Policies for Pulpit Announcements

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Communication Policies:
Policies for Pulpit Announcements

A. Three Types of Sunday “Announcements”

1) Joys and Concerns. Announcements to be included in the “Joys and Concerns” portion of the service are always appropriate. Those should be submitted to the church office or one of the ministers as available.

2) Special Addresses. Members or visitors are sometimes invited to be part of services and to speak from the pulpit or platform (e.g. canvass update, report on GA, what the Ombudsperson does). Such participation is at the discretion of the officiating minister or other service leader.

3) Congregational Announcements. Oral announcements of events, issues, etc. are commonly requested but there is a limit to what can be accommodated without diminishing the nature of the Sunday service.

B. Policies for Congregational Announcements
At the discretion of the officiating minister and other service leaders (e.g. Worship Associate, lay leader), announcements may be read with the following priorities:

1) Institutional matters (see Definitions)

2) Programming matters relating events taking place that day or within the next week (up through the following Sunday in some cases)

C. Other Policies

1) Announcements should be submitted to the church office by noon on the Wednesday prior; it is not appropriate to submit announcements to the Worship Associate or Lay Leader immediately prior to the service. Announcements may be added on Sunday mornings on a limited basis and only with the approval of the officiating minister.

2) Pulpit announcements should take five to ten seconds to read.

3) Detailed information (phone numbers, addresses) should not be included since it is unlikely the listeners will be taking notes.

4) It is not acceptable to have both a pulpit announcement and Order of Service announcement on the same Sunday.

5) Pulpit announcements should only be done once for an event, unless it is a congregational meeting or important institutional matter.

6) Announcements may be moved to the Order of Service at the discretion of the Communications Coordinator. (Decision based on content of announcement and number of oral announcements requested that particular Sunday.)

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This page last updated on 03/29/2006

First Universalist Church of Minneapolis

Communication Policies: Policies for Pulpit Announcements

Communication Policies:
Policies for Pulpit Announcements