Voting for new pastor?

[seeker2122]

I'm wondering when your church is choosing the new pastor, do they bring in the candidates and let them guest preach for one Sunday
and then have the congregation secretly submit a voting ballot to see who they want or don't want?

Or does your church simply make the decision based on the leader of the church and they make the decision without the congregation input/vote?

 

[PloverWing]

Our parish went with an option that's in between the two you listed, when we chose a new priest a few years ago. We formed a Discernment Committee, made up of members from the parish, chosen to represent the variety of demographics among our members; the committee had a variety of ages (teen to retiree), genders, ethnicities, and viewpoints along the liberal-conservative spectrum. I don't remember right now whether the congregation voted to approve the membership of the Discernment Committee, or whether the committee was simply appointed by the vestry (the governing lay body of the parish). I got to be one of the people on the committee, so I saw what the committee's work was. We formed and published a description of our parish and what we were looking for in a priest, and there were about 5 or 6 people who applied for the position. We looked over their resumes and had teleconference interviews with them. We chose two to come for in-person visits. The discernment committee talked at length about those two candidates and voted by secret ballot for our choice, after which we had chosen our new priest.

The candidates did not meet with the entire congregation, and the list of candidates was confidential. The idea there is that it could be divisive if we hired Sally, but half the congregation wished we had hired Bob. Additionally, maybe Bob and Sally don't want their current parishes to know that they're interviewing for a position at a new parish. This does mean that the congregation put a lot of trust in the committee to do our work carefully and with sensitivity to what the needs of the parish are.

In the end, we did hire an excellent priest.

 

[Paidiske]

I am familiar with a process similar to what PloverWing describes (noting the involvement and approval of the bishop, as well). Our committee is elected by the parish.

I would add, while in my experience a potential pastor would not come and be a guest preacher in the church, often the committee would go and visit the church that pastor is currently at, observe a service or two, talk to the people there (discreetly), and so on.

 

[The Liturgist]

Our parish went with an option that's in between the two you listed, when we chose a new priest a few years ago. We formed a Discernment Committee, made up of members from the parish, chosen to represent the variety of demographics among our members; the committee had a variety of ages (teen to retiree), genders, ethnicities, and viewpoints along the liberal-conservative spectrum. I don't remember right now whether the congregation voted to approve the membership of the Discernment Committee, or whether the committee was simply appointed by the vestry (the governing lay body of the parish). I got to be one of the people on the committee, so I saw what the committee's work was. We formed and published a description of our parish and what we were looking for in a priest, and there were about 5 or 6 people who applied for the position. We looked over their resumes and had teleconference interviews with them. We chose two to come for in-person visits. The discernment committee talked at length about those two candidates and voted by secret ballot for our choice, after which we had chosen our new priest.

The candidates did not meet with the entire congregation, and the list of candidates was confidential. The idea there is that it could be divisive if we hired Sally, but half the congregation wished we had hired Bob. Additionally, maybe Bob and Sally don't want their current parishes to know that they're interviewing for a position at a new parish. This does mean that the congregation put a lot of trust in the committee to do our work carefully and with sensitivity to what the needs of the parish are.

In the end, we did hire an excellent priest.

It’s a pity that some parishes basically got locked out of their own church buildings and in one case pushed out of the denomination, in not just the Episcopal Church but also the United Methodist Church in at least one case in the past two decades or so*, their original building, and forced to buy new buildings and into different denominations such as ACNA because they were not given the discretion your parish was afforded, chiefly because they disagreed with the new perspective of the appointed clergy and the mainline churches overall with regards to moral theology.

Now, conversely:

Historically, churches such as the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox and Assyrian Churches have, conversely, assigned priests to parishes as a unilateral decision by the bishop based on his discernment of the spiritual needs of the parish. In the Coptic Orthodox church, a major problem arose in extra-diocesan areas where there was no diocesan bishop who could remove clergy who were not preaching an Orthodox doctrine, and this resulted in some major scandals, for example, one Coptic church in the US and one in Egypt basically became for a time akin to Pentecostal or non-denom megachurches in doctrine, until Pope Tawadros appointed diocesan bishops for all of the former extra-diocesan areas. The case in Muqattam, Egypt, an impoverished suburb of Christians in Cairo who live by herding pigs that feed in the city’s landfill (one of many tragic instances of discrimination against Christians in Islamic countries) was particularly striking, as the church didn’t even look like an Orthodox church but rather a movie theater).

