In a stunning article written in 1987, J. Gordon Kingsley, then president of William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri, tried to answer the question of what a college president does.1 Naturally, he acknowledged all of the business of leading: the…
Read MoreExperiencing Silence
Silence is hard to find in our culture. Our homes are filled with the whining of kitchen appliances, the clanking of exercise equipment, and the beeping of computers. People carry their own boom boxes. Cars play stereos at top volume….
Read MoreDialogue across Difference: Congregations Talk about Homosexuality
Talking, teaching, and learning about homosexuality at church may seem out of place in an American religious context in which polarized denominational debate about homosexuality regularly leads to newspaper headlines like “Nation’s Churches in Turmoil over Gays,” “Conservative Group Amplifies…
Read MoreSermon on the National Disaster
September 16, 2001 15th Sunday after Pentecost Year C Redeem the Time Any preacher who presumes to comment on this week’s tragedy knows silence is the first language that must speak to such anguish. It is a time to let…
Read MoreOur Readers Respond to Young Clergy Issue
Thank you so much for this publication. I am not clergy and I won’t see 35 again, but I meet people in all five mainline churches. Because of what I read in CONGREGATIONS, I am going to more proactively encourage…
Read MoreCongregations and Technology
Choosing and Using Congregation Management Software Nancy Armstrong The Indianapolis Center for Congregations has worked closely with dozens of congregations in selecting computer software as well as hardware and has reviewed and compared more than fifty Congregational Management Software (CMS)…
Read MoreThe Clergy Killer Debate
Thoughts on Lloyd Rediger’s Clergy Killers Speed B. Leas Like Lloyd Rediger, I have devoted a good deal of my life to wondering how to respond to difficult, ornery, hostile, or mean-spirited people in congregations. Rediger’s book Clergy Killers: Guidance…
Read MoreWhen Clergy Get Cancer: Receiving the Gifts that Come With A Change Role
When ordained people get cancer, we get it the same way other people do. One of a dozen triggers joins our genetic make-up, our exposure to carcinogens, and our immune system to compromise it, allowing cells inside us to grow…
Read MoreAdditional Evaluation Survey Information
Below are the original survey, the complete tabulation of results, and additional charts on evaluation mentioned on page 27. ONLY respond to this survey if you are CURRENTLY employed, as clergy or as lay staff, by a church or synagogue….
Read MoreA Proposed Cycle of Conversations for Ministry Evaluation
The “Cycle of Conversations” is intended to be a framework for innovation and adaptation rather than a blueprint for process. The cycle attempts to move the evaluative method away from corporate models of performance appraisal, in favor of a process…
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