Tag: clergy

ELCA is not the church, by Luther’s definition

Also, for Martin Luther, the real church consisted of people who hear the Gospel and proclaim it, Croghan said. The institutional church arose to aid that mission, “but institutions are not the church.” And, when to ensure their continued existence, such institutions compromise Gospel truth, they can be readily shed, Croghan said.

“The ELCA is not the church, by Luther's definition,” Croghan said.

In an article about congregations in South Dakota leaving ELCA, I came across this quote about ecclesiology. The rest of the article is good too.

via Gay clergy vote splits South Dakota Lutheran churches | argusleader.com | Argus Leader.

Did Christianity Cause the Crash?

Your Best Life Now, which has fueled a TV show that Osteen claims is now seen in 200 million homes worldwide, opens with a story of a man on vacation in Hawaii. He was “a good man who had achieved a modest measure of success, but he was coasting along, thinking that he’d already reached his limits.” While sightseeing, he and his wife admired a gorgeous house on a hill. “I can’t even imagine living in a place like that,” he said. For this bit of self-deprecation and modesty, Osteen pities the man: “His own thoughts and attitudes,” he writes, “were condemning him to mediocrity,” or what is known in the gospel as the “defeated life.”

via Did Christianity Cause the Crash? – The Atlantic (December 2009).

Kennon Callahan

He is the founder of the Center for Continuing Education at Emory’s Candler School of Theology. Dr. Callahan is the founder of the National Certification Program in Church Finance and Administration, providing training and certification for pastors and church administrators. He has received many awards and recognitions, including being elected to the Hall of Fame of the National Association of Church Business Administrators.

via Twelve Keys Seminar with Kennon Callahan via Prof. Doubleday

Seminaries face financial woes

Among the 175 “free-standing” institutions in the Association of Theological Schools, 39% were “financially stressed,” with less than a year’s worth of spendable assets, a fall 2008 report says. That’s up from 26% a year earlier, and the data don’t reflect fallout from the stock market crash in the fall.

Seminaries face financial woes – USATODAY.com.

Leading Pastors: Men vs. Women

Although there may be differences between how male and female lead pastors see themselves and function, it appears that the nature and challenges of large church leadership shape the experience of male and female lead pastors in ways that make their leadership more similar than different.

To see the survey results, go to: http://www.gbhem.org/atf/cf/%7B0BCEF929-BDBA-4AA0-968F-D1986A8EEF80%7D/CW_LWPP2009results.pdf

To see an analysis by HiRho Park and Susan Willhauck, go to: http://www.gbhem.org/atf/cf/%7B0BCEF929-BDBA-4AA0-968F-D1986A8EEF80%7D/CW_LWPP2009.pdf

via Lewis Center Update July 2009.

Leadership in Small Churches

The preacher is the chief storyteller of the congregation’s story and knows the value of telling and retelling it on the occasion when most people are gathered and receptive to the storyteller’s spell, that is, the sermon. This is especially valuable to small membership churches, where neglect of history to the point of institutional amnesia is a telling symptom of a lack of corporate self-esteem. A small membership church that cannot tell its own story is prey to a fabricated story told about it from outside by an unfriendly critic. For the sake of building up the body of Christ, the preacher must become a determined student of congregational history. Then in an act of strategic leadership, the preacher must tell that recovered story from the pulpit.

via Leading Ideas: A Resource for Church Leaders.

Sexual Violence in the Church

Sexual abuse by people in power has been reality in religious circles since the beginning of times. Joy A. Schroeder has written a book about how sexual violence in the Bible has been interpreted by the church through the ages, Dinah’s Lament: The Biblical Legacy of Sexual Violence in Christian Interpretation.

Joy A. Schroeder wrote an article about sexual abuse in the middle ages in Lutheran Quarterly, 7 (1993): 171-190, called “Marguerite of Navarre Breaks Silence about Sixteenth Century Clergy Sexual Violence.”

The third text worth mentioning is by Marguerite de Navarre, The Heptameron, but stories twenty-two and twenty-three in that book address a sexual abuse of clergy.

Trúartæknar

Ein af hættulegustu villum kirkjunnar er að einoka trúarlífið. Þegar kirkjan færist frá því að vera samfélag trúaðra og verður þess í stað stofnun með fjölda trúartækna í vinnu, þá er þessi hætta e.t.v. hvað mest. Hættan felst m.a. í því að trúartæknarnir taka yfir svið trúarinnar í þjóðfélaginu og almenningur verður neytendur. Þar sem trúin hefur marga snertifleti í daglega lífinu, þarf sífellt fleiri trúartækna til að dekka mannlega tilveru, svo ekki reyni á trú neytendanna.
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