Dear Friends,

This week, I want to turn my attention to one of the ways interim rectors look at the congregations we serve—as systems.

What does it mean to talk about a congregation as a system? The answer to this question comes out of the work of an American psychiatrist, Murray Bowen. Dr. Bowen pioneered the theory that bears his name. Bowen Theory views the family as an emotional unit and uses systems thinking to describe a family’s complex interactions. Knowledge of how the emotional system operates in one’s own family, in the workplace, and in other social systems offers options for solving problems in each of these areas.

Congregations fall into the category of “other social systems,” and a Maryland rabbi Edwin Friedman did pioneering work in applying Bowen Theory to congregations. Rabbi Friedman was interested in answering questions like: How is the whole arranged? How do its parts interact? And how can the relationships between the parts produce something new? I love Ray Johnson’s cartoon entitled “A System.” It portrays with elegant simplicity what a system is (see above).

Now instead of two people, think of 10 or 100 or 1000 people standing on tables all connected to one another, all with the potential to affect one another, and you’ve just imagined a congregational system.

The idea of a congregation as a system isn’t new, of course. In one of his letters to the church at Corinth, St. Paul used the metaphor of a body to help the members of that faith community understand how they were all connected to each other.

Paul was reminding the Corinthians that every member of the church affects every other member. The church at Corinth—and every other congregation, including St. Paul’s—is a system. This is important for any leader to know, whether that leader is ordained or not.

Peter Steinke, a Lutheran pastor, consultant, and the author of several books about congregations as systems, points out that congregational leaders are the key stewards of the congregation as a unit.

In his book, Healthy Congregations, Steinke lists seven “health promoters” or key things that can positively influence congregational health. Let me mention just two of them.

The first is a sense of purpose. Healthy congregations have a clear direction. They keep asking “What is God calling us to be?” “What is the meaning of all we do?”

The second “health promoter” is, for lack of a better descriptive phrase, mood and tone. Mood and tone affect all organizations. Better functioning congregations are more energized. Interactions are charged with spontaneity, wholehearted involvement, and joy.

Healthy congregations don’t happen by accident. The health of a congregation comes from individuals being responsible, being stewards of the whole. I give thanks to God that St. Paul’s is a healthy congregation as this time of transition moves forward, and I am particularly grateful for those leaders who have, by the grace of God, made it so.

Blessings,

Stephen Applegate