Especially for a blog called the High Calling, this is quite the admission.
There are thousands of ministers out there who no longer wish to be ministers. They no longer want to work in churches. … But they don’t know how to leave. They don’t have anywhere to go. They don’t know what to do. …
Some ministers become disillusioned with the business side of the church. Seminary was all theology and ideology. Then you arrive in the church of our culture and discover that the congregation is really looking for an entrepreneur, someone who can grow the congregation like a thriving business. …
[S]ome just lose faith altogether. Something about the message wears thin, and one day what used to sustain you is now just a bunch of words. Some wear out. Some burn out. Some get depressed for this reason or that. Really, anything that prevents you from being a gung-ho cheerleader for the cause on Sunday mornings is a problem.
[T]he real question — the one we need to talk about — is how they cope if they can’t go anywhere. What if they have no other marketable skills, are approaching mid-life, are in debt like the rest of us, and just don’t have any good employment options. What then?
Good questions. I hope the answer involves a great resource like the Clergy Project, an organization for ex-clerics that caters to current and former religious professionals without supernatural beliefs.
It’s one thing to keep your job as a realtor for a few years while you figure out what your next move will be. It’s another thing to keep preaching the Word of God on Sunday mornings when you don’t want to be there anymore. The first is acceptable and even admirable. The second is hypocritical.
Fewer hypocrites. More people who cast off unhappiness and oppressive beliefs, and embrace freedom from all that. Sounds great to me.
(Image via PostSecret)
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