This YouTube channel features videos of sermons by newly appointed bishops and priests regarding returning these parishes to doctrinal Orthodoxy: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC03thjqxbi4Jmwae5rGeTeQ

My friend @dzheremi , have you heard of that?

This whole thread is interesting because I find myself with both Congregationalist and Episcopal leanings in terms of polity. In a sense, I think bishops should exercise control if there is a true bishop and a true diocese, whereas congregations which join and bring their building with them should not be locked out of their parish if a change in doctrine is promulgated by the bishops.

*St. Paul’s , a United Methodist Church in Anchorage, whose members had paid for the original building, and who had to purchase another building wound up an independent congregation, similar in a sense to the excellent traditional Wesleyan-liturgical Epworth Chapel on the Green in Boise, Idaho. The bishop of that Conference literally shut their parish down because they politely objected to her desired appointment in terms of clergy.

 

[Paidiske]

It's my sense that the ideal is a process of discussion and discernment between the church (through representatives), the prospective priest/minister/pastor, and any governing authority (bishop, presbytery, or the like). In reality, this can sometimes be hampered by problems with any of the parties. Lack of honesty on the part of the church (about their true situation), over-control by a bishop, a sense of entitlement on the part of the clergy person... any of these and a myriad of other things can be problems.

I have been asked to consider parishes which, after consideration, I have declined. I have also had a parish I was quite interested in decline to take me on (I respect their reasons, though I was quite disappointed). There are bishops I couldn't work with (and no doubt the feeling is sometimes mutual)! So it's complicated.

 

[The Liturgist]

It's my sense that the ideal is a process of discussion and discernment between the church (through representatives), the prospective priest/minister/pastor, and any governing authority (bishop, presbytery, or the like). In reality, this can sometimes be hampered by problems with any of the parties. Lack of honesty on the part of the church (about their true situation), over-control by a bishop, a sense of entitlement on the part of the clergy person... any of these and a myriad of other things can be problems.

I have been asked to consider parishes which, after consideration, I have declined. I have also had a parish I was quite interested in decline to take me on (I respect their reasons, though I was quite disappointed). There are bishops I couldn't work with (and no doubt the feeling is sometimes mutual)! So it's complicated.

Indeed.

I feel like some churches with bishops do not have them as actively involved in each individual parish as might be ideal. I think there should be a Hierarchical Divine Liturgy or Pontifical Mass every year in each parish. Canons* exist for a reason - to celebrate at the cathedral church

*In Orthodoxy and in the Assyrian church, the cathedral chapter I haven’t seen called as such, but cathedrals tend to have multiple priests led by an archpriest. There are also Chorepiscopi, or Choir Bishops, who can be married and who can ordain people as Psaltis or Readers and do other things (for example, my understanding is that Assyrian archpriests can reconsecrate an altar that has been desecrated) but not as Subdeacons, Deacons or Priests.

 

[Paidiske]

A lot of the time it's a question of how many parishes are under a bishop's oversight. My bishop now has far fewer parishes than where I was working before, and consequently he seems much more involved.

There's also a fine line between involvement and imposition, which can sometimes get rather blurry...

 

[seeker2122]

I am familiar with a process similar to what PloverWing describes (noting the involvement and approval of the bishop, as well). Our committee is elected by the parish.

I would add, while in my experience a potential pastor would not come and be a guest preacher in the church, often the committee would go and visit the church that pastor is currently at, observe a service or two, talk to the people there (discreetly), and so on.

I agree with this approach.
But what if I want the congregation to be able to see and choose who they want?
The concern of "what if 51% wanted A and 49% wanted B and we hire A therefore upset half the congregation?" is not going to happen under my idea because I would not allow a vote to be concluded based on such a close 51-49 total. I would put in a requirement that for a majority vote to be passed, it has to be 70% or higher. If it ended up being like 60-40, I would not proceed with hiring. Then I would go back to a private hiring.

But regardless of which format we use, some people will always be unhappy with the choice. That is only natural to happen. So if that is going to happen anyways, I'd rather let the congregation decide their own fate than some singular leader in our church to decide who he thinks is best for us.

 

[Paidiske]

But what if I want the congregation to be able to see and choose who they want?

Hmm. Can we unpack that a bit? Why do you want that? Do you really think that a guest preaching spot (even, presumably, with mingling afterwards) is going to help a whole congregation discern together whether this is the right person for them? Because I'd be skeptical, myself. I think it takes both deeper and more intentional conversation that covers a whole lot of things you won't learn from a guest preaching.

I would put in a requirement that for a majority vote to be passed, it has to be 70% or higher.

