As a student of human interaction from the standpoints of public safety, i.e. criminality (assessing the actions of offenders, victims, and law enforcement) and that of the private sector primarily in higher education (managers, employees, stakeholders), and that of church world (church leaders, volunteers, and congregants) I have seen common behaviors of those who are exceptional and those who are not as exceptional. It’s not as difficult to assess an individual as having a particular dysfunction as it is for a group. Groupthink is more challenging as one is attempting an explanation for the whole acting as one.
Scott Peck (The Road Less Traveled and People of the Lie) does a fairly in depth study of the group mindset with the American Vietnam soldiers involved with the massacre at MyLai and attempting to answer how over 500 soldiers could have covered up such an atrocity with their silence for such a long time. Because of the nature and intimacy an individual typically has with his or her own spirituality I have done extensive research with the conditions in Nazi Germany in the 1930’s and 1940’s, the Jim Jones cult mass murders in Guyana, and the David Koresh cult in Waco, Texas to assess the groupthink of such extreme groups and how organizations, especially church related organizations, can seduce the minds of usually clear minded individuals.
Unfortunately, there is a long list of church organizations that have been subjected to the same or similar type of dysfunctional leadership but have not resulted in the extreme circumstances mentioned. Why take a closer look at church leadership in particular and not the private business or public sectors? First and foremost, this one area strikes at the core of the one thing that is most sacred to many people. Whether that person is mildly or moderately religious or even not at all, but merely has an interest, makes them vulnerable.
I asked one former employee of a church that imploded due to its ineffective leadership and was on the brink of closing its doors for reorganization how a group of employees could be taken in for so long? Although the best answer is complex the employee could only speak to her own involvement before making the choice to leave. “We knew Satan had a hold on him (the leader) and probably had for a while. In the beginning he masked it well. Then, his self serving personality shone brightly. Talking about God on weekends on stage didn’t correlate with the loud arguments, yelling and screaming, and ‘F’ bombs in the back office. The scariest parts were his followers who thought he walked on water. Except for a few others whom I trusted I kept my feelings to myself and did my job and stayed out of his way.”
The common factor in circumstances like this is fear. Fear emanates from only one place and is not of God. Fear is a fertile field for despair and giving up. Further, the groupthink in this situation for those who did the bidding of the church leader would exhibit what Scott Peck calls “psychological immaturity” growing out of their own narcissism and that of the highly dysfunctional leader. In the end, there is enough ownership to go around. Psychological immaturity fuels dysfunctional groupthink like gasoline on a fire.
Sadly, if and when reorganization does happen, many who did the bidding of the highly dysfunctional narcissistic leader remain. The best analogy would be ridding the world of Hitler and keeping in place Goering, Goebbels, and Himmler to now run the organization. The only logical choice is a total reorganization.
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