Original Research - Special Collection: Practical Theology

Kerkleierskap as bemiddeling van ‘n onmoontlike werklikheid: ‘n Prakties teologiese ondersoek na die rol van leierskap in die transformasie van gemeentes

Frederick (Frikkie) J. Labuschagne, Malan Nel
HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies | Vol 66, No 2 | a853 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/hts.v66i2.853 | © 2010 Frederick (Frikkie) J. Labuschagne, Malan Nel | This work is licensed under CC Attribution 4.0
Submitted: 12 May 2010 | Published: 15 October 2010

About the author(s)

Frederick (Frikkie) J. Labuschagne, University of Pretoria, South Africa
Malan Nel, Universiteit van Pretoria, South Africa

Abstract

Church leadership as mediator for an impossible reality: A practical theological study of the role of leadership in the transformation of congregations

The Church finds herself in a complex society, which currently has a destructive impact on the realisation of the Church. To overcome the challenges of our time, leaders must help to shape new realities creatively and innovatively. Church leadership must find an alternative way of dealing with the issues at stake in order to guide congregations on a challenging journey. The challenge for congregational leaders is to let the realisation of the Church take place in a revealing and developing manner. The assumption is that the Church is realised organically rather than mechanically and institutionally. Leadership is a dynamic matter that should be realised in a congregational and ecumenical context. The question to be answered in this article is: What is the role of leaders in a world typified as complex? Because of the complexity of postmodern society, leadership theory and practice have developed beyond the point of planning, organisation and control (acceptable managerial scientific methodology). Leadership in the Church is a collective matter, and, as such, it should be approached and managed holistically with dynamic and relational methods.


Keywords

leadership; management of change; complexity; postmodernism; identity of the church; life-cycle approach; strategic planning; relational

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