In the Church of Scotland, the responsibility for the spiritual care of the parish lies with the Kirk Session, the lowest of the courts of the Kirk, the other two being the Presbytery and the General Assembly.

The minister chairs the Kirk Session and is known as the Moderator.  New Kilpatrick's Session is over 130 strong and comprises the Moderator, ordained elders, including the Session Clerk, who have been admitted as members of this Kirk Session, and associate members who are ministers in the congregation who have accepted Session's invitation to join.  Associate members may speak at Kirk Session meetings but may not vote.

The Session itself decides on the number of elders needed to carry out its work and when new elders should be added to its number. In New Kilpatrick, this happens every 2 to 3 years when a list of eligible members of the congregation who are 18 years of age or older is drawn up confidentially by Session after the congregation has been invited to nominate suitable persons for consideration.

Membership of all the committees is a mixture of elders with specialised knowledge of a subject and elders who take a more general approach to a committee's functions. Committees may co-opt members of the congregation with particular abilities to assist them.

Responsibilities
The form of government in New Kilpatrick is a quoad omnia constitution, which means that the Kirk Session has both a spiritual and a business role to discharge. As Andrew Herron says in his book 'A Guide to Congregational Affairs', the Kirk Session has a responsibility (a) for the people of the parish, (b) for the services of the sanctuary, (c) for the organisations of the congregation and (d) for overseeing the conduct of a vacancy.

In relation to the first of these, most of the elders look after districts.  All congregational households in Bearsden, whether within the parish or not, Craigton Village, Milngavie and Hardgate have district elders appointed to them.  Unfortunately, other areas, even the west and north-west of Glasgow, are outside the district elder system because there are not enough elders to cover areas where households are inevitably scattered.

All newcomers to the kirk who want to become members of New Kilpatrick's congregation have to be approved by the Kirk Session, though this is largely a formality.

A large part of the duty of elders is to be responsible for a district and to visit the families at least twice in the year, to carry out their obligation to take an interest in the spiritual well being of the people in their care and to issue invitations to attend communion services.

The Kirk Session, in co-operation with the minister, determines the times of public worship and the number of services.  The minister is responsible for the content and the conduct of all services, and he is responsible to the Presbytery for this, not to the Kirk Session. One of the principal duties of elders is to assist the minister in serving the elements of bread and wine to the congregation at communion services.

Elders are appointed by Session to represent it and to look after its interests on all congregational organisations.  Some are members of the management committee of the organisation, while other kirk groups receive visits from elders. All such elders act as a link between the organisation and the Kirk Session.

The Kirk Session itself meets seven times in the year. Two of these meetings are made as free of temporal business as possible to allow Session to concentrate discussion on major policy matters of the day and on the key spiritual issues. Thinking about the direction in which the Church of Scotland, and specifically New Kilpatrick, is heading requires elders to be free from issues of financial detail or property repairs on these two occasions.

Because of the type of constitution, the Kirk Session is also responsible for managing the business side of the congregation's life. There is no Congregational Board or the like. Accordingly, Session appoints committees to deal with specific remits, and the committees report regularly to full Kirk Session meetings.