preachers

While Christian witness doesn't mean necessarily going into seminary, Waggoner and Perry have both found, in pastoral training, their voices for this time. 

Guy Nave 11-11-2013
Kjetil Kolbjornsrud / Shutterstock

A close-up of a christian woman reading the Bible. Kjetil Kolbjornsrud / Shutterstock

When I was a Ph.D. candidate in Yale University’s New Testament program, I had the honor of preaching at an ordination service for a classmate who was being ordained as a Presbyterian minister. Following the service, a number of my classmates asked me why I wanted to spend four-seven years working on a Ph.D. in New Testament when I clearly had a "gift" for preaching. I responded that it was actually my academic study of the Bible coupled with my life experiences that illumined and enlivened my preaching.

I did not grow up reading the Bible. I was almost 19 years old and a U.S. Army soldier stationed in the Federal Republic of Germany when I purchased my first Bible. A series of life-changing events led to me "accepting Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior." A few months after purchasing my first Bible, I attended a revival service at a local church. I returned to post that evening describing the service to fellow soldiers, who, along with myself, comprised a group self-identified as the "Soul Patrol." We were African-American Christians who strongly believed in the necessity of Christian evangelization.

Eileen Guenther, RNS photo by Kim Jackson

Eileen Guenther, RNS photo by Kim Jackson

Eileen Guenther, the national president of the American Guild of Organists, reveals behind-the-scenes church struggles in her new book, Rivals or a Team?: Clergy-Musician Relationships in the Twenty-First Century.

Guenther, an associate professor of church music at Washington’s Wesley Theological Seminary and the former organist at Foundry United Methodist Church, talked with Religion News Service about her findings and advice. Some answers have been edited for length and clarity.

Q: You titled your book Rivals or a Team? From your research, which is a better description of most clergy-musician relationships?

A: I would say that rivals may well be the most prevalent, but team is our aspiration.

Q: Why is it so difficult for musicians and ministers to sometimes get along and not have an intense rivalry?

A:. Part of it is lack of understanding of roles. Part of it is control. Each of us is used to kind of being in control in our area, but sometimes if the roles haven’t been clarified, then the control issues become simply that, rather than sorting out, 'OK, who’s going to choose the hymn?' That’s one of the really big issues.

Joel Goza 9-13-2011

One little known fact about Houston is that it was the only major city in the South to integrate nonviolently. A meeting was held in a downtown hotel with key African-American leaders -- preachers, business owners, barbers, undertakers -- and the business and political power players from Houston's white establishment. The meeting determined that Houston would integrate silently and sit-ins would end -- no newspaper articles, no television cameras. They were simply going to change the rules of the game; and they did without any violence. It was a meeting that represented how Houston politics happen: provide a room, bring together community leaders, business interests and politicians, and get a deal done. Such meetings certainly make for strange gatherings, but at critical junctures in our city's history this mixture has proven to be a winning cocktail.

Rev. Billy Talen 8-10-2011

The Christianized Jesus -- the turning of a radical into a conservative shadow of his former self -- explains our problem of establishing and celebrating freedom fighters today. It is important that our progressive heroes be given their deserved fame, an accurately reported fame, and this is crucial in ways that impact our own activism.

Jesus of Nazareth was not a Peak Performance Strategist as the prosperity preachers would have it. Nor was he a foreigner-hating patriot as the tea party would argue. Obviously American politicians and their lobbyists pursue so many policies that are against the teachings of Jesus but are supported by mainstream Christian opinion. In fact, Jesus' parables and sayings push the spiritual revolution of gift economies, and of justice through radical forgiveness.

Lynne Hybels 6-06-2011

No, I am not submitting a belated entry into the heated conversation about Rob Bell's latest book.

Jim Wallis 3-04-2011

I like teachers. My three sisters are teachers in the public schools. They are all very good teachers; Teri won teacher of the year in her district. Two of my wonderful brother-in-laws are, or have been, teachers. One of my nephews just got accepted to Teach for America.

Charles Gutenson 9-29-2010
Ah, the evils of "social justice"!
Steve Holt 4-23-2010
"To believe is human, to doubt divine."

Last week, The Washington Post's On Faith site devoted their weekly Q&A to the debate over social justice which they titled, "Wallis vs.

Michael Hidalgo 3-09-2010

Recently Glenn Beck made some comments about leaving a church if the priest or pastor speaks about "social justice." He instructed his listeners to "look for the words 'social justice' or 'economic justice' on your church Web site" and then, should they find those words, told t

Jeremy Del Rio 10-01-2009

"He who sings prays twice." -- Saint Augustine

"What's going on?" -- Marvin Gaye

Mimi Haddad 6-09-2009
"Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord." (1 Corinthians 1:31, NRSV)

Shane Claiborne 4-21-2009

"Good" Friday was real good this year. We remembered Jesus, and we remembered Jesus disguised in the "least of these" -- those who continue to be tortured, spit on, slapped, insulted, misunderstood

Kurt Armstrong 2-13-2009
Last month I started some contract work for Geez magazine.