Employees

The Lutheran congregations and parish union in Vantaa employ a total of more than four hundred and fifty people.  The parish union collects church revenues and other income and runs financial administration, so it pays the salaries of all of these people.  More than sixty percent of the employees, however, have been designated as workers of a specific parish.

Local parishes (congregations) have pastors, church musicians, youth directors, diaconal workers, employees who work with children, office staff and other workers who fulfill the ministry of the church on the local level.

The parish union directly employs its own administrative staff and all those who maintain cemeteries and various buildings.  It also employs people in special diaconal and other tasks (see page Vantaa Parish union).

In the ELCF, missionaries are not directly employed by congregations or parish unions.  Instead, congregations support organizations that employ and send church members as missionaries to other countries (see page Global mission).

These web pages in English are not updated very often, so you cannot find names of pastors and other church employees here.  Names and contact information (in Finnish or Swedish) of Lutheran church workers in Vantaa can be found with our Church worker search engine.  You can search with a name of a person or look up the employees of a given congregation.  Glossaries of Finnish and Swedish words that mean church workers are below on this page.

You can also try calling the parish office (for contact information, see the page of that congregation on this English-language website).  You can also look up ”Vantaan seurakunnat” in part 2 of a printed Helsinki area telephone catalogue.

VOCABULARY IN FINNISH
diakoni, diakoniatyöntekijä – deacon, diaconal worker
diakoniatoimisto – office for diaconal work
diakonissa – a diaconal worker who has also been trained as a medical nurse
kanttori – church musician
kappalainen – associate pastor
kirkkoherra – parson, vicar, leading pastor (one in each congregation)
kirkkoherranvirasto – parish office
lapsi- ja perhetyön sihteeri – secretary (director) of work with children and families
lapsityönohjaaja – director of work with children
lastenohjaaja, lapsityöntekijä – an employee who works with children
maahanmuuttajatyö – work among immigrants
nuorisotoimisto – office for youth work
nuorisotyönohjaaja – youth director
pappi – pastor, ordained minister (this word means a priest of any church or religion)
papisto – clergy (collective word for pastors of the church)
pastori – pastor
pyhäkoulusihteeri – Sunday school secretary
rovasti – senior pastor (honorary title)
seurakuntapastori – assistant pastor
tiedottaja, tiedotussihteeri – information secretary
toimistosihteeri – office secretary
vahtimestari – custodian
vs. – deputy (serving temporarily while someone else is on leave)
vt. – interim (serving temporarily while the post is vacant)

VOCABULARY IN SWEDISH
barnarbetsledare – director of work with children
diakoniarbetare – deacon, diaconal worker
diakonissa – a diaconal worker who has also been trained as a medical nurse
församlingspastor – assistant pastor
informationssekreterare – information secretary
kanslist – office secretary
kantor – church musician
kaplan – associate pastor
kyrkoherde – parson, vicar, leading pastor (one in each congregation)
präst – pastor, ordained minister (this word means a priest of any church or religion)
ungdomsarbetsledare – youth director
vikarie – deputy