Managing Christian Clergy

Most congregations will appoint, or will have appointed to them, a minister (whether that minister is called a minister, a pastor, or a priest). To the minister will be allocated a variety of functions, and particularly those of teaching, preaching, pastoral care, and presiding at the congregation’s services, so in this chapter we shall study New Testament texts relating to bishops, presbyters, and deacons, and we shall explore how clergy function in congregations today. We shall find that a number of aspects of management theory developed in the private sector might be of use, and because we shall find a large number of both interesting parallels and interesting differences between the ways in which private sector managers relate to their companies and the ways in which the clergy relate to their congregations, we shall draw some of our more detailed conclusions within the third section of the chapter rather than include them in an already rather long list of conclusions. Finally the chapter will offer a case study on teams of clergy.