In case you haven’t noticed, brain science is coming to a church in your neighborhood, perhaps even your own. Just like sociology, furnace repair science, and adolescent psychology, neurobiology has moved from the front pages of newspapers and science magazines…

Ever wished you could be one of those church leaders who draw large crowds of listeners lost in the rapture of being in the presence of such a wonderful person? In your dreams, maybe? There you are: wavy-haired, strong and…

Welcome back to the second segment of a column devoted to the question, “What is happening when a charismatic person operates as a leader in a congregation?” Last month we thought about the interdependence of leaders and followers in a…

Ever wondered about the poets in your congregation? How they think, how they find words for their thoughts? You know them, right? These are the people who have an uncanny ability to capture life’s moments with especially evocative words and…

Luke 16-10 “Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much…” Nothing prepared me for the experience of pastoring the small congregation to which I was first called. Neither my personal experience nor my seminary training had…

For at least a decade, loving and critical church leaders have pointed out that the “presumption of neediness” that has guided several generations of pastors and thousands of mission statements is essentially flawed. These criticisms seem to group themselves around…

When your brain shows up in church, it likely encounters platitudes, phrases of known and unknown origin that pass for “communication” in much of our life together as God’s people. (Good, you already caught that platitude swimming by!) Because these…

After two years of work on a sexual harassment problem at a Fortune 500 company without producing the desired results, an organization development consultant specializing in gender issues and conflict resolution sought help from David Cooperrider, a professor at Case…

Americans have a passion for information. We treasure our freedom of speech and the growing access we have to all kinds of information. Some of us have a vision of governance based on the town meeting where officers are challenged…