Church employment contract terms (AVRs) have a different legal nature than collective agreements. In part, it is still unclear how AVRs are to be handled by labour courts—in particular within the scope of the control of general terms and conditions. This work examines the ‘whether’ and the ‘how’ of a labour court’s control of AVRs. The issue of how reference clauses in employment contracts are to be treated in labour court proceedings is another focus of this study. It points out that for both constitutional and simple legal reasons clauses in employment contracts referring to ecclesiastical AVRs are not subject to the control of general terms and conditions.