Tag: ministry

When God Smacks You in the Head

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized5 Comments

I’ve been wanting to write more about my recent transition from the Presbyterian Church to the Episcopal Church, but a hectic schedule has not allowed. Hopefully, I will get to that soon. I’m sorry for leaving my readers in the dark, but living life has taken precedence over documenting it.

The transition process has been full of providential coincidences, deepening relationships, and a profound sense of finally settling into a church tradition where I can feel at home.

I have had a steep learning curve in my new job as parish administrator at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Battle Creek. I’m grateful that the community there has been wonderfully welcoming and patient with me as I learn how to juggle these new responsibilities. I have desperately needed to learn the administrative and financial aspects of church life, which this job allows me to do. Knowing about these things will make me a much stronger presbyter when I (hopefully) return to that role in a few years. I believe I am exactly where God has called me to be for this moment.

At the same time, this new season is not without its own pain and anxiety. First of all, I am still grieving my previous call as pastor of North Presbyterian Church, Kalamazoo. I had hoped to remain in that position for much longer than I did. Even after I came to the realization that I was not a Presbyterian, I was determined to stay on for the sake of serving that amazing group of people. Unfortunately, the financial realities made it impossible for me to continue in the call.

Second, the reality has begun to sink in that I am taking a substantial risk by hopping between denominations like this. The Anglican commitment to the historic episcopate (a theological commitment I have come to agree with, btw) means that I will have to re-enter the discernment process for ordination. The process will take several years. And there is the possibility, however slight, that a bishop might look at my situation and not decide to move forward with ordination. My priest assures me that this, while technically possible, is highly unlikely. Nevertheless, the fear sometimes keeps me up at night. I felt it acutely this weekend at the Diocesan Church Development Institute (DCDI), where clergy and parishioners from two Michigan dioceses gathered to learn about helping members grow spiritually, live together in community, and nurture transformative change. I was thinking about how much I love this when the terror struck that I might never again be able to invest my whole life in pastoral ministry, as I have for the last decade.

But God is not without a sense of humor.

Today’s epistle reading at the Daily Office was from 1 Peter 5:1-11. St. Peter writes as an apostle, bishop, and priest (presbyter, translated as “elder” in the NRSV) in the Church. He exhorts the leaders of the Church “to tend the flock of God that is in your charge, exercising the oversight, not under compulsion but willingly, as God would have you do it not for sordid gain but eagerly.” (1 Pe 5:2)

I heard the following words as if they were spoken directly to me in this moment:

“Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you.” (1 Pe 5:6-7)

And I then I read the following as a promise:

“And after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, support, strengthen, and establish you.” (1 Pe 5:10)

As one trained in the arts of biblical exegesis and church history, I am fully aware of the dangerous situations that arise when one inserts one’s personal desires and fears into the text of Scripture. Furthermore, I know how church bodies work and have come to trust in the process of discernment that happens with the bishop in concert with relevant committees. There are no guarantees that I will ever become a priest in the Episcopal Church. Even if I do, the path will not be short or easy.

But the promise I hear in this text is that my life is destined to reflect God’s “eternal glory in Christ” and I will be given whatever manna I need to make that journey safely. I write these words from a place of faith, knowing that those same old fears are likely to reassert themselves in the next few years, days, or even moments. May God grant me the grace to trust the promise, even as my own heart screams in terror.

Last night, I was venting these fears to my wife at some length (ad nauseum, she might say). I eventually paused to go say Evening Prayer. Reaching down to get a hymnal from the bottom shelf, something must have shifted. There was a noise on the shelf above me and a sudden, stinging pain in the back of the head. I turned around to see what had fallen and hit me… it was my ordination certificate.

PCUSA Ordination Certificate.JPG

Honest Preacher

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized1 Comment

This is the best, most hilarious thing I’ve seen all week. And it’s totally true. I hope this video goes viral. Subscribe to Friend Dog Studios. Share with your friends.

Every clergyperson has weeks like this sometimes.

[Just for the record, I am not having that kind of week. In fact, just last night I was telling the elders of North Presbyterian Church how proud I am of them and how thankful I am to be their pastor. That being said, enjoy the video and have a laugh.]

