Diocese of Liverpool

Thought for the Day, 25 October 2002

The Rt Rev. James Jones

Estelle Morris's frank confession in her resignation letter to the Prime Minister that she was “not very good at dealing with the modern media” raises an important question.

Is the ability to handle the media effectively a prerequisite for holding public office? Well, I'm afraid it is!

“Afraid” – because it would be good to say that it was sufficient to be hardworking and honest.

“Afraid” – because there's much about the media that appals. Reporters notoriously hunt with the pack, and when they scent blood they hound the quarry till they get it! They are without mercy in pursuit of their scoop.

Yet we the listeners, readers, viewers happily (and hypocritically) feed off the carcasses of media-hounded personalities.

Any of us who've had first-hand experience of an event that's been reported in the press invariably read the account with disbelief, saying to ourselves “Well, it didn't happen quite like that!”

And it leaves us healthily and rightly sceptical about the media. But the problem is – the next time we read something sensational about someone we dislike (even though we've never met them and depend utterly on the media for our view) we gladly suspend our scepticism and swallow the scandalous story hook, line and sinker! - 2 –

And yet without the media we can't communicate our message to a mass audience. Leaders in politics, business or religion need to be able to communicate.

I remember at the funeral of Brian Redhead asking a leading management consultant how she would define “leadership”. She gave it in one word “Followership”. But leaders can only secure a following by communicating a vision that the political followers can see. In the modern world that necessarily involves the media.

I'm sometimes asked if I think Jesus would have used the media had he lived today. I think he would! But I suspect he would have done only live interviews! It's in the editing that the distortion happens!

And yet one of the remarkable things about Jesus is that, even though he was literate and handling truths of life and death, he wrote nothing down. He entrusted the communication of his unique message to other people.

It was his choice, and it was yet another sign of the voluntary vulnerability of God. In the end, every leader has to entrust their message to somebody else. That's the essential vulnerability of leadership. You need to communicate it with skill, and in your handling of the media you need (to coin a phrase of Jesus) to be as wise as a serpent and as innocent as a dove. But, once the word has gone out, you're at the mercy or mercy-less-ness of the media.

Which is why I have some sympathy for the Prime Minister's reply to Estelle Morris that politics like all positions in public life “can be a tough and lonely job”!