Good luck with that. Just remember, (as one former boss of mine told his congregation once), "Jesus and his mother are not available." To some degree, you are choosing a pastor whose strengths you need, and whose weaknesses you can carry.

But regardless of which format we use, some people will always be unhappy with the choice.

It's worse than that, I'm afraid. No matter who you choose, sooner or later everyone will be unhappy with something about them. They'll make the wrong decision, or say the wrong thing, or overlook something that's terribly important to someone else... The honeymoon won't last forever. The question is, is the congregation mature enough to work with someone imperfect, even when they are unhappy for whatever reason?

So if that is going to happen anyways, I'd rather let the congregation decide their own fate than some singular leader in our church to decide who he thinks is best for us.

I agree that it's probably not best to leave the choice to one person. But I think it might be worth thinking about what you actually want to know about that person, in making that decision; what they want to know about the church; and how you protect everyone through the process. (For example, I know of one church which is looking at changing its selection process for senior leadership because, in the age of social media, an open and public process leads to too much trolling and bullying online).

 

[WolfGate]

I'm wondering when your church is choosing the new pastor, do they bring in the candidates and let them guest preach for one Sunday
and then have the congregation secretly submit a voting ballot to see who they want or don't want?

Or does your church simply make the decision based on the leader of the church and they make the decision without the congregation input/vote?

We never did the comparison preaching tactic. There is so much more to the role of a pastor than just how they sound from the pulpit. We would narrow it down to a top candidate, then bring them and only them in the preach. We did give the congregation an opportunity to provide feedback, and if that went well we would have a formal "yes/no" vote. If the vote had not been overwhelmingly positive, we'd try to figure out why, but that never happened in our church.

 

[The Liturgist]

A lot of the time it's a question of how many parishes are under a bishop's oversight. My bishop now has far fewer parishes than where I was working before, and consequently he seems much more involved.

There's also a fine line between involvement and imposition, which can sometimes get rather blurry...

I suspect imposition would seem to be a particular risk in some Anglican dioceses due to potential differences in churchmanship and also in many Anglican jurisdictions, politics. For example, in the Episcopal Church USA, where there are still some parishes which are theologically moderate or conservative, and also a very few bishops (I think in Louisiana and elsewhere in the Deep South there were or are a few).

 

[The Liturgist]

I agree with this approach.
But what if I want the congregation to be able to see and choose who they want?
The concern of "what if 51% wanted A and 49% wanted B and we hire A therefore upset half the congregation?" is not going to happen under my idea because I would not allow a vote to be concluded based on such a close 51-49 total. I would put in a requirement that for a majority vote to be passed, it has to be 70% or higher. If it ended up being like 60-40, I would not proceed with hiring. Then I would go back to a private hiring.

But regardless of which format we use, some people will always be unhappy with the choice. That is only natural to happen. So if that is going to happen anyways, I'd rather let the congregation decide their own fate than some singular leader in our church to decide who he thinks is best for us.

Dude, this model would not work; you might on rare occasions get a candidate who could win that many votes, but it would take many rounds of voting and be extremely fractious. As someone with a Congregationalist background, I can tell you that specific approach is problematic these days due to a lack of theological unity.*

The way Congregationalist churches normally work is the people elect “Ruling Elders” who in turn are responsible for calling a “Teaching Elder” who serves as the Pastor, and any assistant pastors, etc. This de-politicizes the process of selecting a pastor and reduces the risk of schism, which is a problem that churches with Congregational polity have to deal with.

Now in the Early Church, which in some cases had dioceses which were just one local church (and in the Eastern churches there still are dioceses like this in the Middle East, such as Muqatam, which I mentioned before), and all the ancient patriarchates started as one congregation that exploded into many, so thus we can say that a semi-Congregational phase existed in the process by which the Early Church blossomed into the beautiful ancestor of the apostolic churches of today, some Patristic figures were dragged, in some cases literally, into the cathedra, by the people, and compelled to serve as bishop even though they would rather have not. The early church however had immense spiritual strength due to continual persecution by Jews and Samaritans, then Pagans, and then when St. Constantine’s heir Constantius was converted from Nicene Christianity by the heretical bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia, Arians, and later by Muslims (some of which were former Arians of Visigothic ethnicity) but especially under Diocletian, which is why the Coptic calendar is dated from the start of the Diocletian persecution (thus this is the Year of Martyrs 1739).*

*I feel Christians should actually switch to this calendar epoch due to recent genocides, and the apparent misalignment of the BC/AD epoch with the most probable time of the birth of our Lord by at least six years, and because non-Christians keep trying to secularize it into BCE and CE. That said the Coptic months would be more of a problem: today is the 7th of Meshir, because Coptic months do not align with Julian/Gregorian months, although the calendar has the same duration and leap years as the Julian Calendar, which was derived from it.

