Bridging the church conflict gap: A peacemaking strategy to educate local church members in resolving conflict

This project/dissertation concerns a lay ministry approach to the management and resolution of destructive church conflict. It advocates for the training and installation of managers of conflict at the local church as peace educators, to preserve the unity of the church and safeguard the integrity of its message. The author argues that despite the proliferation of conflict resolution and peace education programs in colleges, universities, and divinity schools directed toward the church and its leadership, the culture of conflict destroying local churches has not significantly changed. This research and ministry project explored that reality. It identified issues that may account for the gap, and implemented a lay ministry solution to serve as a bridge.;Key assumptions explored to account for the gap between the peace education programs and the local church are: 1) they are most often higher education programs largely directed to the professional leadership of the church, 2) peace education is not generally a stated ministry priority of most local churches, and therefore not given budgetary considerations, 3) they are not lay member friendly: they either require a baccalaureate, or more advanced degree to access, 4) private consultants are effective but are too few, and are often engaged as a reaction to crisis, 5) the majority of churches have no dedicated peace ministry, intentionally educating members to resolve situations of conflict on a day to day basis.;The lay ministry initiative seeks to close the conflict gap at the local church by installing a team of managers (resident council), trained in conflict resolution as a dedicated ministry. It educates members in their Christian duty of peacemaking and peacekeeping, and resolves the day to day situations of conflict that might develop. This approach finds precedence in the literature and ministry practice.