This
is the first in a two-part series looking at the growing clergy shortage
in the Massachusetts Conference. Part two will look at those who enter
the ministry as a second or third career.
By
Tiffany Vail
With
more than 300 members, a $140,000 budget and a church school with 90
children, members of Westminster Congregational Church expected their
next pastor to be someone who had learned the ropes at a smaller church.
But
now, a year into the search, the congregation has discovered there just
aren’t that many mid-career candidates circulating profiles.
“Going
into this process, we didn’t think this church was appropriate for someone
just starting out, due to the size and complexity of our church,”
said Bart Sides, a member of the search committee. “What the congregation
was looking for was someone in the 37- to 48-year-old age range, maybe
looking for their second church. But the bulk of our applicants have
been age 40 to 55, looking for their first church.”
The
Westminister church’s experience is an example of what is being felt
all over the United Church of Christ and other mainline Protestant denominations:
the number of clergy members is shrinking, and their average age is
on the rise.
The
trend can be seen in the statistics. In the Massachusetts Conference,
there are 855 ordained ministers, compared to 958 in 1990. Of those
ordained pastors, only 18 percent are age 45 or under. Fully 55 percent
are between 46 and 65, and the remaining 27 percent are over 65.
What
that means, according to those who work in denominational and seminary
settings, is that as these middle-aged and older ministers retire, there
will not be enough younger pastors to take their places.
“We’re
graying and we’re declining in numbers,” UCC General Minister and
President John Thomas said during a recent visit to the Conference.
“We went far too long without enough people entering into training
for the ministry and far too many of them were middle-aged. That creates
a basic problem with the numbers.”
Part
of what has created the problem is that fewer young adults are entering
seminary.
At
Andover Newton Theological School, the number of seminarians training
for their second- or third-career has increased steadily over the last
10-plus years. The average age of students there is 40 years old.
The
school’s president, Benjamin Griffin, said that change has to do with
the different route people take to seminary.
“It
used to be, 25 years and more ago, seminaries did not recruit students,
we didn’t even use that word. Andover Newton didn’t even have an admissions
office _ people just showed up on the doorstep,” Griffin said.
“I
was ordained 37 years ago, and most people in my class at Andover Newton
were under 30,” he said. “We were brought up in the church, we went
to church camp where a young minister would say `have you considered
full-time ministry?’ Most of us went to a church-related college. We
were nurtured by the system. But all that’s broken up now. Very few
seminary students come from church-related colleges. And the colleges
have changed, many don’t have the denominational identity they had anymore.”
Griffin
also believes that young people don’t go into the ministry because the
status of being a pastor, and the respect and compensation that goes
with the position, is not what it once was.
And
many potential ministers are likely put off by the type of debt they
will incur by going to seminary.
A
1998 study of UCC graduates showed that the average debt load of those
who took loans was $28,072. In order to pay such a student debt safely
_ without jeopardizing quality of life and care of self and family _
the banking industry recommends a minimum annual salary of $41,700.
But, the compensation guidelines for 2001 passed by Annual Meeting recommend
starting pay for clergy at between $24,000 and $44,000 annually, with
only clergy at the largest churches on the high end of that scale.
“Many
young people today can graduate into very lucrative careers, and ministry
isn’t one of them,” said Richard Sparrow, Associate Conference
Minister for the Central Area.
Sparrow
also questioned whether current clergy encourage others to enter the
ministry.
“Do
we make it attractive? Do they see joy in us? People in my generation
remember clergy engaging us in worship leadership and other forms of
ministry, and saying to us `you should consider ministry,’” he
said.
Thomas
makes a similar point, saying clergy in recent years have suffered a
“sag in morale,” which has resulted in their moving away from
recruiting others to the ministry.
“We
haven’t been ready to challenge a young person to enter a life we weren’t
completely sure of ourselves,” he said.
Another
factor effecting churches like Westminster is that pastors today are
more often spending the majority of their ministries at just one or
two churches.
“We
still have a number of clergy who have 25 or 30 years of experience,
but they are not circulating profiles as frequently,” Sparrow said.
“Before, the male minister would say `I feel God calling me to
a new place,’ and the family would pack up and move. Today, pastors
have spouses who have careers and children in good schools and they’re
saying they are not going to move.”
Sparrow
said for “99 to 100 percent” of churches, having a minister
stay for a long period is a blessing.
“The
church gets good, consistent leadership over a longer period of time,”
he said. “Do they get burnt out? Not if there is an allowance for
sabbatical at five to seven years.”
Sparrow
said that when Conference churches lament the dwindling number of profiles
they receive during a search, he reminds them of how lucky they are
to be in Massachusetts, because churches in more rural parts of the
country are having a much more difficult time finding pastors.
“Churches
also should remember that all that is required for a successful ministry
is one profile, as long as it’s the right profile,” Sparrow said.
“While it sure is nice to get 120 profiles, not that many are required
if committees do their work prayerfully.”
Meanwhile,
at Westminister Congregational Church, the search committee is beginning
to accept the notion that they may want to call a newly ordained pastor.
“We’re
a very active and very supportive church so if we do end up hiring someone
brand new, the congregation will be able to hold that person’s hand,”
Sides said. “There might be a positive aspect to this. We might end
up in more of a partnership, rather than relying on the pastor to do
everything.”
Read a commentary: Lack of young
clergy a loss for churches
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