'But you only work on Sundays...'
How do we know what our job is as clergy?
Just before the turn of the century, I served at a church in New York City. Fortunately, the congregation owned an apartment building where the staff lived, so we didn’t have to pay rent. The commute was very convenient - a ‘secret’ door at the back of the church that led directly to the building next door.
One summer I was directing the church’s summer camp - something that was definitely not in my wheelhouse or my letter of agreement - so I was working seven days a week for three months. Camp was Monday through Friday. Saturday was morning soup kitchen and evening homeless shelter. Sunday was worship - two morning services, one evening service. Rinse and repeat.
I was making $19,000 a year.
The summer camp had a morning worship service at 8:00am (which I led), and I would enter through the side door from my apartment.
One morning I was talking with the young campers after the service and one of them remarked on how I ‘lived at the church’. It certainly seemed like I did! But I explained I had my own apartment on the other side of the door. The kids were a little disappointed - they had images of me sleeping in the pews!
Being clergy is the strangest vocation.
In my 25 years of serving the church, I have a boatload of stories and experiences. Yet it’s always struck me how hard it is to actually define what we do - and what we’re supposed to do - as ministers.
I’ve served with four congregations now - and on a diocesan staff, and I have my own ministry. Through all this time and experience, I’ve found these two things to be true:
No one really tells you what the job is.
It’s never really clear who’s in charge.
Maybe it’s different in other denominations (although hearing from clergy friends makes me doubt this…), but it’s always seemed odd to me that when I’ve taken new positions within the church: the actual tasks are never explained.
My letters of agreement have been concerned with salary and pension, time off and away, with perhaps a paragraph stating that the clergy person ‘will lead the congregation as pastor, teacher, and priest, and engage with the councils of the church…’.
But nowhere does it say - and rarely is it discussed - what exactly this means.
I think this leads to a lot of confusion for clergy (and I’m guessing with other types of ministers as well).
What is expected of us day-to-day?
Presumably, leading worship and preaching - how often?
Full-time clergy are supposed to get some Sundays off (usually five a year). But whose job is it to invite guest preachers/worship leaders when we’re not there? If there’s more than one clergy person (or other minister) serving the congregation, do we have to be at every service of the church? Who decides?
Presumably, pastoral care and teaching are expected as a clergy person. But what does this mean? How often and under what circumstances?
Beyond this, it’s often assumed the clergy person is the de facto CEO of the organization - in charge of personnel, administration, finance, buildings and grounds, etc. Does this have to be so? Is it always the case?
So often, what a clergy person or other minister actually does with a congregation is simply what they’ve always done - what the clergy person is used to doing, the congregation is used to doing, or some combination of these.
It’s a kind of dance which can sometimes lead to conflict, and often leads to guilt or frustration…
‘‘Am I doing enough?” “Should I be doing more/less of this?” thinks the pastor. “Why is she doing that? Why not this?” thinks the congregation.
This particular quirk of how congregations and ministers serve together accounts for a great deal of stress, burnout, and church decline, in my experience.
Clergy usually over-function in this situation, and congregations are usually not attuned to it at all (ministers do what ministers do, and they don’t feel they have the expertise or the authority to question it).
In my own experience, I worked basically 24/7 until I pretty much collapsed. And quit.
Why was I doing this? Because I felt like I had to. The rector - my boss - simply told me that was the way it was. And my sense of duty and service led me to believe I had to give it my all.
I never questioned whether it was my job - or who had the right to define that for me.
I’ve always found it very odd that as clergy, we’re seen as both in charge of and employed by a congregation. This can make for some truly unhealthy dynamics.
In some ways we’re the boss and in other ways the congregation is the boss - particularly around money - and around our continued employment. If we’re junior clergy, then the senior clergy is our boss (Or are they? In some church structures, all clergy contract with the congregation independently. This can also make for tricky dynamics).
