Where two or three are gathered together, you have an institution. All institutions, according to sociologist Robert Merton, tend to be degenerative. But institutions are also inevitable: not much gets done without them. The spiritual masters are unanimous that religious institutionalism is inimical to a well-developed spirituality. We are either a religious functionary, or 'spiritual' person. Why? Because institutions are about power, control and conformity. Spirituality is about creativity and powerlessness. Institutional religion tends to innoculate people - giving them just enough 'religion' so they'll have no desire for the real thing. Being a religious person and a spiritual person is not the same. A religious person may have the right words, but there is no reality.

Moral power means being free of the world's institutional titles, adulations, rewards or punishments. Pilate said to Jesus 'I have power'. Jesus responded: 'No you don't; you are trapped in an illusion and haven't a clue what real power is!'

I spend a lot of time these days talking to ex-pastors. For most of them relating to the church-as-institution was difficult. All of us have met the 'petty bureaucrat' - the uncreative character who follows rules and loves making decisions for others; being the powerful parent to your powerless child. The commissar hands down edicts ('someone's got to take charge') rather than be collegial or consultative. One pastor said: 'I enjoy preaching more than anything else in ministry: in this role I'm not ruled by petty bureaucrats!'

Bureaucrats are trained to comply strictly with rules. They don't easily improvise or innovate. Their career path is dependent on their perceived conformity to the institution's expectations. They may not bend the rules even when it is clear the organization might benefit. So official regulations become ends in themselves. 'Red-tape' inhibits the service of clients. The bureaucrat does not know how to ask, or is afraid to ask, of others, 'Who can I be for you?' He or she is not really listening. When the bureaucrat says 'He's a nice guy' 'She's a good lady' that means those people don't disturb anything: they conform to and propagate the norms and myths of the institution. Those who aren't nice people will be passed over for promotion. (An elected or nominated leader is like everybody else only more so).

And bureaucracies tend to become impersonal. The customers are there to 'fit into the system'. Hospital patients are awakened from a deep sleep to enable the nurse get his/her work done...

Religious bureaucrats tend to define the church primarily in terms of its structures and dogmas. Avery Dulles ('The Church as Institution', Models of the Church, Doubleday, 1987) writes: 'The Church of Christ could not perform its mission without some stable organizational features... [but] institutionalism is a deformation of the true nature of the Church... The primary notions of the church [are] mystery, sacrament, Body of Christ and People of God... A characteristic of the institutional model of the Church... is the hierarchical conception of authority... It is clericalist, for it views the clergy... as the source of all power and initiative... There is a tendency to juridicize not only the ruling power, but even the powers of teaching and sanctifying... This ecclesiology is triumphalistic. It dramatizes the Church as an army...'

The problems with such an institutional theory and practice, says Dulles: there is a meagre basis in Scripture and in early church tradition; the laity are reduced to a condition of passivity; the role of human authority is exaggerated, and the gospel is turned into a new law; theology is bound too exclusively to the defence of currently official positions; ecclesiology fails to give sufficient scope to the charismatic element; and it is out of phase with the demands of our times - an era of dialogue, ecumenism etc. 'In an age when all large institutions are regarded with suspicion or aversion, it is exceptionally difficult to attract people to a religion that represents itself as primarily institutional...'

So the Church is often stuck with yesterday's way of doing things. 'It worked then, so it should work now' is a dangerous fallacy. Indeed, the churches which are doing it like their grandparents did are dying, all over the world. Today's minds must never be set. For many, a cold in the head causes less suffering than an idea! But beware of confusing creativity with novelty: trying the new for newness' sake. Our basic gospel beliefs do not alter, but certainly the way we 'package' them must.

Most Western churches are static or declining numerically. Main reason? Lack of creativity.

CREATIVITY.

Australia, we are told, has a choice: become either a 'clever country' or a 'banana republic.' The hot topic right now in business around the world is creative problem solving. In Minneapolis 3M encourages employees to devote about 15% of their work schedule to non-job related tasks. Hewlett-Packard spent two years and $40m designing a 'factory of the future' in Puerto Rico where computer-systems employees are hired on the basis of their creative potential. The three skills of thinking, learning and creativity are what John Naisbitt and Patricia Aburdene, in Reinventing the Corporation, call the 'new TLC': 'These are the new basics, the three Rs of the new information society.' The most precious commodity in business - or any organization in times of rapid change - is a fresh idea. The biggest challenge is connecting innovation with existing business. Books like Betty Edwards' Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain are selling millions of copies.

We humans have creative ability because we are made in the image of our creator. Creativity is working with, rather than against, the Creator. Alexander Fleming said, 'I have been accused of inventing penicillin, but that's impossible. A mould has been making it for thousands of years. All I did was to bring it to your notice!'

WHAT IS CREATIVITY?

Artistic creativity is a view of the world, of the arts, of human emotions, which sees beneath the surface, or rearranges components of these into novel or beautiful forms. Then there's problem-solving creativity: 'convergent thinking' is what is measured on intelligence tests; 'divergent thinking' is originality of thought: 'thinking sideways' or laterally, as de Bono put it.

Creative thinking and lateral thinking are not the same. Some creative thinkers can be very rigid in some areas. A lateral thinker is always looking for changes and exceptions, doing things differently. Lateral thinking is based directly on understanding how the brain acts as a self-organizing information system.

