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"You see me but it's not me:" The Interplay of Religious Authority and Lay Empowerment in Congregation-Based Community Organizing
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Lara Rusch ~ 27
challenge around which to organize with lay people. Characteristically, organizers view
just about any challenge as a learning and team-building opportunity.
The development of lay organizing capacity is a central goal of contemporary
community organizing, and this comes across when interviewees highlight the
significance of lay people’s role in maintaining participation in MOSES, across
denominational differences. In many cases key lay members keep the congregation
connected more so than the pastor—but they describe their involvement in terms of the
pastor’s needs and support. Mr. James Smith, wearer of many hats including core team
leader at Greater Apostolic Faith Temple, explained,
I think in our church, the lay people may be kind of driving the involvement. Our pastor is busy. […] He has a diocese in Florida and South Carolina that he has to deal with. He’s one of our national bishops, so he’s pretty busy in his own right. But he gets involved in MOSES, you know, at their big meetings and different things like that. I think he has a representative come to the pastors’ caucus when he can’t make it. So I mean, he’s very concerned about it. But you know, with his agenda, it’s almost impossible for him to do all the things they want him to do. That’s why he asked, you know, us, his key people, to kind of help out.
In this relationship, the clergy and congregation members develop an understanding
about where lay people can take initiative on behalf of the congregation, and how to ask
for approval from or report back to the pastor. At Greater Southern Baptist, long time
core team leader Henrietta Rogers generally has the go-ahead on MOSES projects.
So pastor just more or less gave it over to the core team, and I handled it. Gave my people whoever’s the best suited for this, and so they take it and they run with it. And he say, “Go for it.” Well, so far for eleven years, he say, “Go for it,” everything. […] It’s whatever I could come up with as far as community involvement, so far he has not turned me down, ‘cause I’m not gonna bring him anything that’s not to benefit people.
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Lara Rusch ~ 27
challenge around which to organize with lay people. Characteristically, organizers view
just about any challenge as a learning and team-building opportunity.
The development of lay organizing capacity is a central goal of contemporary
community organizing, and this comes across when interviewees highlight the
significance of lay people’s role in maintaining participation in MOSES, across
denominational differences. In many cases key lay members keep the congregation
connected more so than the pastor—but they describe their involvement in terms of the
pastor’s needs and support. Mr. James Smith, wearer of many hats including core team
leader at Greater Apostolic Faith Temple, explained,
I think in our church, the lay people may be kind of driving the involvement. Our
pastor is busy. […] He has a diocese in Florida and South Carolina that he has to
deal with. He’s one of our national bishops, so he’s pretty busy in his own right.
But he gets involved in MOSES, you know, at their big meetings and different
things like that. I think he has a representative come to the pastors’ caucus when
he can’t make it. So I mean, he’s very concerned about it. But you know, with
his agenda, it’s almost impossible for him to do all the things they want him to
do. That’s why he asked, you know, us, his key people, to kind of help out.
In this relationship, the clergy and congregation members develop an understanding
about where lay people can take initiative on behalf of the congregation, and how to ask
for approval from or report back to the pastor. At Greater Southern Baptist, long time
core team leader Henrietta Rogers generally has the go-ahead on MOSES projects.
So pastor just more or less gave it over to the core team, and I handled it. Gave
my people whoever’s the best suited for this, and so they take it and they run with
it. And he say, “Go for it.” Well, so far for eleven years, he say, “Go for it,”
everything. […] It’s whatever I could come up with as far as community
involvement, so far he has not turned me down, ‘cause I’m not gonna bring him
anything that’s not to benefit people.
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