Too often our institutions, be they a church or a judicatory, assume the spiritual life of the clergy is left to the clergy. Yet, considering that the faith of our clergy is one of the critical factors affecting the health of our faith community, maybe we should focus more attention on the pastor’s faith. At another time we can look at what congregations can do in this area, but for now let’s reflect on what a presbytery or other judicatory can do.
A first step might be to honestly recognize the pressures and challenges to one’s faith that affect our clergy. What about drawing together one or two focus groups of clergy and asking them to brainstorm with you what they think might be the 10 biggest challenges to our faith that the practice of ministry can create. This may take more than one meeting. It is probably best not to ask them to come with a list but to come and think together. No answers are asked for here. Only to identify some of the biggest challenges that they see present in the ministry.
Next, share that list with all the clergy in the presbytery, perhaps electronically, and ask them to prioritize the list according to what they perceive about ministry and its pressures. At this point, they are asked to speak in general and not about their specific situation. (This may help them enter the conversation without the need to feel defensiveness.) The responses are correlated and a group consensus is again shared with all of the clergy.
The third step is to ask the clergy to pick no more than two of the areas identified about which they are willing to explore further. They are asked to do the following. First, to identify what they think is the theological or faith issue that underlies the challenge. Second, to identify some Scriptures that may be helpful in addressing the issue. Third, to identify some practices that they think would be helpful.
A fourth step would be to convene in small groups clergy that have worked on a given issue and share their work. Out of the discussion, they are to personalize what they have found most helpful and offer to share that with the presbytery as a whole. That might be a written report but it also might be a called meeting of presbytery. (It could be at a regular meeting of presbytery but then it would have to be done an issue or so at a time.)
The hoped for result would be to lift up the pressures of the ministry, invite some deep discussion about these pressures from a spiritual perspective, and to share the results of that work with their colleagues.
