In his excellent book, Between Two Worlds, Andrew Irvine writes: "To allow the theological educators to assume they alone know the needs of the clergy, and for that matter the Church, in today's society, is to have training controlled by academia rather than by practice. Both must come into the equation to create an effective balance."
And that is fundamentally how and why this comparatively unknown URC minister, from a comparatively unknown Leicestershire town, presumes to write a Sabbatical paper which he contends impinges upon all PFS Ministers (full time stipendiary ministers in pastoral charge) irrespective of their denomination.
I used my Sabbatical to enquire of 38 URC colleagues, chosen at random, a series of time-related questions in order to research their use of time in ministry, how much time on a weekly basis they expend 'at work' in ministry, and to enquire about the upsides and downsides of ministerial working life.
My reasons for undertaking this research are these:
What do ministers do, and how do they use their time?
My enquiries indicate an average working week for a PFS Minister (pastoral, stipendiary, full time minister) of 52.5 hours at least. At least, because PFS ministers have no standard method of accounting for their workload. Many respondents did not record prayer or theological study as 'work time'. Some did not account for working mealtimes, or ad hoc phone calls, or travelling between 'work events'. None at all included time 'on call'. If such were to be included in the data then, even when disallowing 'on call' time, the average week would rise significantly from 52.5 hours per week. Moreover, the variation from the average was considerable, and ranged from under forty hours as a working week to over seventy. The greatest concentration, however, was in the 50-55 hour column.
Then we asked how that time was used, offering six headings similar to those employed in the 1990 Church of Scotland Reports to General Assembly, namely:
A. Announcing (Preaching and Teaching)
B. Bothering (Pastoral Work)
C. Church Growth (Mission to the Parish)
D. Devotion (Personal Study and Spiritual Growth)
E. Extra-Church (Community, Denominational, Ecumenical involvement)
F. InFrastructure (Organisation, Administration, Management etc.)
We found that in an average week, the PFS minister devotes an average
17hrs 10mins to Announcing
8hrs 35mins to Bothering
3hrs 55mins to Church Growth
4hrs 5mins to Devotion
5hrs 10mins to Extra Church
13hrs to InFrastructure
(averaged from 21 respondents which accounts for the minor discrepancy of 35 mins/week between this totalled figure and our overall average).
Now this is quite concerning for in 1953 the extensive research of Blizzard ('The Ministers Dilemma' 1956) showed that PFS ministers used their time then in this order of priority;
In all probability this reflects what is still the popular notion of how the PFS minister should or does use time today. But by comparing the two, it can be shown that there is a significant shift in these post war years.
The priestly function, the devotional aspect of ministerial life, has been privatised and diminished, largely, one guesses, because of the pressing nature of other tasks. Meanwhile, the administrative and management task has risen from the bottom rung to a massive second place, topped only by preparation and preaching. Church growth and mission languishes, with respondents expressing the hope that it is part and parcel of other more well defined tasks. Denominational, ecumenical and community tasks make a significant entry at fourth place. These shifts warrant considerable reflection, and prayer. Is PFS Ministry heading in the right direction? And if not, irrespective of the view of any influential body or person about ministry, how in practical terms can time use priorities be revised?
Asking about the pros and cons of ministerial experience, the two most mentioned downsides were frustration at the inability to address the ideological concepts of ministry because of the pressing nature of practicalities, and personal and family stress for want of opportunity and time to devote to oneself and to one's nearest.
Consequently, when we asked if an Induction agreement about expectation of number of hours to be worked and usage of time would have been useful, 61% of respondents replied in the affirmative. Given how important it is to establish financial and housing arrangements for some denominations at induction, one enquires why this, the most precious of commodities, time, is left out of the equation. And given that strains often appear because of the endeavour by an individual to implement a whole range of (sometimes conflicting) expectational models of the role, purpose and function of the PFS minister, one enquires how we can hurtle on through the ecclesiastical fog, without having some of these expectations stated, resolved and agreed from the outset.
