United Church Clergy: Top Ten Survival Tips

United Church Clergy: Top Ten Survival Tips

As a former UCC clergyperson, there are a lot of pitfalls to be avoided. The best decision is to leave the denomination, but if you do stay, here are some tips for being able to serve Jesus Christ without having the denomination and congregations grind you up too badly.

1. Pastoral Visiting: Do lots of it, but focus quickly on matters of the heart. John Wesley would ask, "How is it with your soul." Because many clergy in the UCC are secularists many people have never had a real pastoral visit. They might have gotten some psuedo-counselling, but never a real talk about how their discipleship with Jesus is going. Be aware that people may not have the language and be compassionate with their inexperience. While I don't like the expression "spirituality", it can be a good place to start. "How is your spirit?" "As a Christian, how have your grown spiritually this year?" "What are some things that you are interested in talking about, regarding your connection to God?"

One question that is a favourite, "Well, the Church sent me to school for 4 years to learn lots of stuff. Not that I have all the answers, but what is one thing you've always wanted to talk about?"

Reject the UCC concept that the congregant must bring these things up. Most UCC leadership follow the Clinical Pastoral Educational model which is deeply secular and individualistic in its approach. While you must not be a pushy person, if you as the congregants pastor do not offer the opportunity for faith talk, who will. If you are understanding and patient, the people will understand your love for them and your sincere desire for them to grow in Christian love. Many will also stand with you when the secularists and progressives in the congregation and presbytry attempt to derail your ministry.

2. Exceptional Preaching: The preaching is of a very poor quality in the UCC due to decades of neglect in teaching preaching. If you put in time for extra studies, books and resources, you can become a good preacher. If the vortex of administration and management is stealing your time from this essential activity, you will pay the price eventually. First, preaching is near sacramental and key to the Protestant understanding of the role of the clergy. Since most people in the pews are not involved in the leadership of the congregation, when trouble comes around through a 363 initiated by secularists or heretics in your congregation, you will need the folks in the pews to come out and vote for you. If you are a good preacher, this will garner support from those in the pews.

Don't buy into the individualists nonsense taught at theological school about not signing up for preaching journals or using other people's sermons. If you are busy, borrow. Nothing is original in authentic Christian preaching so there is no real plagerism. The people of Christ deserve good sermons. Use my sermons if you want. See http://www.jameslove.com/sermons.htm

3. Eliminate Novelty and the Non-essential: UCC ethos is in love with "the new and the next" rather than seeking the deepness of the worship, good ol' fashioned Christianity and spiritual wisdom of our forebearers. Lots of extra stuff will keep you from doing visiting and preaching. If you fall for this folly, it will undermine your primary ministry and the support you need when trouble comes.

Novelty and Non-Essential Removal:

1. Children's Time: Substitute it with a prayer time where you ask "What are some things good that we can thank God about this week?" Say together something like "Lord in your mercy, hear our prayer." Or "Loving Jesus, we give you thanks for these and all the blessings of life." Next ask, "What are some of the sad or troubling things that we can ask for God's help with? After this say something like the previous suggestions. Do this every week and the kids will have different stuff to say. If someone complains, read a bible story occasionally for a change. Don't ever let the congregation laugh at the children's innocence and never tell silly morality stories or midrash.

2. Choosing Hymns: A bunch of musical types think it is wise to introduce new hymns every 10 years. It is also part of a theological battle to remove redemptive theology from the UCC, but it also is trouble for you. Most congregations can really only hold onto about 60 hymns. If you have had good secretaries, you'll be able to go over the hymns of the last 10 years and find out what the favourites are. Also, ask people to sign your hymn book on their favourite hymn, and you'll discover what people know. Choose about 40 of the core hymns that have a breadth and depth of theology. Repeat repeat repeat. Do include new hymns but only 5 a year and pick the solid theological ones. This method can move one meeting from a monthly to a quarterly meeting or elminate the committee altogether: The Worship Committee.

