Leadership is a longstanding feature of many American churches, much as it is across society. But leadership is widely perceived to be in crisis because of its practical caricature in public life, its co-optation by business cultures (and by business schools at universities), and its failures at the levels of church communities. What kind of leadership do we need now? On what resources might we draw from the long history of Christian spirituality? This panel responds to these questions by proposing new models of leadership that are attentive to the spiritual wellbeing of all members of the faith community across a changing ecclesial landscape.
Twenty-first-century leadership is often characterized by a "Machiavellian pragmatism" that prioritizes the accumulation of power over communal flourishing. Grounded in the bifurcations of Enlightenment dualism, this leadership void has left both civic and ecclesial spheres struggling with deep polarization and systemic disintegration. This paper proposes a restorative model of kenotic facilitation as a framework for missional leadership and prophetic witness.
By integrating the relational ontology of John Zizioulas with the historical exemplar of St. Francis of Assisi, I argue that spiritual leadership find its most potent expression through the voluntary self-emptying (kenosis) of positional power. Drawing on lived experience and qualitative data from Participatory Action Research (PAR), the study brings Foucault’s theories of power into dialogue with Habermasian communicative action. The result is a praxiological model that empowers the community to move beyond hierarchy toward a perichoretic, interdependent pursuit of shalom in a disrupted cultural landscape.
This paper examines how clergy and lay leaders tend to the spiritual wellbeing of congregations that have experienced numerical decline. It provides analysis from a pilot study including long-form interviews from revitalizing and redeveloping parishes in the Episcopal Church. The analysis considers practices intended to promote spiritual revitalization for the whole parish as well as the devotional, prayer, and self-care practices that sustain church leaders during times of transition that can be challenging to them personally, spiritually, and vocationally. This paper is intended to establish the scaffolding and parameters for a larger-scale, ecumenical study to advance academic knowledge and support religious communities by describing and analyzing best practices to promote spiritual well-being for their constituents amidst organizational change.
In our increasingly volatile world, Christianity needs leaders prepared to stand firm in the maelstrom of change. Recent leadership scholarship emphasizes complexity, adaptive systems, and the need for leaders not only to permit but also to embrace and maintain tension. Complexity scholars assert that organizations transform within “adaptive spaces” where perspectives collide, conflict, and connect. Such spaces are chaotic and can tear organizations apart, but when held properly, they innovate without sacrificing continuity. Organizations, including churches, therefore, depend on leaders to create and hold these spaces for their communities. But what type of leader is needed to facilitate and hold these tense spaces without resorting to control, withdrawal, or burnout?
This paper puts complexity leadership scholarship in conversation with the mystical theology of St. John of the Cross. It suggests that St. John’s spirituality offers a vision and an itinerary for standing within chaos without succumbing to it.