I was speaking to my own vestry (church board) once and I mentioned that in the Episcopal Church, they were not able to fire me as their rector (head priest). ‘We can’t??’, they asked, rather alarmed.
In the Episcopal Church, the only way a rector leaves (unless by misconduct) is by mutual consent to dissolve the letter of agreement. Although I’m guessing that if one side has dissolved their part of the agreement, it would be very hard for the other to continue on…
Add to that a bishop, presbytery, conference, or other denominational oversight, and there’s more confusing roles - we’re all in some ways beholden to the oversight leadership, but they’re typically not our direct supervisors, yet at the same time they often have direct or indirect control over our employment.
Again, this leads to a great deal of confusion - and assumption - about who’s in charge of what.
Which leads to a lot of over-functioning: the clergy person often takes on roles that they may not want - like overseeing personnel, or making decisions about capital campaigns or buildings and grounds.
All of this uncertainty is unsustainable - and it’s also a lot of freedom.
Re-imagining ministry can mean asking ourselves - and each other - what our job really is. It can mean serving a task-based, rather than a time-based ministry.
Rather than ‘half time’ or ‘quarter time’, it can mean what the actual job entails. For instance, in my current service, my contract specifies that I will provide:
Holy Eucharist 30 times a year
weddings and funerals as I’m able (and paid for separately)
pastoral care (further defined in the contract)
ministry support (helping congregation members serve their own ministries)
spiritual exercises (Christian formation)
technical administration (church membership software, website, etc.)
Even within a highly structured church - like the Episcopal Church - there is a lot of room to define what the ministerial role is. And a lot of opportunity to open that conversation with those we’re in ministry with.
Even after many years in the same role, we can ask ourselves:
What is my job? What do I do day-to-day? How would I describe my work in one (short) sentence?
How do I know? Do I define the work I do? Does someone else? Am I doing things because I’ve always done them? Because the congregation expects them? (how do I know this?) Because it has to get done and someone’s got to do it?
Is the the job I want? Not ‘is this the vocation I want’? The question isn’t whether or not to be in ministry, or to serve in this place. The question is - does this particular task need to be done by me?
These questions are important for our own ministries - I’m in a completely different place in ministry now than I was 25 years ago. I definitely do not work every day, and I define my own work, and clarify it with those I serve.
These questions are also important for the future of the whole church. We can - and I think we’re called to - support the ministry of others, and change the direction and emphasis of our work of sharing the Gospel, one step at a time.
Oh goodness, add to all that complexity the ways in which the job description keeps changing: IT expert, social media content and design, property management, investment oversight, office administration. And of course the biggie: Whose job is church growth? (85% of church visitors have been personally invited by a friend.)
Full disclosure. For almost 40 years I was a non-stipendiary, non-paid assistant. Having retired 5 years ago I continue to assist at two different parishes on opposite coasts. I had a day job as a professor in a public university with pension, benefits and my spouse worked fulltime in a corporate situation. I don't hold this up just to be honest about where I come from. I too saw in my parish clergy colleagues the helocoptor" pastor, or 24/7 chaplain tendencies, much as you described. I have also done research in addition to listening to many fellow priest experiences and in Community as church, church as community and Ministry Matters I listened to more with depth on ordained ministry in our time. There are no recipes. There are not easy fixes. Your experience and situation works quite well I think. I would add that going forward the majority of congregations will not be able to financially support a fulltime pastor, nor house such either. Thus, we are looking at more "worker priest" or "tent making" ministries as well as other part-time arrangements. As you've described online for years and in your book, this kind of pastoral ministry nurtures the greater ministry of the whole people of God, of the laity and this is a great gift at this point in history. It also hearkens back, as I have argued, to the ancient church where clericalism did not dominate. The new presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, Sean Rowe has made clear there will continue to be changes we must make in how we do things, not so much in who we are or what we believe. You continue to do a great serve Fr Cathie, in putting these kinds of things out there for us.