Ilkley Baptist

A while ago I read a line that made me think: "despite the way it may seem, I honestly believe that everyone is doing the best they can in the cricumstances." Something similar has been put more grandly, but equally strikingly, by Theodore Zeldin (who I think is best described as 'an intellectual'): that there is a world shortage of appreciation.

I was listening to the Today programme just now, as you do. The whole programme and the political world it reports is about blame. A government minister has just got the sack; the Sun is very pleased about this, describing him as a bungler. There was an edgy interview about City Academies and standards which have failed to rise as promised. I could go on, but I've turned it off to write this, and we all know it will just be more of the same. Whose fault that prisoners absconded, whose lack of leadership that a system is failing, whose head to roll because things aren't as we want them? Sniping, criticism, accusation, blame.

I'm so glad I'm not a politician. I'm glad I don't work in the culture of demand, pressure and 'you're fired' that dominates many work places (though not, I suspect, Alan Sugar's). It's not what human being need.

There are alternatives. There are management styles that are based on praise. There are leaders who look for opportunities to say 'I'm proud of you.' I think of Jesus, going up to someone who has had a thousand kicks from the world he lives in - you're a leper, you can't work, you can't come into the Temple, you can't live with your family, you're dirty and sinful and dangerous, you're not good enough for the rest of us - and reaching out a hand to touch and identify and forgive and make clean.

Society is turning into a big thug, a hostile environment. Well, society is just us. We can change it if we want to, if we think a little appreciation would be nice.

I thank you.