The Precautionary Tale of Ministry and Departure

Over the last few days, an article has swept through the PCUSA social media channels and caused significant responses from clergy and laity alike. Rev. Alexander Lang declared that he had preached his last sermon at this church and chose to leave the ministry altogether.

As someone who has navigated the waters of this vocation, I am sympathetic to his journey and the many responses generated from the post. However, I want to leave my reply for anyone who might read the article and wonder if they should enter the ministry or depart themselves.

Ultimately, Lang’s article is a precautionary tale of making many reasonable decisions that lead to inevitable burnout. I also wonder if some cynicism might help us use his article best.

I want to walk through his article and offer some of my thoughts. I preface all this by saying that as a co-laborer in the work of ministry, I am deeply sympathetic to how any of my colleagues can arrive where Lang does. I’m not writing here to diminish what he’s saying or his story.

Pastor Resignations

Lang begins by referencing Barna’s large-sweeping survey of pastors chronicling “The Great Resignation.” There is no doubt that the difficulties of the last few years in ministry with COVID, shutdowns, and political turmoil have caused significant pain for many clergy. It’s not unusual for congregations to direct their frustrations on a clergy member. The last few years have been full of stories of congregants mounting efforts to unseat clergy from their positions in what (at least in my estimation) seems to be a response to having control of a situation they determine is untenable. But rarely is the main reason for many of the issues people are most upset about the pastor, but instead, an amalgam of matters distilled during the crisis brought on by COVID.

So, Lang feels the stress and isolation from the job, which should be precaution number one: we as clergy are not always able to build friendship networks with others outside of the church where we can remove ourselves from the stress of the job and alleviate our isolation, and we need help finding ways to do that. Throughout this article, I wondered where Lang’s support network was inside or outside the church… did he not have them, or did he not utilize them? But, I also think of my situation — the typical clergy networks that help provide collegiate friendships have collapsed. If it weren’t for some heavily intentional efforts on the part of my family, we’d be struggling even to have a couple of friends outside of the church.

Pastoral Intimacy

Lang notes his relationships with his congregation and “how enmeshed you will become in other people’s lives.” One of the things many of us have to learn (in part through Clinical Pastoral Education in residency and through experience) is how to keep some professional distance in our hearts from the people we serve. We are finite and cannot expect to carry the burden of hundreds of people right in the most vulnerable parts of our hearts. It doesn’t mean we’re not loving or hiding ourselves, but just as a good therapist might do, we have layers of intimacy that we’re willing to provide and carry. There’s a lot I’m willing to connect with the congregation I care for, but not everything. That reason is two-fold: First, I cannot be everything for my congregants in pastoral care. We are not members of the churches we serve in the PCUSA, so at some point, we have to recognize that we are stewards and prepare the congregation to support and care for itself as much as I do. Second, the members of my congregation are not bound to the same ordination standards as I am to them in care. So, at some point, I have to draw a line in what I should expect them to bear. But that also means there are certain things I cannot bear for them.

Lang notes that it can be overwhelming, and it is! But that should ring an alarm bell in our hearts each occasion it overwhelms us: we must recalibrate. That would be the second precaution: we cannot bear the burdens of the people beyond what our spirits can carry. Again, where are the other leaders in the church? What of the Deacons? How might the situation have changed if Lang didn’t feel he was the primary locus of support for so many?

A Single Boss, Select Co-Leaders

I took a bit of exception with Lang’s depiction of the bosses in the congregation. Not only is it not true from a theological point of view (our single leader is Christ, and we are stewards of Christ’s church), but it is also not accurate from a polity perspective. At best, we as clergy are accountable to our Sessions. Still, they are accountable to us equally — such is the reality of the parity of elders in the denomination. This is the next precaution: our leadership needs to carry its responsibilities, and we must focus on them to lead the church.. Where was the Session, for instance, in the attempted coup on Lang’s leadership? If he had to bear that burden alone, then it was a failure of their leadership, and they needed to be aware. This is why, for instance, many PCUSA churches have personnel committees and the Session as a whole — to help discern when the behaviors of all community members need to be addressed.

Unrealistic expectations?

Perhaps of all the parts of the post, I took the most exception with the section on expectations for two main reasons:

$55,000?

To be blunt, I guess that Rev. Lang did not make $55,000 leading a 1,000-member church. It seems disingenuous to relate his expectations and experiences to someone likely making multiple thousand dollars less. Moreover, it diminishes the, at times, real troubles of individuals who are making the median and cannot afford the area where they reside or have significant expectations put on them. I was a pastor who earned that amount, but at a church much smaller than Lang’s and with far lower expectations of what I would do. The church I serve now asks more of me than the previous, but I am also compensated more. So here, I worry that Lang is trying to weave a narrative that ultimately is misguided.

