Principles of Organization from Early Christianity Applied to Management Today

Abstract
This paper looks at the organizational structure of the early Christian communities and highlights the ways in which mission and vision played central guiding roles in the maintenance of these communities. It also shows how these communities had clear leaders and how the morale of the communities was supported through the celebration and honoring of the martyrs, whose relics were preserved in shrines. The paper then explains how these principles can be applied to an organization today.
Introduction
Organizational structure is something every organization must address in order to maximize its power and reach its potential. The organization that lacks definition and order will likely be one that fails. The early Church communities provide an example of how an organization can succeed even in the face of a hostile environment. By analyzing the structure of these communities, one can see how mission, vision, networking and leadership all helped to give the early Church a sense of purpose and place and to keep it going in the right direction towards its goal. This paper will describe what can be learned from the early Church communities in terms of organizational structure and how those principles can be applied to a contemporary organization today.
Organizational Structure
The early Church communities existed within a hierarchical structure though in terms of faith everyone was viewed as equal—for as Brown (1981) points out, “differences of class and education played no significant role” in the development of these communities and the religious rituals that they partook in (p. 19). What united these people was their faith in the vision and the mission of the Church. Just like any organization today is full of diverse workers who unite and rally around the mission and vision of the organization, the organization of the early Church had a unifying vision and mission, both expressed through the Church leaders—i.e., the Apostles and their descendents (the pope, bishops, priests and monks). The Church leaders were granted a great deal of authority in overseeing these communities because it was through them that the faith was taught and the vision communicated and the sacraments received and the rituals conducted.
These communities also operated under a basic economic system of what would today be called distributism, as described in Acts 4:32: “All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had.” Indeed, as Henry notes in his Commentary, “they had all things common; for there was not any among them who lacked, care was taken for their supply. The money was laid at the apostles' feet,” and the Church leaders determined how it should be distributed among the members of the faithful, going as it did to those in need.
But as Brown (1981) also notes, the gap between the poor and the wealthy was also bridged by the faith they shared and the teaching they embraced regarding their sisterhood and brotherhood in Christ. In the early Church communities there was no sense of a poor Christian being oppressed by a wealthy Christian for the doctrine they received was based on charity and respect for all. Thus, the wealthy and poor mingled and became as one, and the wealthy used their resources to facilitate the practice of the religious rites, turning parts of their homes, or their gardens, or their cemeteries into shrines for the saints or places of worship where the Sacrifice of the Holy Mass could be offered (Brown, 1981).
The faith was especially important in facilitating the organization of these communities in hostile environments where the Christians faced persecution. Those who were martyred were viewed as heroes and saints who died for the faith and went straight to heaven because they had given up their earthly lives to testify to the Lord. The relics of these martyrs were preserved by the early Christians and venerated in shrines, and this served to boost the morale of the communities and to give them a real, tangible sense of and connection to the other side, where they saw their ultimate home (Brown, 1981). Thus, they were not afraid of the persecutions but viewed the hostility as a test of their faith. As Brown (1981) notes, the martyrs represented those “who had persevered [in the faith] unto death more magnificently and more publicly” than the living (p. 34). The relics of the saints and martyrs provided these communities with a sense of purpose, place and unity.
These communities also learned to survive on their own, as they were increasingly viewed with suspicion by Roman authorities. Thus, they became independent to some degree, with the Apostles and the Church leaders guiding the communities in terms of how they should organize and integrate. However, these communities still remained highly integrated with Roman life for the most part so that many Christians flew under the radar of their enemies in power. They blended in and practiced their religion underground in the catacombs so as to remain undetected. Yet, they prayed together and contributed to the needs of one another, supported one another, and were converted by one another. Charity, faith, vision and mission were the ties that bound them together so that one could recognize a Christian through his generosity of spirit. Thus, these communities did not form ghettoes in which they could insulate themselves. They did not establish silos. Rather they passed on the culture, faith, teaching, and charity that they received and implemented it in their own lives and communities, seeking only to spread the vision and mission far and wide, to shine their light upon the hill rather than to conceal it (Price, 2012). They were guided by leaders who were able to make decisions on their own, based on the vision and mission of the Church and the clear guidelines they received from the Apostles. Those who bought into the vision became like investors—except in return for their gift, they received not a share of stock but rather membership in the community. Thus, Acs 4:36-37 describes how “Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means ‘son of encouragement’), sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet.” This is the type of spirit of mission that animated the early Church communities and allowed them to flourish in spite of hostilities.
