I recently talked to a pastor about a negative termination experience at a church. It recalled for me several times when I participated in a severance agreement with a member of a church where I was pastor. Sometimes we handled it better than at other times. In the first experience, the church simply lowered the salary and hoped the person got the hint. That, for me, was not an appropriate way for the church to behave. Another time, I participated in talking with the individual about what was perceived as substandard performance. We set up some criteria for improvement and a time period to review the process. That was better but it was still not without lots of hurt feelings.
I think churches get very confused as to how they should behave. Part of that has to do with a vague theology that translates for many of them into a mandate to be nice. The result often is that there is little direct feedback to the employee until a lot of negative pressure has built up. It would be better if we could learn as a community to “speak the truth in love” from the beginnng but that is rarely the case.
I think that presbyteries should engage in some theological discussion around how churches should behave towards those they employ. What is the proper way that the Body of Christ treats those who are employed by them? It is even more difficult when the negative experience is that between the congregation and the pastor. It would be interesting to have a session and a pastor explore together how they should address the failure of either to live up to expectations. If this could be done before there are any major conflict issues, perhaps they would be better prepared when disappointments did occur.
Tomorrow I will explore how such a theological/biblical discussion might take place.