3. Prayers: Don't write your own prayers unless your talented. There are loads of good solid prayer books and some even are set to the litergical seasons. What can you say better that others can say?

4. Meetings: UCCers say they hate meetings, but in reality they love them. This must be true, since why are there so many of them. . Delegate as much as possible to inviduals and small groups of people. Reduce the meetings and create other opportunities for people to build friendships. For the Counsell or Session or whatever name they use, include a 10-15 minute time of prayer at the start of the meeting. This will be highly resisted at first, but it will help recentre this core meeting from tasks to faith leadership. Have a strong rule that these meetings must be done in two hours and stick to it. Say, "Some of the elders are very busy and wants to get home quick." There will always be some who are thankful for short meetings. Everything that needs to be done can be done in 1:45 minutes unless there is disfunctional leadership then they will want to discuss the colour of the lawnmower purchase and all sorts of mundain stuff. Don't let that happen since it will suck the energy out of you and any good lay leaders. If you can reduce meetings to your presense at the monthly Counsel meetings, you'll have more time for what you are really called to do. This will be a very tough thing to do and not something to do quickly.

Top Useless Meetings:
1. Worship Committee: - Quarterly or eliminate. Delegate the choosing of readers to a small group or the secretary. You must recruit readers. The same goes for Worship elders who read the prayers.

2. Ministry and Personel Committee: Quarterly. This support committee rarely works. It is a requirement so meet minimally to discuss the basics. If you are visiting well, you should know what they will say. Be cautious if one or two new people come onto the committee. Keep a journal of anything discussed at these meetings. You may need the information later.

3. Finance Committee: The congregation is responsible for these issues. Trust they will do the job and stay away. Do get the reports and read them carefully. Ensure that the Counsel does its job to ensure that enough people are on the committee to catch cases of fraud.

Lastly: NEVER NEVER NEVER allow meetings on Sunday. It is against the Sabbath and less importantly, after worship most clergy need to go home and relax. If people are too "busy" to meet during the week then it must not be that important. Don't be a wimp, never allow a meeting or even a "short discussion". If they insist on Sunday meetings, find a new congregation.

4. Be a Supporting Presybtery Member or Die: If you get into trouble in your congregation and Presbytery doesn't know and trust you, they will feed you to the dogs. If you are mainline or conservative and you don't have the support of someone substantial in Presybery, it may mean being delisted. Most Presbyteries will deal with troubled pastoral relationships by shedding the clergy. This is pretty much on the level of fact. Unless you can get about 70% of the people vote to maintain the pastoral relationship (more if you are conservative), you are gone. Note that if you have not done good pastoral visiting or good preaching the masses in the pews will not come out to the 363 meeting. Remember, it does not matter whether it is your fault or not. In the UCC, the primary goal is to serve the individual's spiritual needs (my opinion) rather than be a mission for Christ. If Presbyery can keep another spirituality shop open, you are expendable. Secretary or Treasurer are good positions to work on at Presbytery since they often ensure visibility and therefore support.

5. Support the Choir: One of the primary power centres in the UCC is the choir. This is understandable since the choir is still one of the remaining groups in the Churches where people still get to know each other quite well. The other is the UCW, however it is quite insignificant now due to the aging of the UCC. Younger leaders in the Church will be in the choir and if you don't support their efforts, you're screwd. It is also where you might pick up on trouble brewing.

6. Power families: Entitlement is huge in our culture and this is reflected in the UCC. Many people will believe they are entitled to your time because they give somewhat to the Church (the UCC has a dismal giving level). Families which see themselves as the pillars of the Church will often react very badly if they are not given the entitlements they believe they are due. This includes family members who are marginal yet see the congregation as "their church". As a faithful clergyperson you will need to serve Christ first, however be aware that these families perceptions of their entitlements exceed those of others. For example, I was told that driving to visit a dying child twice (an hour away) of a family marginally connected to the congregation was "a poor use of my time." At the time I was bewildered by these comments from Church leaders, however I now realize that the pillar families did not think I was giving them enough of my time. Their entitlements were more important than the pastoral needs of a dying child and their family. Sad but true. The power families must preceive themselves to be getting special access to you or they will turn on you.