What of our ordination?

Some places make me anxious as Lang describes the role of pastor, and makes me wonder how much is perception and how much is a congregation being unhealthy:

• I never see my role as a pastor as one who “correctly interprets the Bible.” That unfortunate cultural issue has much at play between the pastor and the congregation. But it is better to assume the role (and let the congregation know) that we are all looking together and engaging God’s Word with joy, fear, and trembling. All that I’ve been tasked to do is train to unfold that wonder more precisely. I very well could be wrong. Sometimes, I want my congregation to push back — I’m also growing. Yet, through all that, I have not felt “authority” being questioned, mainly because I’ve not claimed that mantle in a way that questions about the Bible would diminish what “authority” I’ve been called to have.
• My heart breaks for Lang if he’s felt like he and his family have been required to be perfect, and shame on any church that had led him to think so. But, I do not believe that Scripture asks a community leader to show “grace and forgiveness” as something benign and milquetoast. See: Paul inviting people to be castrated for lousy theology. See: Jesus flipping tables in the temple. See: early arguments amongst disciples in Acts. We don’t need to be rude or spiteful, but we are not without our backbones. So, please, dear clergy or clergy-to-be: do not sacrifice your backbone and your dignity for some false sense of cross-bearing. Richard Ward, in his Working Preacher commentary on 9/3/23’s gospel passage, hits this on the nose, and I invite you to read it if you have time.

I understand why Lang speaks about the requirements of the pastorate, and for a 1,000-member church, it makes sense. But they are not the fundamental “job requirements” of our calling. Instead, I would point to the Book of Order and our vows at every ordination and installation. Amongst many others, here is what is specifically asked of us:

Will you be a faithful minister of the Word and Sacrament, proclaiming the good news in Word and Sacrament, teaching faith, and caring for people? Will you be active in government and discipline, serving in the councils of the church; and in your ministry will you try to show the love and justice of Jesus Christ?

That is the standard by which we are held. Everything else, out of that context, becomes a distraction. And, sometimes, we need to remind ourselves of that.

Body Scans

Just as no plane takes off without an extended checklist to ensure everything is in working order, each of us — no matter our vocation — must do the same. Where are we taking damage? What repairs must we make? Yes, sometimes we have small fissures that we are unaware of, but part of our training should be to continue to have the self-awareness to find where we need to repair. Leaving that to burnout is a recipe for precisely what Lang describes. And again, I’m sympathetic to what happened, but I hope it is another precaution for the clergy. And when we have to rework cultures in our congregations to help us better do the work of repair — let’s continue to pray for more robust presbyteries and synods that enable us and don’t leave us alone to carry that change alone.

…and buy my book.

What shifted this article to be enough that I felt like I wanted to write on it was the last part of the post. Some members of the boards on the PCUSA sites argue that this is a personal story, and why might we treat it more harshly than simply an expression of a journey? It fundamentally comes down to the ultimate intent of this very public (and perhaps for the church he’s departing from, deeply humiliating) departure. The final hook is an invitation to his first book, podcast, and upcoming book. If that’s true, it’s having an impact — on 9/4, the number of people who viewed his post is up over 160,500, which is 160,000 more than the previous two posts in his blog combined. While trying to understand The Great Departure, this certainly doesn’t feel too far from a marketer’s shrewd maneuvering.

Should this be true, I’d argue that while it doesn’t diminish some of the fundamental issues Lang brings up, it taints the messenger enough to ask basic questions about how things got to where they are. Underneath these stories, reactions, and counteractions are real pains, reactions, and heartache. Capitalizing on those traumas financially and raising their visibility to this level feels like everything clergy should be avoiding in a hypercapitalist system and demonstrates some insight as a CEO.

Hang on in there…

If there’s something I could leave with any of you who read this, it is that this job is hard. It requires so much out of each of us, but there’s also so much beauty and opportunity around us, should we believe it is possible. Even if your story has shades of Lang’s, it doesn’t mean it has to go down the same road and result in the same response. Just because one thinks of resignation doesn’t mean they will. Hopefully, it spurns more significant conversation for clergy to reach out, build relationships, and receive help to change toxic cultures that persist in churches. And I look at Lang’s story with sympathy and perhaps pity — no one should end up where he is. But, I cannot see him as a standard bearing of some needed change. Instead, his story (as a friend said) should be given to seminarians across the country as a story replete with how the best intentions can lead to a personal hell.