I am very much aware with the ongoing scandal with Mark Driscoll over using church funds to drive up his position the New York Times best seller and plagiarism. It does not end with Mr. Driscoll, there been a rash of pastors resigning for various forms of sexual sin. Then there the flood of prosperity gospel and mega church vision casting heretics. There also what I call the independent CEO is where the person just builds a church and just preaches; the past become like a CEO entrepreneur. The common thread in many of these cases is Presbyterian, congregational polity, and what I call independent church CEO.. I feel the latest examples of pastoral misdoings demonstrate the flaw in presbyterian and congregational polity: there is little to no accountability beyond with the local church and the leadership can bypass or corrupt church authority.
In both the Presbyterian(to a point), congregational polity the authority and government belongs to the congregation ether by electing of elders or by direct democracy. Such system can be compromised by unwise decisions or felt feeling by the congregation to bullying by the pastor. In the case of Mark Driscoll he essentially forces out elder and pastors who disagree with him. Another case I head on Fighting for the Faith, a prosperity gospel – word of faith heretic gave his testimony how his father made him a pastor at 18 in violation of 1 Tim 3:1-7 in particular v. 6
In the episcopal polity there is a level of accountability over a parish with bishops. Furthermore the polity ensures the screen of candidate wishes to become minsters. If a person want to become a priest he must go through a series of examination by the vestry, priest and final examine and ordinated by the bishop to become a deacon. The process of examination is repeated when the deacon is ordinated to become a priest. This ensures the people are qualified biblical to become a priest. The bishop provides a level of accountability and dispel is need if the priest “goes off the rails” as my priest puts it. To be fair, the Episcopal Church USA uses a hybrid system of episcopal and Presbyterian polity.
