In Praise of Committees

One of the benefits of serving a United Church is that I can tap into the wisdom of a somewhat different tradition. The following is from the E-News of the Iowa Conference United Church of Christ, by permission of the writer:

It has often been said that a camel is a horse designed by committee. Usually, this tired old saw is uttered in an attempt to disparage both camels and committees. But does it, really?



What it is it about the camel that makes it so obviously an inferior design? Given the environment in which it functions, the argument can be made that a camel is, in many ways, superior to a horse. It has large feet to make walking on sand less of an effort. It can go for days, if not weeks, without water. It can carry a heavy load over great distances. It is even claimed by some that a camel is faster than a horse, at least in the desert. Is it possible that the camel, and not the horse, is the superior design? If so, what does that say about the design skills of a committee? Could it possibly be that a committee design is in some very meaningful way a better design than one done by a single designer?



I was thinking about this just yesterday. It was the day of the Conference's annual get-together for pastors serving their first call in Iowa. There were about 20 pastors in the room, of varying ages and degrees of pastoral experience. There were licensed pastors and ordained pastors, seminary grads and diplomates of the Conference lay ministry program. There were young and old. It was a widely divergent group, everyone with different strengths and different weaknesses. As the day wore on, however, some common characteristics became apparent, characteristics like genuine love for pastoral ministry, enthusiasm, realism, commitment to the well-being of their congregations. And, more than anything else, a core of competence. This was a really good group of people, anyone of which I would be proud to call colleague.



And yet, each one of them was chosen by a committee! Not a single one of these men and women was there because some individual had the power and authority to say to one "You go to that church" and to another "You go to that other church." All of them were serving their congregations because some group, some committee, of caring, concerned and faithful members of those congregations, guided by the Holy Spirit, did the hard, tedious and often thankless work of sifting through dozens and dozens of profiles, checking references, conducting interviews and trying to separate wheat from chaff. And I, for one, was impressed by the results of the hundreds of hours of work those committees devoted to the wellbeing of their churches.



Maybe the camel is a horse designed by a committee, but when the nearest oasis is a couple of hundred miles away, having a camel to ride is a pretty comforting thought.



Tony Stoik

Associate Conference Minister/Western Iowa

Iowa Conference