 

[dzheremi]

It’s a pity that some parishes basically got locked out of their own church buildings and in one case pushed out of the denomination, in not just the Episcopal Church but also the United Methodist Church in at least one case in the past two decades or so*, their original building, and forced to buy new buildings and into different denominations such as ACNA because they were not given the discretion your parish was afforded, chiefly because they disagreed with the new perspective of the appointed clergy and the mainline churches overall with regards to moral theology.

Now, conversely:

Historically, churches such as the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox and Assyrian Churches have, conversely, assigned priests to parishes as a unilateral decision by the bishop based on his discernment of the spiritual needs of the parish. In the Coptic Orthodox church, a major problem arose in extra-diocesan areas where there was no diocesan bishop who could remove clergy who were not preaching an Orthodox doctrine, and this resulted in some major scandals, for example, one Coptic church in the US and one in Egypt basically became for a time akin to Pentecostal or non-denom megachurches in doctrine, until Pope Tawadros appointed diocesan bishops for all of the former extra-diocesan areas. The case in Muqattam, Egypt, an impoverished suburb of Christians in Cairo who live by herding pigs that feed in the city’s landfill (one of many tragic instances of discrimination against Christians in Islamic countries) was particularly striking, as the church didn’t even look like an Orthodox church but rather a movie theater).

This YouTube channel features videos of sermons by newly appointed bishops and priests regarding returning these parishes to doctri Orthodoxy: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC03thjqxbi4Jmwae5rGeTeQ

My friend @dzheremi , have you heard of that?

Yes. This was all a big scandal in our Church very recently. Thanks be to God, the appointment of diocesan bishops for the trouble spots (there were also some in Canada, where I believe HG Bishop Mina now serves) has quieted things down in most places, or at least I haven't heard anything new about D.C. (where there was an investigation into St. Mark's, if memory serves me), Canada, etc. lately.

Regarding Moqattam and the zabbaleen ('garbage people'), that has had a bit more visibility due to the precarious nature of the lives of the people there (the zabbaleen being the poorest of the poor, which as you might imagine really means something in a country like Egypt, where the living standards more generally are not up to what we enjoy in the West), but that did not stop HG Bishop Abanoub from setting things right a few years back, again thanks be to God for that. I'm sure I've posted this video approximately a million times across CF, but here he is telling the gathered people at the Church of St. Simeon the Tanner what's what with regard to how things had been going there (in a word: poorly):

 

[The Liturgist]

Yes. This was all a big scandal in our Church very recently. Thanks be to God, the appointment of diocesan bishops for the trouble spots (there were also some in Canada, where I believe HG Bishop Mina now serves) has quieted things down in most places, or at least I haven't heard anything new about D.C. (where there was an investigation into St. Mark's, if memory serves me), Canada, etc. lately.

Regarding Moqattam and the zabbaleen ('garbage people'), that has had a bit more visibility due to the precarious nature of the lives of the people there (the zabbaleen being the poorest of the poor, which as you might imagine really means something in a country like Egypt, where the living standards more generally are not up to what we enjoy in the West), but that did not stop HG Bishop Abanoub from setting things right a few years back, again thanks be to God for that. I'm sure I've posted this video approximately a million times across CF, but here he is telling the gathered people at the Church of St. Simeon the Tanner what's what with regard to how things had been going there (in a word: poorly):

Indeed, I love Bishop Abanoub.

Also by the way St. Abanoub the Martyr is a saint I wish was more widely known and venerated beyond the confines of the Coptic Orthodox Church.

 

[Paidiske]

I suspect imposition would seem to be a particular risk in some Anglican dioceses due to potential differences in churchmanship and also in many Anglican jurisdictions, politics. For example, in the Episcopal Church USA, where there are still some parishes which are theologically moderate or conservative, and also a very few bishops (I think in Louisiana and elsewhere in the Deep South there were or are a few).

That's not really what I had in mind.

I was thinking more, for example, of things like this. There's a situation I know of currently where the bishop intends to remove one centre from a multi-centre parish (for a whole bunch of reasons I don't really want to go into) and has no intention of consulting with that parish's members at all. That's heavy-handed, even though I think technically it might be within the letter of the relevant canon law for him to do so.

