Thought for the Day reflects on Jesus's personality type

During this morning's Today programme on BBC Radio 4, we were interested to hear the Reverend Giles Fraser talk about the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator as part of his Thought for the Day. Rev Fraser recounted how, as part of his studies at theology college, he and his fellow students were asked to complete the MBTI questionnaire. However, before doing so and before discovering their best-fit types, the students were asked about what type of person they thought Jesus was.

The exercise revealed something fascinating about the way people think about Jesus: that in the vast majority of cases, people said they thought Jesus was similar to themselves. Rev Fraser is an ENTP, and thought of Jesus as having similar personality characteristics - Extraversion, iNtuition, Thinking and Perceiving. The same was true of other participants who had different preferences - there was a high degree of convergence between each person's own type, and the type they ascribed to Jesus, regardless of preference.

Rev Fraser asked: are people worshipping themselves, or a projection of themselves, when they worship Jesus? He concluded by suggesting that actually, Jesus may be much stranger than people think.

You can listen to Rev Fraser's Thought for the Day (or read a transcript) at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p015kmsp?goback=%2Egde_21411_member_219839924.

As Rev Fraser's account demonstrates, the MBTI tool can be used in a variety of contexts. Similarly, OPP has worked with the National Church Institutions to foster a more collaborative leadership style and teamworking culture - have a look at our case study to find out more.