Those who nurture and lead a community based on grace and forgiveness can find themselves distanced from those very qualities in their own spiritual life.
The openness, vulnerability, and honesty encouraged in disciples of Jesus can be seen as liabilities for leaders.
When leaders don’t meaningfully engage in grace and forgiveness themselves their message becomes less Gospel and more spiritual theoretical process.
And when they are exposed to prolonged denial of the peace, security, and relationship which grace and forgiveness provide, they will find themselves looking for gratification, meaning, and intimacy through other, harmful, means.
When spirituality becomes spiritualisation, life in the body becomes carnality. When ministers and priests live their ministry mostly in their heads and relate to the Gospel as a set of valuable ideas to be announced, the body quickly takes revenge by screaming loudly for affection and intimacy. Christian leaders are called to live the Incarnation, that is, to live in the body, not only in their own bodies but also in the corporate body of the community, and to discover there the presence of the Holy Spirit.
Henri J. M. Nouwen, In The Name Of Jesus – Reflections On Christian Leadership, The Crossroad Publishing Company NY, 1989, pgs. 67-68.
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