While attending this past summer’s School for Pastoral Ministry, I had the opportunity to participate in a question and answer session with both Deans of Cabinet and myself. During that session, more questions were asked than we had time to answer.
Utilizing the Michigan Area Reporter I would like to share my responses to the unanswered questions, from my perspective as Clergy Assistant to Bishop Jonathan D. Keaton.
Along the way, we may even discuss a couple of questions you wanted to ask, but didn’t.
If you would like to submit a question, please write me: bdobbs@miareaumc.org. Thanks for letting me share this time with you.
Question: How are you advising pastors who might itinerate in the next year regarding the housing issue?
Dobbs: As I hear this question, I think that there are several implied unspoken questions attached. In general, we are advising pastors who are itinerate — all elders are, in theory, itinerate, but that’s another question — to go very slowly if they are thinking about getting out of the parsonage system. It is no secret that the Michigan housing market is not in very robust shape at this moment in time, nor is it likely to return to good health in the near future. For pastors and parsonage families who already own homes, my advice would be to consider finding a good property manager and renting your house to help with mortgage payments if you can. When I came to my present position, I chose to rent an apartment in the city of Lansing so that I would not have to make a 150-mile round-trip commute every day to our home in Mt. Pleasant.
My wife and I did not want to try and sell our home given the current market, so we have someone renting our house while we are in this job, and we will return “home” when the job has ended.
I realize that everyone’s situation is different, but if someone had advised my to keep the home we owned before going into the ministry some 38 years ago, and I had taken their advice, we would have owned it by now and retirement would look very different. No pastor should expect that the Bishop and cabinet will make appointment decisions based solely on the location of a home that they own. It may be a factor taken into consideration, but it would only be one among many. If location is a primary factor for parsonage families, and it very well may be, then it is possible that no appointment will be available in a given year or the appointment might look quite different from a pastor’s previous appointments; e.g. part-time or much lower salary etc.
Question: How does an elder move and live into a call that is outside pastoral ministry?
Dobbs: The short answer is — pray! The longer answer would begin at the same place. Just as you did when you first heard the call to pastoral ministry, spend a good deal of time in prayer and meditation. And talk your sense of call over with trusted friends or, perhaps, a career counselor to get a better idea of what it is that you feel called to. I believe that it should be a calling “to” something and not just an overpowering weariness with what you have been doing. Two of the people that I hope you will include in this testing-your-call time are your D.S. and someone from the Board of Ordained Ministry. I know all about the “stories” that have circulated among clergy; stories of abuse and neglect by uncaring superintendents or Board Members who only want to say “no.” But my personal experience with the people who sit on cabinet or with the Board of Ordained Ministry is that they genuinely care about clergy and clergy families and want to help them achieve what is best for them – even if that is in a career that is not pastoral ministry. The process itself is stated in the Book of Discipline, beginning with paragraph ¶353 and following, but the answer to the question is found in the faith that God will lead us, with the support of friends and counselors to guide us along the way.
Next month we will discuss two more questions: 1. “Who is the pastor to pastors? Will the conference ever consider having someone to confide in that doesn‘t have connection to (the) appointment process?” And, 2.“How can Bishop Keaton’s pastors express both their support and affection for him without appearing to simply be currying favor (sucking up)?”
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