Faith in Leadership

edited by Robert Banks and Kimberly Powell

an excerpt

“LEADERSHIP IS A HOT WORD these days. We live in difficult times, with things breaking down and changing too fast; we may feel uncertain or lose our way. When this happens we start to look for help. We call for leaders to step in—or step out, in some cases—and deal with difficult situations. The 'L word' is also being tossed around frequently because those in charge of our venerable institutions, both public and private, have often failed us: they have either lacked the courage to do what was needed or used their positions to serve their own interests rather than to fulfill their proper responsibilities. Thus we continue our search for women and men of integrity to assume these leadership positions.

Coincidentally, another hot word today is spirituality. When life becomes difficult, we look for guidance and strength. When we feel that others have let us down, we search for something or someone greater than ourselves to depend on. Instead of experiencing anxiety and perplexity, we hunger for trust; we desire vibrant faith.

These two tendencies—the call for leadership and the search for faith—are two sides of one phenomenon with a complex relationship. Our hope that we will find help from capable leaders to solve our current problems is itself a form of faith and occurs precisely because we have lost faith in our existing leaders. We are once again realizing that leadership involves more than a charismatic personality or particular skills; rather, leadership is about character. Character does not emerge from nowhere but springs from deeply held convictions. In other words, if leaders are to do what is required of them and to withstand the inherent pressures in their positions, then their character must be anchored in faith.

At the deepest level, then, faith and leadership go together. It is just that for a time we lost sight of this....”

from the foreword, Max De Pree