CREEDE HINSHAW: When clergy care for themselves

Earlier this week, I was privileged to join with five pastors to encourage, support and train a group of approximately 20 other Methodist pastors in a proven way to maintain and sustain their physical, spiritual and mental health.

You might find it odd to think that clergy would need encouragement and support in what seems like should come naturally to them. Don’t clergy care for others? Don’t they have spiritual resources in abundance to guide, cleanse and renew? Can’t they care for themselves?

In reality, self-care is often pretty challenging for those called into ministry, a phenomenon not limited to Methodists. Ministry can often be isolating and stressful; the job is never completed and sometimes it’s hard to even know what the job is.

Expectations of the congregation are unrealistically high, often matched by the clergy’s own uncompromisingly high standards. Clergy at times can be distrustful of and competitive with other clergy, unable to escape their role and uncertain whether they are making any difference for the Kingdom of God and/or their church or community.

Even more seductive, because their primary day of visibility is the day of rest, clergy are notorious sinners when it comes to finding and observing Sabbath time for themselves.

Thirteen years ago, I was fortunate, thanks to a generous grant from the Eli Lilly Foundation, to spend two years developing friendships with a self-selected group of seven other clergy. The money allowed us to gather five times during the year to study together, serve together and, perhaps most important of all, to eat well and play golf.

For those who think that clergy only work one day a week or that they have an easy, non-stressful job, the whole concept of self-care will seem absurd. But most laypersons recognize that caregivers are sometimes the least able to care for themselves. And so, the Lilly Foundation wanted to find ways to develop and encourage clergy excellence and well-being through this program.

Our money ran out after two years. By then we had discovered how important we were to each other and how important it was to maintain the discipline and pattern of study, service and Sabbath keeping. We have spent our own money these past 11 years staying healthy and in touch with God and each other and for seven or eight years now we have been recruiting and training other groups, aided by generous foundations who care about clergy effectiveness.

As we adjourned this week from another three-day training session we sent 20 new clergy in three new groups on their way. Two of the groups were reporting back to us after their first year of being together. The third group, eight young clergymen with long careers ahead of them, will set out on what we hope will be a life-changing, life-sustaining adventure.

I’m sure other denominations have ways to encourage their clergy in these same kinds of ways. Why not ask your pastor how he or she is approaching the issue of regular, disciplined, self-care, Sabbath-keeping, study and service?

Email columnist Creede Hinshaw, a retired Methodist minister, at [email protected].