Is the Ward Clerk Technically a member of the Bishopric?

[nathansterlingsmith]

I was just ordained as the ward executive secretary here in Pisa Italy. In the LDS tools app when you click on "bishopric" my name appears along with the bishop and his counselors. While I don't see the ward clerk listed, his name is not listed in the directory, as privacy laws in Italy are pretty strict and only those that want to be listed are listed.

Actually, I just logged into LDS.org and under organizations and "bishopric" in addition to the bishop and his counselors, the ward executive secretary, the ward clerk, and even the assistant ward clerk's are all listed.

[simonawright]

The listing of bishopric under the LDS tools app and LDS.org are to help with contact information, it would be irritating to have to look under 2 different organisations for the Bishopric and those that help the bishopric, namely clerks and exec sec.

This is a different issue to roles and responsibilities where the Bishopric is the Bishop and counsellors as described by lajackson

[jeffrey_stevenson]

According to the "Getting Started for Ward Clerks" on the official Church website, in the "Ward Clerk's Introduction" video (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/hel ... n?lang=eng) it is stated: "A bishopric is comprised of not just the Bishop and counselors, people need to remember, bishopric is clerks and executive secretary. Each has a role, a bishopric, a bishop and his counselors are only effective if they can spend a preponderance of their time ministering to members of their ward. The clerks and the executive secretary role is to eliminate as much of the administrative function as possible to allow that to happen for a Bishop and his counselors."

[lajackson]

Good catch. The first two quoted sentences are conflicting. There is no question that a bishopric cannot function well without a clerk, an executive secretary, and assistant clerks.

The current General Handbook (6.0) clarifies that "The bishop . . . and his counselors form a bishopric," and "The ward clerk and ward executive secretary work closely with the bishopric, but they are not members of the bishopric and do not need to be released when the bishopric is reorganized."

[jeffrey_stevenson]

Yeah, I just read that in the handbook too. When I was a clerk 15+ years ago I read they were, so maybe policy has changed, but their video hasn't.