One sentence in the MacDonald article cited yesterday sums up the challenge. “Pastors are constantly forced to choose, as they work through congregants’ daily wish lists in their e-mail and voice mail, between paths of personal integrity and those that portend greater job security. As religion becomes a consumer experience, the clergy become more unhappy and unhealthy.”
He suggests, and I agree, that this reality, more than too many long hours, is the cause of burnout within the ranks of the clergy. People do need rest to restore their batteries, and occasionally they need to step aside from the pressure of their work to maintain an emotional balance and perspective. However, what robs them of meaning is the loss of purpose. Sometime ago I referred to Kathleen Norris’ book, Acedia and Me, and her powerful reflection on those periods in life when you lose the sense of satisfaction in what you are doing. Most of us know that we have to pay attention to the needs and likes of parishioners. Some of their desires are of the petty or trivial sort but also some are reflections of their own struggle for a good life. Some of our work is what Jim Glass once identified is what we do to “pay the rent.” It is when we become so focused on such activities that we lose sight of the greater purpose that we begin to wonder why we are doing all of this. Worse, we may begin to buy into the consumer mentality and see our purpose in making more and more people happy.
It would be a worthy act to take some time and try, perhaps for 30 minutes, to write in a stream of conscious fashion, of what you sense God’s call is in your present circumstances. One can live with a certain amount of compromise if it is part of a larger purpose towards which we are moving.
