the abstract I found that he also approached his topic from the same theoretical perspective as I. My heart skips a beat. Did he already do my research?!!

(OK, you are thinking get a grip Michels...research something else then. But this has been a long three years. Back tracking here would not be good.)

I located a copy of the thesis and found that though there were similarities, it was not what I was doing. I did help me in my reading though so in the end I'm glad to have found it. So back to work. Time to pick up the pace on data collecting and writing or maybe next time I really will get scooped!

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Surprise! It's not the internet's fault!

The dictionary definition of faith is complete trust or confidence in someone or something. It is also defined as a strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion. I like the first definition better because it suggests something more than an intellectual assent. One of the Bible's most notable chapters about faith states "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."

But let's go back to the second definition: the belief in the doctrines of the church. Last Thursday I submitted an extended abstract for the Canadian Association for Information Science meetings during the 2010 Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences. When I started my research planning over eighteen months ago, I expected to find that new communication technologies were undermining religious authority and confusing doctrine. The average parishioner doesn't need to turn to the "expert" (pastor or priest) any longer for theological information; they now have access to significant resources online. The question is whether they have the skills to effectively evaluate and integrate what they find. I thought this would be disruptive to the local church's ability to equip their members. Recently however, I've begun to question that assumption in part due to some recent work by Heidi Campbell (2007, 2010 Forthcoming) on authority online, and a rethink of some of Reg Bibby's work on the the endurance of religious traditions in Canada (2002, 2004). I've lots more thinking (and analyzing) to do but here is where I'm at now.

Maybe online seeking isn't really undermining the teachings of your church. People are trying to make sense of their world the best way they can, looking for answers for faith questions that to that point their church hasn't provided them. I've seen evidence that people are open a better answer from their church, if one was offered. But in the meantime they need something to help make sense of a life situation and find it online. So I guess the ball is in the local church's court: who is teaching your parishioners? They need answers and they might not wait for you to get around to it. Just saying. ;-)

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Flu, Faith and Information...

H1N1. Such a little word but it unsettles people so much. Those of us in the developed world aren't used to this kind of pandemic. We don't daily deal with the risk of Malaria or Tuberculosis which combined annually kill 2.7 million people. We are well fed and affluent. We put much faith in our health care system (though we complain about it a lot.) Now we feel vulnerable and a little scared. Notice how people react now when someone coughs on the bus? The question "have you got your flu shot yet?" is replacing "so how about this weather?" as Canadian small talk.

So how do I respond? I educate myself with sources that I can critically evaluate. That includes government sources, workplace sources, and credible scholarly sources. (If you would like links to good sources try the Kellogg Health Library's page.) I take reasonable precautions. And I critically assess my attitude. Yes, my attitude.

About 13 years ago Nova Scotia was on the verge of a huge health care strike. I was working in a small rural pastorate with a high population of seniors. People were understandably concerned and, well, a little scared. Like they are now. We talked about it as a congregation and considered how our faith should influence our perspective of the impending crisis, our conversation about it, and our behaviours. I personally believe I am in a universe with purpose, designed by a God who cares about me and my family. I believe if I must face sickness and suffering I can turn to God for strength, hope and wisdom. I believe that even death is not the end but only the beginning of eternity. Those beliefs should influence my attitude about H1N1 or really any other personal health crisis. Easy to say...harder to do.

I have good information, both medical and spiritual on which to base my personal health choices. So now what do I do with it? How does my personal faith help me evaluate, interpret and apply non-religious information? Should it? I think so....

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"Well, probably because I enjoy..."

"talking with them." I've been reading the book Information and Emotion this week about the importance of affective aspects in information seeking users studies (i.e. how our emotions influence our seeking of information.) It is an emerging field, although we've known all along that how I feel can radically change how I search for information. Am I frustrated, satisfied, inspired, confused, bored; oh sorry, I'm online: (>_<) :-) :-0 :-\ (-.-) ? I noted in an earlier post that people frequently prefer talking with other people when seeking information. The words in the title were from a study I assisted with some years ago that considered how people selected information sources. Most of the time people talk to people because they need human judgment and opinion around the facts already obtained. Sometimes people are convenient sources. Sometimes they are the least expensive source. But sometimes I'll ask you because I enjoy talking to you. Yes, you may not know a lot about the subject, and yes, you may meander all over with your answer. Yes, maybe there is a website that covers the question is detail. But I don't enjoy AskJeeves's company and the expert dude on the Futureshop search page kinda freaks me out (is he still waiting on the other tab....)

Sometimes I'll stop by to ask you a question because I like your company and if I get info at the same time so much the better. Maybe at the end of the day feeling good about information seeking is just as important to me as good information seeking. Gosh, did a librarian just say that! ;-)

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Somethin's wrong in my spiritual neighbourhood...

who am I gonna call? My public librarian! Yes, surprise...not the priest or pastor... and not the local theologian (do you even know who the local theologian is?) Sometimes when people have a spiritual question they turn to the place they go to answer questions like "where do I find information on jobs in Alberta?" or "when was Genghis Khan born?" The local public library.

I had an email from a librarian colleague who is working in the public library. He was asked a Bible question by a regular patron. He is a skilled librarian but not being satisfied with the information sources he had at hand he emailed me to ask for a second opinion. Yes, librarians do network to find the best answer to your question :) .

So why go to the public library to ask a religious/spiritual question?

