3 N’s - Search for Significance
Professor of Sociology and Baptist preacher, Tony Campolo, neatly summarises what we teach our young folk to be the meaning of life. We tell them to work hard at school so that they will get good grades, if they get good grades they will get to university, if they get a good degree they will get a good job, if they get a good job they will earn lots of money, if they earn lot of money they can buy lots of stuff. A concise summary of our consumerist society. Others have sought meaning elsewhere.
The social psychologist Arie Kruglanski writes about the “search of significance” in young people attracted to violent extremism. He describes the three “N’s” involved in both radicalisation and in de-radicalisation. The three “N’s” are shared by all of us, none more so that the first one. The first “N” is need. The need to feel significant, that one matters, that one is deserving of respect. The second “N” is the narrative; the story which we are told which confirms our needs are being met. The final “N” is the social network; the group which we belong to which confirms that our need is met and that constructs the narrative in which we understand that it is true.
Kruglanski is addressing the problem of those who see violence as the means to the ends, which is “a search of significance”. How does the church help those with a search for significance and promote a very different ends and means? A different world from rampant consumerism or hate filled scapegoating. We start by being very local and practical. We can help create social networks for young folks and older folks. We need to explore our Bible narrative, our bible stories, in relevant and practical ways so that we make meaning of both the suffering and the joy in our world. And we need to remember and to act in a way in which people know that they are significant, that they matter and they deserve not just our respect but our reverence as Children of God.
Through our Girls and Boys Brigade, our Guild, the Memory Café, the foodbank, and the likes, we can help in our own little and local way. I have been so encouraged at the response of our first group to go through the mindfulness course. A new way of thinking and being has evolved. We will run a second course starting on Monday 9th October, in the mean time
we will meet on the first Monday of the month as a meditating community, developing ways of finding peace in a frantic world.
Jesus said that the kingdom of heaven in within us. It may not have the bling of consumerism nor the macho respect of violence, but it is a lasting, an enduring, peace of significance.
Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.
Chris