Thomas Oden has recently written that we live in a time of remarkable cultural transition. One culture is dying and another struggles to be born, and we live in the huge gap in between. Now it is unraveling, sometimes with devastating, frightening consequences. Oden suggests that what we call postmodernism is really only a severe critique of modernism. No new culture has yet emerged to tell the story of who we are and where we think we are going.
Cultural drift can be a dangerous thing.
In this time of transition, we need leaders. But I grow more convinced all the time that we need a new kind of leader. We live in a time when leaders need to understand not just the tools of technology, not just the leverage that money can bring, not just the means of being most productive, but how to shape lives of meaning. We need leaders who can bring hope. We need leaders who can bring moral vision.