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Organization and structure of the Reformed Churches in Switzerland

According to Reformist perception, the church is there where faith is lived and communicated in the community. This community is not there purely for its own sake. The existence of the church is bound to a specific assignment; it should spread the Gospel and testify to God’s work for the benefit of mankind. Every member of the church is entrusted with the task of making the Gospel seen and heard throughout the world by word and deed. This is what Reformists call “the priesthood of all believers”.

For the church to carry out this task, which is of vital importance to it, it must organize itself. It must develop structures and prepare offices that make it possible for the Gospel to be heard in a modern and multifaceted society.

The structures must address the requirement that all Christians shoulder equal responsibility for putting the Gospel into effect. The Reformed Church takes care to ensure that no public office has authority over the others. With structures, great value is placed on including as many members as possible and allowing everyone to assume responsibility. In Switzerland, the church is organized on three decisive levels: municipal, cantonal and federal.

The church communities may take independent decisions in a variety of areas. They know the local conditions. As a rule, it lies within their power to decide how to fill the offices in their area, how to set up services and how to combine activities with other communities. The decisive factor is that the community is alive and that the work of spreading the Gospel can be practiced in a responsible manner. The community meeting of church members entitled to vote is the organ that delivers power to a democratically elected local church community management within a defined framework.

All church communities of a canton or an even larger region form the cantonal church, whose purpose is to assign democratically elected representatives from the community as part of a synod church parliament. The implementation of resolutions and the management of the cantonal church lies in the hands of a democratically elected authority (church council / synod council), which works in collegial fashion and can also be presided over by a non-theologian.

The cantonal churches form regional concordats to fulfil specific tasks (.e.g. basic and advanced training of pastors etc.) They are united with the Protestant-Methodist Church of Switzerland and Église Évangélique Libre de Genève in the Schweizerischen Evangelischen Kirchenbund SEK, (Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches). This represents Swiss Protestantism at national level vis-à-vis the state and other Christian confessions and religious communities. SEK also looks after external relations as a member of international church organizations such as the Conference of European Churches, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and the World Council of Churches.

The church structures in Switzerland mirror those of the state in many respects. The fundamental principles of both were created in the 19th century against a background of independent tradition and have since been constantly redefined.

Food for thought
What do you think are the advantages and disadvantages of the democratic structure of the Reformed Church?

Links
Link to the Reformist portal
Introduction to the organization of the Reformed Churches in Switzerland
List of links to websites of cantonal churches
List of links to church communities

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