By Laura Stephens-Reed For a long time there has been commonly-held wisdom about church size dynamics and the role of the pastor at each church size: The family size church has fewer than 50 people, with most of them related to one another. This congregation experiences little numerical growth because it is difficult for visitors … Continue reading
By Laura Stephens-Reed Over the course of their vocational lives, many pastors find themselves charged with leading a church staff. This is not only true for senior pastors, but associate pastors can also function in the same way within their more specialized ministry areas. The supervisory role is challenging. Most pastors enter ministry expecting to … Continue reading
By Laura Stephens-Reed In A Path to Belonging: Overcoming Clergy Loneliness, leadership specialists Mary Kay DuChene and Mark Sundby raise the red flag that loneliness among clergy, a stress response to not having adequate levels of social connection, is epidemic. This was true before the pandemic, but our need to distance ourselves physically during the … Continue reading
By Brian Foreman The first six months serving as Coordinator of Congregational Ministries could be summarized in two words: listening and learning. At first, much of the listening was done with my ears, through one-on-one conversations, video calls and focus groups. As opportunities to travel, gather, preach and visit began to fill up the calendar, … Continue reading
In many churches, this is the time of year when annual reviews of staff take place. For some pastors, these conversations are the only times they hear what is and isn’t working from their congregants’ point of view. That makes reviews somewhat nerve-wracking for clergy. They wonder: What surprises await me when that conference room … Continue reading
By Rev. Laura Stephens-Reed Recently my family moved from one town to another, which meant my son changed schools. A couple of weeks into the semester, the school hosted a Back-to-School Bash on a Friday night. What a great idea! The students would have an opportunity simply to have fun together without the constraints of … Continue reading
By Laura Stephens-Reed It is no secret that many churches, once pushing the fire marshal’s maximum occupancy to its limits, are now in numerical decline. I have my pick of statistics that I could cite, but here’s a particularly poignant visual from the Hartford Institute for Religion Research: The pews are no more than 38 … Continue reading
By Andy Hale In some families, there are just certain things you don’t talk about ever. We all have sat through those Thanksgiving meals, just praying that no one brings up politics or religion in front of the highly contentious uncle. Growing up in the Hale house, much to my mother’s chagrin, there didn’t seem … Continue reading
Churches and clergy are facing an unprecedented crisis. How is this moment affecting pastors personally? How are ministers leading their congregations through all of this? What resources are being offered to connect churches together? And where do we find and see God? Join us in the coming days and weeks as we connect with leaders … Continue reading
The following post comes from Bill Wilson, president of the Center for Congregational Health. Nearly all observers of the 21st century church in America agree that the next generation of leadership is a cause for concern. Many write, blog, tweet and generally lament the state of leadership cultivation and training, or lack thereof. Far too … Continue reading
CBFblog 