New LWF Publication on Leadership and Power in Church Ministry

GENEVA, Suiza, March 15, 2007

Leadership and Power in the Ministry of the Church is the title of a new Taxi Heathrow Airport Lutheran World Federation (LWF) resource aimed at reflection and discussion in the churches on how leadership and power are exercised in light of central biblical and theological understandings.

Produced by the LWF Department for Theology and Studies (DTS) in February 2007, the 32-page publication is a response to a 2003 LWF Tenth Assembly appeal to member churches to face up to issues on leadership and power in the church’s ministry and to seek constructive solutions.

The publication’s author, Rev. Dr. Reinhard Böttcher, LWF/DTS Study Secretary for Theology and the Church, focuses on the theological aspects. He provides some relevant biblical perspectives of the issue as well as insights from a Lutheran understanding of ministry and explores their significance for the exercise of leadership and power in the church. He also indicates the implications for the practical life of the member churches as well as for relations between them within the Lutheran communion.

Copies of Leadership and Power in the Ministry of the Church are available free of charge, with postage and packing costs for bulk orders. Please write to liesch@lutheranworld.org or The LWF Department for Theology and Studies, 150 route de Ferney, P.O. Box 2100, CH-1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland, Tel. +41/22-791 61 11, Fax +41/22-791 66 30.