CAN CREATIVITY CAN BE LEARNED? Yes. The experts suggest:

1. Develop a childlike sense of wonder.

Creative genius is recognizing the uniqueness in the unimpressive. It is looking at a homely caterpillar, an ordinary egg and a selfish infant, and seeing a butterfly, an eagle and a saint. Paul Macready, a 64-year old American, developed the first machine that could fly propelled by human effort for more than 2 km. Why is he so creative? Nobel laureate physicist Murray Gell-Mann, a Pasadena neighbour and close friend says: 'He approaches nature and daily life with an innocent sense of wonder. He approaches problems and learning about new things in the same way, without strongly held, preconceived notions. When he sees something in daily life, when he sees something in nature, he takes a fresh view of it.'

'There are children playing in the street who could solve some of my top problems in physics,' said J. Robert Oppenheimer, 'because they have modes of sensory perception that I lost long ago.' Truly creative people can get in touch with the 'pre-civilized' self, the world of the child. Most of what we really need to know about how to live we learned in kindergarten...

2. Curiosity and imagination.

For Plato, curiosity was the mother of knowledge. Humans who express their creativity in a Christian context - Rembrandt, Bunyan, Augustine, Michelangelo - are not hemmed in by themselves. Our opportunities are only limited by our imagination. But we don't use it enough (which is why, as Charles Kettering said, there are ten thousand fiddlers to one composer). A middle-management friend pretends he's the CEO of his company, and imagines what he would change first.

3. Be a risk-taker.

'I believe in getting into hot water', wrote G.K.Chesterton, 'I think it keeps you clean.' Like mocking birds, conformists are always echoing someone else's song, fearful of going out on a limb with a tune of their own. At W L Gore and Associates (the teflon inventors) they say 'If you're not making mistakes you're doing something wrong!'

Improvisation corrected by feedback was Franklin Roosevelt's way. 'The country needs bold, persistent experimentation,' he declared. 'Take a method and try it; if it fails, admit it and try another. But above all try something.'

4. Understand the creative process.

'Genius,' de Bono says, 'lies in solving everyday problems - and everyone can get better at it.' First, there's preparation, a concerted effort to solve the problem, trying all combinations, ending in frustration. (It was Edison who said that 'genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration). Next, incubation: the problem is left alone. Many abandon a good idea when they get hung up on a 'missing link' they can't resolve. Leave it blank while you attend to something else. Your subconscious mind will work on it while you're eating, sleeping, organizing. Don't give up: your hunches may be your future! For two years, residents of Vulcan, West Virginia complained to bureaucrats about replacing their bridge which had collapsed from old age. Then someone suggested asking the Russians to help. The Soviet government actually sent someone to investigate, and shamed state and federal officials into swift action (Time, January 2, 1978). Then you may experience illumination or insight: an 'aha!' experience from an association or 'out of the blue' (being 'struck by enlightening!'). (Here are some of de Bono's: Make companies that spew waste into water systems discharge their waste higher upstream than their intake of water! Diminish street crime by giving street gangs grants which increase as crime diminishes! If a crawling baby gets mixed up with mother's knitting, put the knitter in the playpen! Why do management and unions have to fight? De Bono suggests getting them together to draw up a list of changes. Savings made would go to the unions in the first two years. You are then motivating them instead of telling them not to do such-and-such). Finally, there's verification: the new idea is tested.

5. Know your own mind.

You are a multi-dimensional person. De Bono says we can think better if we tap into all the resources within us, by learning to wear six thinking hats: a white one for information, red for feeling, black for judgment, yellow for positive thinking, green for creativity and the blue hat for control.

There's also a relationship between artistic creativity and dreaming. While in a drugged sleep Samuel Taylor Coleridge experienced what he later called 'A Vision in a Dream' or 'Kubla Khan' - and composed, in a few moments of sleep, this exciting and mysterious work.

The left and right sides of the brain are specialized in different types of mental function. The left appears to be good at logical, rational thinking, numerics, analyzing language etc. The right side of the brain is better at synthesizing ideas and visual-spatial tasks. Both sides are important in the creative process: the left-brain for data-gathering and analysis, and right-brain for insight. (Meditation - particularly discursive meditation - may be left brain thinking, contemplation right brain or intuitive thinking). Half-wits only use half their brain!

6. Study human psychology.

Why does Saddam Hussein act the way he does? Why is a fundamentalist threatened by ambiguity? Why are aboriginal people - all over the world - given to despair? Or, in your community: what group, when invited to your church to a carefully arranged instruction group will see 90% attend? (Mothers with their first babies). What group will see fewer than 10%? (Fathers, to a seminar on fathering!).

7. Make sure your institution encourages mavericks.

Make any line of work into an adventure. For years, Capt. Grace Hopper (in 1983 she was the US Navy's oldest officer - at 76 - on active duty) had a clock in her office that ran counterclockwise. It was there, she says, to remind people that things don't always have to be done the conventional way. (Her special expertise? Computer programming!).

A librarian had the job of moving 60 tons of books. The board budgeted to pay a removalist. The librarian wanted that money for more books, so she published a story in the local paper urging readers to draw out all their winter reading at once, and return the books in early spring - to the new library. The costs were drastically reduced.

8. Internalize 'hope'.

There are at least six possible solutions to most sticky situations. The only problem: finding the best one! Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're right! Aim somewhere. Set life goals, but enjoy serendipitous experiences on the way. Have fun - enjoy your life (you'll never get out of it alive!). As George Bernard Shaw (then Robert Kennedy) put it, 'Some see things as they are and ask "Why?" I see things that never were are ask "Why not?"