I hate the profession of pastoring right now. There, I said it. I love being a pastor, I love caring for people, I love preaching – even when I must preach a difficult, prophetic sermon – I love the church I currently serve, I love this call. But holy crap, we have found ourselves in a terrible time to try to pastor to people and the larger church.
Just open your Facebook account. Today Iowa still has not declared a final count for the Caucus, President Trump gave the State of Union Address last night, and Nancy Pelosi ripped her copy of his speech in half after he finished – after he refused to shake her hand before he started. Oh, and the impeachment vote will happen today.
What did your friends say about these things? Or, for the pastors who might hear this, your parishioners?
I saw both Nancy Pelosi and Donald Trump revered as the second coming of Christ and feared as the arrival of the anti-Christ. I saw conservatives and liberals derided as stupid evil and deified as the saviors of our nation. I saw discussion not happening and hyper-partisanship ending all dissent.
This morning, before I even got out of bed, I saw these things. Long before I even got to the office to contemplate worship for the week and how I address another long list of unique things I have to address less some thought leader recommend people leave my church – or rather, I have to decide what gets addressed and what I cannot speak to – I saw all these things.
And, just by pointing out the hyper-partisanship, someone will inevitably accuse me of “Enlightened Centrism,” a code-word for complacence in evil by not choosing to fall in line with a side. I cannot win; I will fail every purity check of the left and the right, and I will always be the “problem” despite my desire to do something right.
We live in a time were people celebrate a former moderator of the General Assembly publicly endorsing a candidate and publicly accusing other candidates of a whole host of evils – and publicly stating that people voting for any other party doom the nation. And, when I say this, someone will accuse me of being an Alt-Right white-supremist. How dare I question the actions of someone like that?
Pastors, I have a question for you: do you see any pastoral sensitivity in anything we do in 2020? Recently, at a meeting where the group would vote on the proposed direction for the presbytery, a vocal activist equated being conservative with being evil to prove their point in a room of fairly liberal church people – and my parishioner, a moderate conservative trying to figure out her place in this church, sitting right beside her.
What the Hell should I do? Do I stand up against the prevailing winds because I want pastoral sensitivity and for us to deal with our internal hyper-partisanship so we can more effectively reach out people who have loving hearts and misguided minds? Do I just let the prevailing winds blow the church as they want because the ultimate goal lines up with the message of Christ despite its problematic language and method? Do I even get to call it problematic when the problems come from isolating people the larger American church has largely coddled in decades past – and I see it as unhelpfully driving people away from the message instead of convicting them to change? Do I just give up, sit in my little corner, do what I can to move the needle slightly toward love in maybe one person in the congregation I serve, and just be okay with that?
As I pain over that tension, I also have to provide pastoral care to people. I know thought leaders say we worry too much about pastoral care, but I guarantee you the woman whose husband forgets who she is when he stands will not hear anything about whatever soap box the larger church demands I stand on today. I guarantee the man who had to make the difficult decision to put his wife in a care facility because he could not longer care for her – and then had an appendectomy within two weeks – will not hear my prophetic message. Or even make it to church.
Some people God called me to care for vote straight-ticket Republican, some straight-ticket Democrat, and they all need care. My sermons, my social media presence, my speaking about politics will affect their ability to receive care from me. I do not have a pastoral care staff. I have some volunteers, but they are not trained in any real way. They all have professional and personal lives outside the church.
When someone stares down death – either their own or a loved-one’s – I am it. I believe they give me more leeway to accept my care when I get a bit feisty in the pulpit than I acknowledge, but I know a line of “too far for this moment” exists and I refuse to participate in pastoral ministry that does not at least acknowledge were my people are and what they can hear in a moment – and then receive the care God called me to give them afterward.
I find myself likening this profession to a tightrope walk, which itself just lends itself to the difficult beauty of this calling, but a thing has happened. Thought leaders have demanded we do not spend time on that tightrope and only worry about staying apolitical for the sake of providing care or worry about having a prophetic voice and find someone else to provide that care.
You know where the tightrope is easiest? On the edges, off the actual rope. If you refuse to balance the multiplicity of this calling, of course you can just say whatever you want from the pulpit without any sort of sensitivity or just not rock the boat in your sermons because you always think about the hospital room and the funeral home.
I think the profession used to rejoice – if privately lamenting – the balancing act we must do and the tension we feel between all our callings. Or, at least I thought that when I started seminary. Now, though, I only see thought leaders and “important pastors” pretending that all pastors have staffs, budgets, and opportunities to do all the activism and prophecy – and condemning pastors who have pastoral work to do.
Pastors, I have another question: how many of you actually feel supported? Hopefully your spouses, partners, and families provide some support, but who actually feels supported in their ministries – and their struggles in this soul-killing tension – by colleagues, regional ministers, or church leadership? Or, like me and so many others that I talk to, feel like they have to do it all alone and no one cares about their struggles – and they do not even have a place to express those struggles at all?
Pastors, I have yet another question: how many of you have received the answer, “Find a Therapist, Spiritual Director, or Coach,” when you express frustration over your lack of support? How messed up has the church gotten that we say that you need to pay for the support you need? We preach in a time of hyper-partisanship, provide pastoral care for people we need to preach a prophetic message to, and then must pay for someone to care about our struggles.
We have to choose to pastor in the tension – or choose not to. I just do not know how we sustain this. Or is it just me?
Peace,
– Robby
Red Shoe Pastor 