07/01/2015
The impact of a flagpole or tour guide flag for a tour leader on your tourists can be enormous. It’s a sign of leading, image and a message, towards spectators around you. The first time we read about a flagpole is in the Bible. The staff of Moses, it’s a magical or divine pole, it turns into a serpent and then back into a staff, the first plaque is been completed by touching the Nile with the staff and all water in Egypt changed into blood. Besides being a torch and a flagpole in the dessert for 40 years the Midrach tells us that the staff was passed down from generation to generation and was in the possession of the Judean kings until the First Temple was destroyed. In Samuel I, 17:40, it is said concerning King David: "And he took his staff in his hand." According to Midrash tradition, this is a reference to Moses' special staff.
The staff as the liturgical insignia of bishops and abbots goes back to the seventh century according to some Spanish sources, although its use is perhaps much as older. In Capernaum,Israel we see the statue of Peter the apostle who as designated as the first pope with a staff, probably a sign of continuity of religious leadership.
On November this year, the feast of All Saints, "Pope" Francis showed off his new pastoral staff. Papal Staff tends to be reserved for extraordinary ceremonial occasions. Could it be that guides and tour leaders holding their Telescopic Guide Flagpole represent the republican religiosity ?And making the pole or staff of the mass accessible to many more leaders/guides? If we take the so successful marketing process under the loupe of Moses and the Popes staff I think we should not be ashamed to copy them and use our personalized pole and flag so that all followers and observer turn into our next customer.