Right to Repair

by Eddie Pipkin

Are you familiar with the “right to repair” movement? It’s a movement that has gained traction in recent years that would give legal rights to consumers to be able to fix their own equipment and devices. In some ways it is part of a broader anti-consumption focus that says we should be buying less by throwing out less. In a world of one-click, next-day purchases of cheap crap to satisfy our every whim, what if we invested in fewer but better, well-built goods and went back to a culture of repairing things and keeping them longer? The scourge of instant gratification / disposability isn’t limited to our shopping habits. It’s creeped into our ministry management habits. Whatever happened to the time-honored practices of repair, reconciliation, and redemption?

As far as consumer frustration is concerned, there are plenty of tinkerers who would love to take a shot at repairing their own cars or iPhones, but manufacturers have done everything in their power to make this legally and practically untenable. Currently, such attempts automatically void warranties, even for simple repairs, and parts may be impossible to get because producers want only authorized fixes to be done by their owned-and-operated repair centers. Even better from their perspective, they want to make fixing things so much of a hassle that regular people will just give up, throw the old thing in the garbage, and buy a new replacement.

That dovetails nicely, for those who profit from our compulsive spending, with the constant barrage of advertising on our screens that insists our lives are lacking if we don’t have the newest, latest, greatest device or if we’re not wearing the up-to-the minute hot fashion trend.

It’s a treadmill of consumption that leaves us frustrated, strung out, struggling to pay the bills, and ultimately unfulfilled. Perhaps it is saner and wiser to revert back to a model from yesteryear in which stuff was made with more care and lasted longer, and it was normal for folks to do repairs themselves or have repairs done and keep objects in circulation for a much longer period of time.

Laura Fenton writes about this in her Substack, “Living Small”:

I believe repairing things ourselves is vital. It teaches us that with a little trial and error things can be fixed. We live in a world where it’s easier to add a new item to your cart and have it arrive with free shipping the very next day. It’s all very convenient, but this culture reinforces the idea that broken things cannot be or are not worth fixing. I can think of a lot of big, broken things in our lives (government, healthcare, childcare) that desperately need repair right now. More people might be optimistic about fixing them, if they had experience with everyday repair.

Fenton draws the connection between shopping philosophy and life philosophy: our skepticism, acquired over time, that it’s difficult if not impossible to fix things, and that, even if it’s theoretically possible to repair something, it’s not worth the effort. And who wants an old, used thing anyway?

I worry that churches have fallen into this mode of thinking.

Certainly, in this space we regularly celebrate the joy and necessity of doing new things and embracing new ideas. But when we are so eager to do what’s new that we become perversely eager to jettison the old, we can do damage to institutions and individuals.

It can be a lot of work – a very lot of work – to repair, rehabilitate, and reinvent broken programs and ministries or to help people find redemption and reproachment, but this work can pay deep and lasting dividends. In the case of helping people find redemption and reconnection, it is holy, sacred work. The Parable of the Prodigal Son is one of the most potent passages in the Bible. Yet, too often, if someone goes astray or becomes problematic, it is too easy for us to send them on their way. There are churches on every corner after all.

The redemptive work that churches can facilitate helps people on their human journey, and people who have benefitted from that kind of grace provide a unique and valuable level of service and leadership.

Likewise, instead of just getting rid of a struggling program, if we can figure out ways to help it revitalize and rework itself, we can keep the best parts of the old thing – the parts that really matter – while looking forward to the future and embracing new strategies. Also, we hold onto the valuable people who were deeply connected to the old thing (as opposed to the thing local churches sometimes do where leadership says, “Oh well, if you don’t like us getting rid of this thing, you can find a new church”).

This is deep work.

It’s valuable work, and done well, done with a humble, sincere heart, it pays enormous dividends in wisdom and empathy and making people feel valued and trusting.

How do you do at repairing things? Relationships? Programs? Policies? Do you embrace the path of redemption when people have made poor choices? Or do you more have a habit of moving on to the next new thing? Share your stories of redemption and saving (repairing) something that looked useless and done.