Transparency and Confidentiality – Two Different Things

One of the marks of a healthy church – in my opinion – is clarity between being transparent and holding things in confidence.

Our friends on LinkedIn define transparency and confidentiality this way:

Transparency is the practice of sharing relevant and timely information with your team, stakeholders, and customers.

Confidentiality is the obligation to protect sensitive or private information from unauthorized disclosure.

I’ve known people who wanted to serve in certain roles or on certain committees in order to get the dirt on church members or pastors. I’ve known “prayer circles” who cross the line between pastoral concern and what’s the secret scoop on our church friends.

Congregations with trust issues are the ones where visitors attend all business meetings because they don’t trust the leaders to share what’s going on. They have to see for themselves.

Congregations with trust issues are the ones with over-large boards. Show me a congregation with a membership of 100 and a elder board of 24 and I’ll show you a congregation that doesn’t trust each other.

What’s the everyday difference between transparency and confidentiality?

• It’s transparent to share that the pastor is taking time off for a medical procedure and will be back in the office in six weeks. The purpose of the pastor’s surgery is confidential.
• It’s transparent to share that the Christian Educator is leaving our congregation after three years of service. The reason the Christian Educator is leaving so abruptly is confidential.
• It’s transparent for the Pastor Nominating Committee to share that there are three finalists for the Pastor position. It’s breaking confidence to identify their names or details about them.

I once ran into a former church member in Marshall’s and she was furious about the fact that one of the pastors in her new church across town had been fired. “He was the best preacher on staff.” “He was loved by everyone.” “He visited my mother in the hospital.” “The other pastors must have been jealous of him and they got rid of him.”

As a leader in that Presbytery, I happened to know that the reason that pastor was fired involved sexual misconduct with youth members. It would have been easy for me to reveal that and shut her down. But I said something like, “You need to trust the process. There is probably information you aren’t aware of.” But she wanted to know. She wanted the details. She was owed the details.

Nope. Some things are confidential. We are not owed any details. We need to trust our leaders.

Now, sometimes our leaders are not trustworthy and if that’s the case, we need to elect different leaders. Bullies use information as a weapon and sometimes they make up false information. I see this way to often.

How do we foster trust? Be trustworthy.

Remember that Church is not about me and mine. It’s about transforming the world for good in the name of Jesus. Sadly, Jesus was killed by his own congregation. Let’s not be those people.