Being Presbyterian

Replace "consumer" with "parishioner" and this becomes extremely relevant…

"'Know your consumer' is a business commandment certain to be deeply ingrained at the heart of any successful company. Never, however, has that consumer morphed so quickly or become so elusive. It is important for marketers to grasp and understand the key drivers of this new empowered consumer, one who has grown up with brand new perspectives and redefined the interplay of communications, relationships, brands, technology and media. This is Consumer 2.0."

My tradition is not one of those don't-miss-a-beat-between-former-pastor-and-new-pastor denominations (like our brothers and sisters in the UMC and beyond.) We Presbyterians go for the model of having an interim pastor between called pastorates which makes some people crazy (let's just get on with it already!) and some relieved.

"In the Presbyterian Church, we have an educated clergy. That’s among the main reasons why I joined the PC(USA). I wanted a pastor who was smarter than I was, and I wasn’t finding that in the Calvary Chapel megachurch that I was attending.

We love that our pastors know Greek and Hebrew. We take great pride in our seminary and ordination requirements. In fact, we have so much pride in them that we have been fighting over ordination standards for decades…."