7. Exit Strategy: Given that only 10 people can initiate a 363 in the United Church of Canada and thereby trigger a review, be aware that your pastoral relationship is built on sand. Given that Presbytery will often cast clergy to the dogs rather than deal with disfunctional or even evil congregants, if you get a 363 you are mostly finished with the pastoral relationship. You also may be finished with the denomination.. Ensure that you have some savings to transition to another congregation (or denomination). The good news is that there are lots of congregations who need clergy, so finding employment will not be difficult. The trick is leaving before things get hot enough that the congregation or Presbytery needs to save face. In this case, suddenly your years of ministry will be cast aside for the common expression "s/he has had a series of failed pastoral relationships following him/her". This is not true, of course, but it is often used to absolve congregations of wrong doing and to return the UCC to some sort of community normalcy. If you need two incomes to support your family, make sure you've got a rainy day fund.

8. Exiting Sanity Savers: If your ministry situation is becoming increasingly hostile and therefore stressful, go to your doctor. If you are experiencing a decline in mental health or physical symptoms you can go on short term disability. You don't need to tell people why you are sick. If you decide to leave the pastoral charge, you can continue for a while on short term disability. Burn out from stress is extremely common for UCC clergy. If you are not sick and need to quit quickly, remember that even if you quit, there is the possibility of collecting Employment Insurance. Ensure that you have documented the situation that led to your need to voluntarily leave the work. This will help ensure you get benefits from the government.

9. Interview Really Really Well before Accepting a Pastoral Charge: Make sure you learn how to spot troubled congregations. There was a book out a couple years ago about how to interview a congregation to weed out potential trouble. (Someone please send the title) There are no perfect congregations however some clergy don't even ask why the last pastor left or naively believe what they are told by the interview committee. Phone the neighbouring Presbyterian and Anglican clergy to find out about the congregation. Check if the congregation has fired, forced out, or burned out a clergyperson in the last 20 years. If they have find another congregation to serve with.

10. Open your home to the Congregants: UCC common wisdom is that you should keep your home separate from the congregation. It is called "having boundaries", however what it does is limit the development of true Christian friendship and enforce the idea that clergy are employees hired to perform spiritual services. Have BBQ's, open teas, celebrate your birthday and have people bring money for a special charity of yours, invite people over for a movie and informal talk about the faith issues. Don't be an employee, but be a pastor and friend. I learned this important lesson from a beautiful group of Taiwense (and you Caucasians who were part of Shiloh United too.) in the last UCC congregation I served. It was great fun, lots of informal pastoring occurred and I got to know a lot of wonderful people outside of all those useless UCC meetings. Ministry is always challenging and often rewarding, but if it is not fun, then something is wrong.

Yes, there is an 11th. Guess what it is.

11. Leave the Denomination: Just as there is no perfect congregation, there is no perfect denomination. Consider that the UCC is conflicted on whether they even want paid accountable clergy! Consider that the UCC's giving and worship attendance rates are the lowest of any denomination (outside of the RC Church in Quebec). Consider that the track record of clergy burnout, clergy abuse, and fewer clergy entering ministry, are all signs that the United Church of Canada is a poor place to steward theleadership gifts God has given you. True Uniting Christians, like myself, believe in fosting unity amongst all Protestant denominations such that in the end "all may be one". This can better be done in other denominations which are not diverging theologically from the centre of Protestantism. Each year the secularist and progressive theology of the United Church makes it more difficult for mainline and conservative Christians to ministry in the UCC. Does it not make better sense to find greener pastures and richer soil to plant the seeds of the Gospel. Rocky and spent soil does not make for good farming.