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Congregational Studies

Ron Barker is the developer and editor of this section.

To discern and understand the actualities 
of the life of religious communities is the 
first step to addressing adequately their needs. 
Robert K. Martin -  
 Congregational Studies and Critical  
Pedagogy in Theological Perspective

According to Stokes and Roozen, congregational studies re­sponds to the "challenge of the multiplicity of social and religious forces that erode a congregation's unity of vision,and it is an affirmation that a congregation's inherited and confessed, formal and informal, web of symbolic meaning, values, and commitments—that is, its culture—always consciously or unconsciously informs pragmatic choices made among the diverse alternatives of program, process, and context with which every congregation is continually confronted." In other words, congregational studies focuses almost entirely upon the consoli­ dation of a congregational identity and the enhancement of ministries that develop from the congregation's self-understanding. From Robert K. Martin -  Congregational Studies and Critical  Pedagogy in Theological Perspective