The problem seems to be that we have allowed the task of the PFS minister to be added to unremittingly during the post war years, and allowed the task to define the time required to complete it. The demands of today, the functions of yesterday, and the visions of tomorrow are all being focused onto the one Christian servant, whose life was never designed to carry such a burden. The Church is imploding, so that what was intended to be the calling of the whole Church is being carried by a few willing shoulders on behalf of the whole, and what was intended to be the calling of a shared Church leadership is being carried too frequently by the single employee.
It is time, then, to invert the process:
We argue for two practical considerations - AQAR and the 48hr working week.
AQAR: Assessment, Quantification, Agreement and Review
Assessment: Many denominations recognise the multiple expectations that congregations, and faith communities, place upon PFS ministers. The Methodist Church has produced a humorous and telling video exploring these expectations. The first step in calling a minister to a charge is to assess, identify and prioritise these expectations. There is little point, for instance, if a congregation really wants a pastoring manager, in calling a preaching evangelist, for that can only end in tears. But assessment of course should include:
These things, however, only become apparent when the assessment is prayerfully undertaken.
Quantification: Thereafter the big task lies in attributing a realistic time value to the assessed priorities. Perhaps at this point the congregation may realise that it wants its incumbent, or incoming minister, to do the work of two people or even three. Or wants high class ministry from spare time preparation. Or simply acknowledges that it is really out of touch with how long a given task may take. But congregations must begin to face up to these issues. It is not acceptable to insist on, for example, visitation, attendance at meetings, the need to draw in the young, without setting these things before God, calculator in hand. It is 'not on' to assume that all that a charge wants done can somehow be magically fitted into one's life.
Agreement: Ministry should be a partnership, not a tug of war, a place where time plans, priorities and use of time can be talked through and agreed and not where the family or the minister needs to counter impose personal expectations to secure any quality time for themselves. Unity, vision and fellowship are hardly likely in the life of the Church if they are not shared and agreed at this fundamental level.
Review: It is unlikely that an assessed quantified agreement will be spot on from the word 'go'. It will need constant tuning. More help may be forthcoming in certain areas, which will release the PFS minister for others. Ideas and visions will change. Review is necessary.
I would be delighted to see the Ministry department of any denomination suggesting that all their inductions took place on the above principles, rather than the operative or inoperative systems and non-systems of local assumptions that we utilise at present. After all, these are the principles PFS ministers are invited to apply to other appointments within their own congregational life. Are we the only group within the Church to be regarded as exempt? Too many charges (and in all possibility too many Manses and Vicarages as well) have little quantified idea of how many hours a week their PFS minister puts in, or how these hours are used. AQAR is a principal of partnership to enable prioritisation, understanding, communication, involvement and progress. What principles and systems govern how the Ministry time is used and why in your own Church context?
48 hour working week
The second practical consideration is that of establishing a 48hr maximum working week, inclusive of all that ministry involves, for PFS Ministers.
The EU directive Article 6 (WO4/EC) says:
"Member states shall take the measures necessary to ensure that in keeping with the need to protect the safety and health of workers .... the average working time for each seven day period, including overtime, does not exceed 48hrs."
Many are aware of the exception clauses within these directives governing religious communities. But these were never intended to be a device for stuffing every corner of the diary with every kind of meeting, event and activity.
To argue for the application of that ruling to the PFS ministerial task is to argue for a working life of substantially more time than many denominations acknowledge to be society's norm. For example:
"The starting point was society's acceptance of the forty hour week as the norm, with thirty seven or thirty five as the aim." (Reports to General Assembly Church of Scotland, 1990)
However, it is at one and the same time to argue for a working life of substantially less than the researched average, less than may be required to meet current congregational expectations, and less than some PFS Ministers would feel comfortable in justifying, given the workload that confronts them week by week. Some PFS Ministers, indeed, are given to a work ethic which feels obliged to keep pace in time if not in remuneration with the longest working member of their congregation, irrespective of how that impacts onto health and home and witness. Others consciously or unconsciously calculate their time input in terms of whatever time a working member expends at work, plus whatever they expend at Church on top, neglecting to observe that we are all of us in need of diversion from our primary task, our primary place of labour, and that refusal by the PFS Minister, for whatever reason, to observe the God-given rhythms of work, rest and diversion, which she/he may want and desire for everyone else is as essentially self defeating for her/him as it is for anyone else.