By having these communities loosely but still intimately connected, the Church was able to flourish in a hostile environment. The communities were never provocative in their behavior but they also never denied their faith, mission and vision. So if a suspected community came under attack, it produced martyrs—heroes who inspired other communities. If it flew under the radar of the hostile authorities, it supported itself and still other communities within the network, as shown in the Acts of the Apostles.
How Contemporary Organizations Can Utilize These Principles
Mission is crucial to all contemporary organizations. As Daft (2013) notes, “the mission describes the organization’s shared values and beliefs” (p. 56). If these are not clearly defined and communicated, the organization will have no sense of purpose. The early Church communities all understood their purpose as the mission had essentially been simplified by Christ Who said that to get to Heaven one must 1) love God and 2) love his neighbor as himself. Thus, these communities saw these two orders as their mission and they worked hard to carry them out.
Having a vision is also essential. The vision is what communicates the goal—the place that the organization wants to get to. The vision has to be vivid and realistic and it has to be nurtured and supported. Small victories have to be celebrated in order to cement the pursuit of the vision, as Kotter (2012) recommends in his change management model. For the early Christians, the way they celebrated victories in the face of persecution was to honor the relics of the saints, the martyrs, and to build shrines in their honor where the faithful could pray for their intercession and where miracles were often in occurrence.
In a modern day organization, celebrating victories is important and one way to do this is to replicate what the early Christians did—but instead of erecting shrines to martyrs, the organization can erect shrines to organizational leaders and heroes who have gone above and beyond the call of duty to facilitate the vision and mission of the organization. This is a way to build a sense of community within the organization and to inspire and motivate the workers.
At the same time it is important for an organization to recognize its leaders and to show them the kind of respect the early Christians showed their leaders. They gave all to the Church and the leaders in turn gave all to the members of the community. In a modern organization, the leaders have to be identified and honored with respect, while at the same time the leaders have to implement a type of leadership style that follows in the servant leadership tradition. This approach to leadership is about empowering others and helping them to reach their potential as self-actualized human beings. Leaders who act in this way create great workplace environments where morale is high and workers are supported so that they can do the jobs they were hired to do with confidence and eagerness. One example of this type of organization is Virgin, where Richard Branson has created an organization that thrives on his version of leadership, which blends charismatic and servant styles (De Vries, 1998).
The early Christian communities also show how organizational structure is important in terms of having a positive culture. Culture comes from learning and passing on to others what one has received. Thus, if a Christian leader deviated from what had been passed down, it caused problems in the community. An organization has to make sure that the same principles are being applied, communicated and put in practice across the board so that silos can be eliminated and the workplace can have one culture, with one vision, and one sense of how to achieve the goal.
Conclusion
Organizational structure is vital to the success of an organization and a good example of how that structure can come into being can be found in the early Christian communities, where morale, vision, mission, leadership, culture and networking all came together through tight-knit, focused, inspired and self-actualized pockets of faith. Today’s organizations should focus on achieving the same type of set-up by emphasizing the development of culture through the expression of a clear and unifying vision, a mission that is realistic, a management style that allows workers to celebrate victories and maintain a positive morale, and a leadership approach that allows leaders to be identified and honored while ensuring that workers are served and supported.
References
Brown, P. (1981). The Cult of the Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Daft, R. L. (2013). Organization theory & design. Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning.
De Vries, M. F. K. (1998). Charisma in action: The transformational abilities of Virgin's Richard Branson and ABB's Percy Barnevik. Organizational Dynamics, 26(3), 7-21.
Henry, M. (n.d.). Acts 4 Matthew Henry's Commentary. Retrieved from http://biblehub.com/commentaries/mhc/acts/4.htm
Kotter, J. P. (2012). Accelerate! Harvard Business Review, 90(11), 44–58.
Price, J. (2012). Structured to Flourish: Organization Design Lessons from the Early Church. Journal of Strategic Leadership, 4, 42-47.