In the wake of the
resignation of the pastor of a megachurch in our area, the local paper
published an article citing the findings of a survey related to pastoral
attrition:
“LifeWay Research also found that 40 percent left pastoral
work before age 65 because they had a change in calling, 25 percent
cited a conflict in a church, 12 percent left because of
personal finances and 12 percent left for family issues. The online survey
conducted in 2015 asked questions of 734 former senior pastors who
left in four Protestant denominations, and respondents could choose
more than one reason.”
In reviewing these results,
most of us realize that if a person is continually dealing with conflict,
financial concerns, or family issues, he or she will probably consider “a
change in calling” for personal well-being and relational health! We expect too much of our senior leaders and
often fail to provide the support they need in setting boundaries.
Most of the challenges cited
here relate to boundary issues. Both lay
clergy leadership may have difficulty knowing where one’s responsibilities
leave off and another’s begin. There are
often assumptions on both sides that are not only wrong but create an environment
that feeds distrust and power struggles.
Of all the work/life balance
issues that pastors address, those related to family are most sensitive. These may range from how much time the clergy
person spends with family to how much the church expects from the spouse and
children.
Financial concerns, of
course, are often left unaddressed by leadership. Staff members don’t like to address issues of
adequate compensation and the lay leadership would rather assume that everything
is going well as long as the staff member stays with the church. When one clergy person of my acquaintance left
his former church, he was able to express in the exit interview how poorly he
had been compensated. This did not help
him, but it did provide a wakeup call for the personnel committee to address
the needs of those who were still on staff.
There are ways to address
these concerns, thus improving pastoral satisfaction and tenure. Church leaders can provide coaches for
pastors to support them in setting healthy boundaries. They can also promote an atmosphere where
their clergy leaders can be honest about the pressures that they face, calling upon
outside consultants and denominational staff to facilitate such discussions. They can work to provide the resources—spiritual,
professional, and financial—that their clergy leaders require.
The key thing to realize here is that clergy leave the ministry
every day; that is not news. This story
only saw the light of day because of the high profile of the minister involved.
If lay leaders do not step up and accept this
responsibility, stories like the one in our local paper will only multiply.
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