PUPPET PLAYS AND THE PEOPLE WHO READ THEM

Note from Jim:
Some members of our puppet ministry community recently started a "string?" of comments about negative reviews on the internet and their impact. I thought I'd share those thoughts with you.

Jim Hill recently took part in a round-table discussion about the importance of ratings and comments on-line

Here are his comments

Neat discussion, Jennifer, Rachel and Jeff.

Boy oh boy, do I know what you guys are talking about. Since Puppet2Puppet is a collective and everyone is encouraged to share their scripts, I get a lot of questions and hurt feelings from our membership:

"Why did I get a 1 rating?! I really put a lot of work and love into that script!"

"Who is ------ ---- and why did he/she give my script a 3 and say such mean things? That script really reflects my faith and my understanding of God's love."

"What is going on, Jim? I'm hurt. That play is the one that kids want to see over and over at my church. And some **** says it's unusable because of...."

I do my best to comfort them. I was happy to read here that what I tell them is the same things that I'm hearing you guys talk about in this forum.

I say: "Maybe they don't understand the rating system", "Maybe they're having a bad day." "Maybe they express their love of Jesus in a different way."

I hope it helps them. I mean, they took a risk by putting something that they care about out there for others to read and judge. They risked embarassment and harsh criticism. I think that's hard for ANY writer, but harder yet when you're expressing your love for Christ and for children.

Sadly, what I really think is that we, as a Christian community, and as a community of Christians dedicated to helping children to love God and the world that he has created, I think that we concentrate more on our differences than what we agree about.

That's Jim Hill's two-cents. It's nice to be able to have a frank discussion about these things among my peers. Thank you Jennifer for starting this discussion. (BTW: that's a lovely name. If I were to have a baby girl tommorrow, I would name her Jennifer or Aimee.)

God Bless you all and the children who are fortunate enough to have such thoughtful guides in their lives.

Jim