I can’t remember the first time we received one of those questionnaires in the mail…
Since that time, many more have arrived - although now it is not uncommon for a link to show up in our inbox, requesting us to respond to a list of questions at an online site which then tabulates our input and communicates our replies to whatever agency posted the questions. You would think I would have grown accustomed to this. I haven’t. Instead, I find it harder and harder to keep a good attitude, simply answer the questions and send them back. At the same time, I do understand the motivation behind and the significance of those questionnaires; in theory, I support their validity and see their worth… which makes it hard to argue that they shouldn’t be sent.
So I won't.
On the other hand those questionnaires never fail to, at very best, discourage me. At worst, I get downright angry – as in sinfully angry, even though I hope I know that neither discouragement nor hurt nor sin was the intent.
Perhaps this happens more to those of us who raise the bulk of ministry and work funds from churches and organizations rather than individuals. And maybe those mailings are not as frequent as I seem to recall. But the longer we walk this road, the more I battle resentment each time one arrives.
Often those questionnaires include inquiries like...
...the title of this post...
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It is the custom of those who have no right to ask, to ask. Or to put it another way, their business may be to inquire about my personal habits, but my personal habits are none of their business. So I feel no obligation to answer their questions. I don't take offense at their prying -- it is, after all, the insatiable nature of humans to pry into the lives of others. Whether it's someone prying for gossip fodder, or a marketing department prying to find out how to best target me for a vast plethora of products, it's still prying, and I choose to simply ignore it. After all, if I want to make my personal life anyone else's business, there's always facebook :)
ReplyDeletewell? i can honestly say i disagree with you on this one. but that's ok :-) i do feel there is a right to ask, at least many of those questions. and i think it says something about the state of my heart that i bristle. those questions do force me to look at what i'm doing/thinking/believing and why - examining myself is never bad. part of the problem is the implication that there is a right/best answer to all of them.
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