CHURCH RANT

Got this great letter from my best friend from college days. We both entered the ministry with the same organization and are coming to similar conclusions, and they are not nice. There are great similarities between governmental leadership and denominational leadership. This letter provides me with a great opportunity to rant (as old people are expected to do) about the state of things. This one is the state of the organized church. I have already expressed myself on government. Don’t get me wrong. I love the church. I even go once-in-a-while. It is still ordained of God. However, man seems to have taken over in a number of places. The leadership power, authority, and fame (yes, fame) go to the heads of national church leaders as much as any other business CEO. It’s a shame, but its true. Something is wrong with this picture. Our organization was created to function from the ground up. Leadership serves the needs of the grass roots. But things have changed. Now they seem to be spraying the grass roots with DDT.

A friend is the chaplain at a Nursing Home in a nearby city. It is our denominational nursing home, but the administrator doesn't really think they need a chaplain---just get the program director to enlist some pastors and have them come in and conduct a weekly service. That should do it for pastoral care. Families of clients aren't supposed to hurt or struggle I guess. Or need someone to do their funerals, or visit their clients when they are in the hospital or face emotional needs. Those days are past. With all our modern conveniences clients do not need shepherds. If they want something, get it on line. It’s the modern way. I think I’ll open a business — Funerals on line. It will carry several general messages of your religious choice and the image of a cool attractive middle aged pastor type oozing compassion and concern over the loss of (insert name here).

Churches still want pastors. But church leaders do not want to supply them everywhere. They are looking for the superstar pastor. The one that can draw 5000 with a single word, organize a 10,000 member church with a single plan able to jump all church complaints and have his on TV show with an audience of 10 million and donations of at least a half billion.

They want big churches. Reorganization recently has meant that churches up to a certain size (40 or 50 I think) are being closed. Pastors are fired if the church does not grow. Isaiah would be fired. He felt like he was called to a people who would not hear and that he alone was following God. But we demand results and cost effective churches. It is cheaper to have one church of 1000 than it is to have twenty churches of 50. AND the programs are bigger and better. Professionals can run nearly everything. Those pros are administrations. They don’t visit or call in your home or have any personal contact. The boys in the ivory tower like that. Big means success, small means failure. Naturally that cannot be expressed out loud, but check out what the boys on top are directing church leaders to do. Let the sheep care for the sheep.

Most pastors no longer make house calls (influence of doctors?). It’s more efficient having the client come to you. We don’t counsel, but you can make an appointment to see our staff counselor. The hospital chaplain will visit you in the hospital. He doesn’t know you, but he/she will visit. Hopefully you have family or friends who will come around. If you are the child of a church leader the pastor might conduct your wedding, other wise use the marriage pastor whom you met only at the required pre-marriage counseling class he lead. The big boys want us all to improve administration skills. We take classes in time management to help us learn how to find others to care for our sheep. It’s the corporate farm model. We have speaking engagements, world tours, and books to write. (or more realistic – find an editor to convert our messages to book form).

When you are tired, exhausted, ill, worn out or just finished serving, district and national leadership will sideline you as of no worth or value. They will reclassify your credentials and you will be stripped of your right to vote at Denominational and District Meetings. What would a bunch of old guys know anyway? One leader wants any reference to former times erased so that the younger guys will feel that this is the way it always was. A rewrite of their church history, I guess. Few know of the large number of women who founded churches at the beginning. Many still have no place for women. That started with the national women’s movement. Before that, we gladly welcomed them to serve. National leadership is in charge. Not true, but don’t let the new guys find out.

They act as nothing ever happened until they got in power. A former leader instituted pastoral care for a number of reasons, but one was to reach out to pastors who have gotten hurt and keep contact with them and try to get them back into ministry. But if they left we don't have any responsibility to them now. They are off our books and out of our minds and hair. We have pastors who have given 20-40 years of service and are a thing of the past. They did something someone didn't like. They questioned the direction things were going. They seemed too interested in what was going on.

Lets not keep in contact with past workers. Drop the letters, the newsletter, the magazines, or emails. The previous philosophy that we might need them at least as prayer warriors is gone. They are useless. Why tell them anything? Without having an actual ministry we can no longer give them access to inside information that might be about people we worked with and cared for. Now where’s the trash heap. Throw them out. It’s time to take a new stand on euthanasia so we can “help” the former workers out the back door. (OK, that’s an exaggeration, but not by much.)

Previous leaders got us to where we are. They made a difference in their small little caring churches. Can we honor the contribution they made?