 

[The Liturgist]

That's heavy-handed, even though I think technically it might be within the letter of the relevant canon law for him to do so.

Oh yes, I agree there.

Actually I have to confess I am not a fan of multi-center or “multiple campus” parishes; I think instead a parish should have one church, and if it is impossible to have an ordained priest there every sunday, the solution is to share a priest, and fill the gap with licensed lay ministers or readers or other clergy.

This also applies to churches of a congregational polity; the problem is that multi center parishes become dioceses within a diocese.

That being said, where these already exist when you have a bishop just making a unilateral decision to tear one apart without consultation is the kind of thing which bothers me, as I outlined above.

This is why I have historically always tended to be on the fence about congregational vs. episcopal polity, because good bishops can do so much good (I would cite H.G. Bishop Abanoub or H.E. Metropolitan Serapion of Los Angeles in the Coptic church, or H.E. Salvatore Cordileone the Archbishop of San Francisco in the Roman Catholic Church as examples).

 

[Paidiske]

Well, as someone who currently has four churches within the parish, my comment would be that single-centre parishes are a luxury for wealthy or urban areas. It's not that my churches can't have a service every Sunday (although they have to spread the service times out to make it happen), it's that the smaller places simply can't afford a priest. In a lot of rural areas, the reality is that few churches can support a full-time stipend, and sharing the costs makes it possible to have a priest at all.

 

[The Liturgist]

Well, as someone who currently has four churches within the parish, my comment would be that single-centre parishes are a luxury for wealthy or urban areas. It's not that my churches can't have a service every Sunday (although they have to spread the service times out to make it happen), it's that the smaller places simply can't afford a priest. In a lot of rural areas, the reality is that few churches can support a full-time stipend, and sharing the costs makes it possible to have a priest at all.

Let me clarify my position: I think what you do should be considered being the priest of four parishes, rather than being the priest of a single parish with multiple campuses. For example, I set up two congregations if you recall, each one being separately managed however as its own unit, rather than as a campus of a single parish.

So I don’t object at all to having one priest serve multiple parishes, because I agree there is a lack of funds to facilitate one priest per parish. I just think it should be organized on the basis so that each church is designated a parish and has the same privileges it would have otherwise.

The reason for this is that lets say one of your four churches expands dramatically in size, perhaps due to the construction of a massive new residential housing estate because of the discovery of a massive meteoric deposit of priceless platinum below the surface triggering a mining boom, and that parish suddenly has different needs from the other three.

However, I have no objection to parishes sharing clergy, offices, administrative staff or other resources and for that matter I think it would be maximally convenient for each church that shares a priest to participate in a combined vestry or leadership committee for reasons of efficient management until such time as they no longer need to participate in that.

Now of course benefice issues could arise, but with very small parishes my instinct is that these ideally should have the bishop as their rector or else have their priest share the rector, or have the priest be the rector of the largest one and a vicar of the bishop at the others. As resources grow ideally a model which would allow for a curate to be efficiently assigned as a secondary priest comes to mind.

In the Eastern Orthodox Church by the way parishes which cannot afford a married priest due to small size are usually served either by elderly retired priests or by monastic priests, and this is part of the career progression for bishops (so you have hieromonks, who become archimandrites, and it is from the archimandrites and the abbots of monasteries that the bishops are chosen). This system works particularly well in the highly ethnically diverse Orthodox Church in America in my experience.

 

[Paidiske]

Let me clarify my position: I think what you do should be considered being the priest of four parishes, rather than being the priest of a single parish with multiple campuses.

Oh, no, please no! Four parish councils, four budgets and sets of financials, four sets of governance requirements.... Lord have mercy, one is enough!

Your suggestion of sharing a combined parish council makes them, effectively, one parish.

 

[The Liturgist]

Oh, no, please no! Four parish councils, four budgets and sets of financials, four sets of governance requirements.... Lord have mercy, one is enough!

Your suggestion of sharing a combined parish council makes them, effectively, one parish.

Effectively, yes. A federation of parishes sharing a single budget and unified resources, but with the ability of member parishes to restructure their relationship with the federation if their condition changes.

One could I suppose call it the United Federation of Parishes model.

Conversely, what I really dislike are churches with congregational polity such as Baptist churches or non-denominational churches that have ”satellite campuses”, especially in cases of megachurches like the notorious Mars Hill in Seattle, where the satellite campuses litetally were movie theaters where people watched a live broadcast of Mark Driscoll’s sermon from the central parish.