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Elder (Christianity)
An elder in Christianity is a person who is valued for wisdom and holds a position of responsibility in a Christian group. In some Christian traditions (e.g., Eastern OrthodoxyRoman CatholicismAnglicanismMethodism) an elder is a ordained person who usually serves a local church or churches and who has been ordained to a ministry of word, sacrament and order, filling the preaching and pastoral offices. In other Christian traditions (e.g., PresbyterianismBaptists), an elder may be a lay person charged with serving as an administrator in a local church, or be ordained to such an office, also serving in the preaching (in this case referring to teaching done during church gatherings) and/or pastoral roles. Though there is technically a distinction between the idea of ordained elders and lay elders, often the two concepts are conflated in everyday conversation (for example, a lay elder in the Baptist tradition may still be referred to as being "clergy", especially in America). Particularly in reference to age and experience, elders exist throughout world cultures, and the Christian sense of elder is partially related to this.

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