1) Research has shown that even in the age of the internet, people are still the preferred source for information about personal life questions. Librarians are both accessible and available to answer your questions. They even have desks set up in the lobby just waiting for you to come and ask! If you can't come in person you can phone or email. That is not necessarily the case for churches whose staff may seem too busy or important to bother.
2) Libraries are perceived as community places where churches may be conceived as private places especially if you don't belong to that congregation.
3) Librarians are generally non-threatening. There's a surprise. Asking a religious question might feel safe there because the librarian isn't going to proselytize you. Librarians function under Codes of Intellectual Freedom and Ethics that require us to provide unbiased and complete information in a respectful and safe environment (that raises ethical issues sometime but that is for another post.) You don't have to join us if you ask the question. Though more librarians would be nice.

So why can't churches be more like libraries?

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I've seen researchers pray for good data but...

what happens when prayer is your data? Not all the information used for church decision-making is easily measured or quantified. Take prayer for instance. Many church leaders regularly use prayer as an information seeking tool in determining the will of God for their churches. Is it really information seeking? Well consider this true story I recently heard:

Stoneridge Fellowship Church was faced with a dilemma. They were building a new facility and had already sold their existing property. There were unexpected construction delays and after a couple of extensions, the new owners wanted the keys to their building. Where does a congregation of 500 go to find a room? It sounds like the beginning of a joke but this was serious. They had two options: another area church offered the use of their building on Sunday afternoons, or they could use space in a local shopping mall. Obviously, the church offer had quite a list of pros. It was close to the existing structure and easily accessible. It was fully equipped and...well...it looked like a church! The mall would mean arriving at 6:00am on Sundays, trucking in all the equipment, setting up an auditorium and then taking it all down in time for mall opening at noon. Every week. And it certainly didn't look like a church. The cons greatly outweighed the pros. The leaders went away to think and pray. When they gathered again, they decided that though it didn't make sense, God wanted them to use the mall. What?!! But it doesn't even took like a church! They followed their divine information. It was a lot of early morning work. But they discovered something: Sunday worship was transformed from a spectator event to a community event. Everyone had to chip in. Setup and take-down crews were as essential as preachers and singers if this was going to work. They did it for months and met new people who came out to the church in the mall. It didn't look like church but it felt like it!

How does a researcher account for the impact of divine information; the role of prayer in the information seeking process? Whether you believe in prayer or not, the folks at Stoneridge Fellowship Church do and it is an essential part of their decision making process. Honest, authentic qualitative research must take that at face value. Now how does one put prayer into the data analysis software? ;-)

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Bad news from La Bonne Nouvelle

On June 20, 2009 La Bonne Nouvelle bookstore in Moncton closed after 75 years serving both the French and English evangelical communities. It surprised me; they were such a part of the evangelical community though it shouldn't have been unexpected. Christian bookstores have been closing all over Canada particularly since the collapse of major Canadian distributer R. G. Mitchell last year. They join the ranks of small bookstores of all stripe and persuasion some with even longer history (e.g. The Book Room) who just can't compete in the new economy. When I was a boy there were three evangelical christian bookstores within walking distance; alas now there is one (if I cared to walk that far!). I am left with the big box stores or online shopping. Been to the religion section at Chapters lately? Hey, there are good books there...if you know for what you seek. I think a diversity of viewpoints is healthy in a bookstore. But buddy those books together on the same shelf is like putting Oprah and Kierkengaard together and labelling it "philosophy!" Online shopping: there are good evangelical Christian sellers like CBD if you don't mind paying shipping/duty from the US. I tend to use booksites like CBD to search for titles and then go back to Chapters or Amazon to actually order (Sorry CBD).

In the digital age there is a need for new skills. The days of chatting with the knowledgeable bookseller/local expert between carefully stocked shelves is almost gone. The onus now is on you to find the best book for your needs. So how do you learn to become your own expert? Who teaches you those skills? Your church? Your pastor? Your local library? Oh, well...there is always Oprah's picks. Sigh....

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Still seeking?

I think we all want to live significant lives. The question for most of us is how. For people of religious faith they frequently turn to God, seeking his guidance and direction to answer that question. Kovach (1999) in his PhD dissertation proposed that at the deepest level “seeking to know the will of God may reflect a desire to be accountable to Christ with a profound concern to accomplish something significant for Christ and his kingdom” (p. 2). He argued that finding the will of God has been a preoccupation of evangelical Christians since the 1960s and cited a wealth of literature that offered guidance in finding guidance. When I quickly surveyed Bowker’s Global Books in Print (January 15, 2009) I found sixty books published after 1999 for the Canadian market alone on the subject of discerning God’s will. The majority of these works are written for the popular market with titles like Handbook for Discovering God’s Will (Jackson, 2008) and God has a Plan for your Life (Stanley, 2008). The authors include such evangelical heavy-weights as Charles Stanley, J.I. Packer, Elisabeth Elliot, R.C. Sproul, Henry Blackaby, and Tim LaHaye, best known for his apocalyptic fiction series, Left Behind. Best-selling evangelical author Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven Life (2002) and Purpose Driven Church (1995) discuss “what on earth am I here for” (2002, p. 15) and “God’s purpose for your church” (1995, p. 393). A survey of print literature only hints at part of the explosion of interest. A search of the online video sharing site GodTube (now Tangle)(January 17, 2009) offered over eight hundred of videos that discuss the “will of God”, and a search of podcasts on ITunes (January 17, 2009) on the “will of God” found one hundred fifty podcasts submitted by local churches and international organizations like Jimmy Swaggart Ministries. This preoccupation has not yet abated and is taking on new dimensions in the digital age.

So where would you look if you wanted to know the will of God? What would you read? To whom would you talk?

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