So what reasons can we offer for the implementation of this practice for employees within the Church?
Credibility and Consistency: The CCBI Publication Unemployment and the future of work, 1997, says:
"A proper sense of dedication should not result in overwork which we see as a sign of individual or social malfunction. The good life requires a balanced alternation of work and rest, typified by the Sabbath laws of the Old Testament. It seems to us absurd, and … unjust, that some people should be working so long and hard, whilst other people have no paid work to do at all. As we have said, we believe that the total amount of work done could be increased, but we are also concerned about its distribution. If some people worked shorter hours, more jobs might be created for others."
Is that, then, to amount to a 'do as I say' message from the Church, which we feel at liberty to amend when it refers to ourselves? Do we not also say 'He who has ears to hear'?
Embodiment: In 1977 the URC's Tell me about the Ministry said:
"The minister's first task is to learn the way of life he will commend to other people. He has to learn to pray, to seek God's guidance, to deal with temptations and fears, to live with other people, to use his time well. If he has a special responsibility, it is to study the Christian faith at a level which is rarely possible for others. The minister has to live a Christian life, not only for his own sake, but also because by his character and conduct he will either recommend God or misrepresent him".
Is the essence of PFS Ministry any different today? How can we commend all that Christ means for personal well being, for matrimonial, parental and social relationships if, however, there is never time to do so? Hitting around like a driven worker bee is counter productive to the task that belongs to ministerial calling.
Growth: Look again at the CCBI quotation. By taking so many tasks and duties to her/himself, for whatever noble reason, the PFS minister is not only sustaining the very system which militates against her/his own welfare, but is also thereby depriving the Church of the challenge to be the Church, to be the servant people of God, to be the leaders of the Church under Christ's authority, to be the interactive loving pastors of each other, to be the missioning, praying body pictured in Scripture. What a risk it is to unplug oneself from the Church's current life support system. But how will the body sustain its own life, and life in the Spirit otherwise? In the full Sabbatical report we consider three concentric, and hopefully Christo-centric, rings, whereby workload may be shared and growth made possible.
Bible: What does the fourth commandment mean in the present context? I remain unconvinced that it means working all the hours the Lord sends provided somewhere along the line you have a (notional) day off. On what theological grounds can we justify going beyond, beneath or around, a directive from God that we would agree is given for humanity's best interests, spiritual, emotional, mental and physical?
Perhaps, then, the EU directive, though law not grace, is after all a useful tool for the Church. This writer, incidentally, has no objections whatsoever to local agreements in excess of 48hrs fixed by mutual consent under the AQAR principle. His objection is to the expectation that we all of us will put in as much time, irrespective of our circumstances, as whoever amongst us holds the record for hours in a working week. Interestingly, however, our research showed no correlation whatsoever between PFS ministerial hours put in and perceived growth or decline within the congregation. What are we trying to achieve?
It is surely time the Church became a caring role model and to care for its primary servants by setting down limits and parameters on expectations. Denominations must lead, for it is easier at a local level to implement an agreement, if nationally there is support for that process. Independents can then follow, if the lead given is both Godly and Christlike. Perhaps, however, this overdue paradigm shift will come from the grass roots practitioners applying necessary pressure to the Church for their own, the Church's and the Kingdom's sake.
Please write to the address below and ask for a copy of the Sabbatical report (Please enclose £3 to cover costs). Then in prayer take gracious action on behalf of colleagues, and of the Church of tomorrow.
Malcolm Clarke is Minister of Hinckley United Reformed Church in Leicestershire.
You are reading What are Ministers for? by Malcolm Clarke, part of Issue 17 of Ministry Today, published in October 1999.
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