Longing to See You

On By J. Barrett LeeIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

“8First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed throughout the world. 9For God, whom I serve with my spirit by announcing the gospel of his Son, is my witness that without ceasing I remember you always in my prayers, 10asking that by God’s will I may somehow at last succeed in coming to you. 11For I am longing to see you so that I may share with you some spiritual gift to strengthen you — 12or rather so that we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith, both yours and mine.” – Romans 1:8-12

These words from St. Paul reflect his pastoral heart. The apostle says to his parish, “I am longing to see you”.

At the center of the pastoral vocation is a deep longing. It is a longing to be in relationship: to bear witness to the presence and activity of Christ in the people with whom I do ministry.

When people ask to see me, they often say at the end of our meeting, “I’m sorry to have taken up so much of your time.” I want to say back, “Are you kidding me?! This is the best part of my job! If I could just do this all day, I would.”

The pastor’s first job is to be in relationship with God’s people: not to be “professionally religious”, not to solve their problems, not to entertain them, not to teach theology or correct bad behavior, and certainly not to maintain buildings and manage institutions. All of the above are important and necessary parts of ordained ministry, but they are not the heart of the pastoral vocation. The heart is the relationship: the “longing to see you” that Paul wrote about.

To be sure, there is an exchange of something that happens in this relationship: Paul says that he wants to “share some spiritual gift” in order to “strengthen” his people. But he goes on to say that the exchange is a two-way street: “that we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith, both yours and mine.” Every relationship is a matter of simultaneous giving and taking. All of us are constantly being both filled and emptied by love in the relational network of the Trinity, “in whom we live, and move, and have our being” (Acts 17).

As Christians, we believe that we are saved by a relationship. The Incarnation is a relationship in which God “takes on flesh” and “moves into the neighborhood”, as Eugene Peterson put it. Jesus Christ is Emmanuel: “God with us.” Each Sunday, we further celebrate the Real Presence of Christ in our celebration of the Eucharist. By faith and the power of the Holy Spirit, we receive the Body and Blood of Christ into our very selves.

If we, as Christians, truly want to bear witness to the saving activity of our Incarnate Deity, then our action must mirror God’s in its relational nature. We must follow that deep, inner longing to be with one another in the flesh, as God is with us. When our fellow human beings come to believe that they are loved, that they are not alone, then can we say that we have truly done our job as witnesses of our Lord Jesus Christ.

It is the longing to be in relationship that brought God from heaven to earth in the person of Jesus Christ; it is that same longing that fuels the pastoral vocation. It is the longing to be in relationship that draws the Church together in covenant community; it is that same longing that sends us out into the world as witnesses of the Gospel.

“I saw the person before I saw his or her poverty. And I realized that the person who is hungry, abandoned or in need is first of all a heart who needs to find another heart; someone who will listen, understand and love. People who are poor and discouraged need to hear someone say to them, “I love you. I have confidence in you. You are beautiful. You can give life to others.” This helps them find confidence in themselves, new strength, new hope. The poor do not need to hear a lot of words, not even pious words. They may need people who will do things for them. Above all they need friendship: friends who love them and are willing to do things with them. This will help them grow and develop both humanly and spiritually.” – Jean Vanier

Heart to Heart

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We modern folks, Protestants in particular, have a hard time conceiving of ministry that doesn’t somehow involve an exchange of information. We talk a lot. Many words.

We ask for prayer requests and affirmations of faith. We made the sermon the central feature of the worship event. We analyze hymns based on their lyrical content. Especially since God cannot be seen directly with the eyes, we are tempted to reduce Christian faith to exchanging the right kind of information in the right way.

Let me be as clear as possible: I have come to believe that we have made a vital error in this. Faith and ministry are adamantly not primarily about the exchange of information.

I experienced this firsthand in a new way last spring when I visited St. Gregory’s Abbey, a Benedictine monastery in Three Rivers, Michigan. During my week there, I shared that space with the monks who live there year-round and with several other visitors: an Anglican priest, a Quaker pastor, a woman going through a difficult life transition, two young women in campus ministry, a group of men on retreat from a nearby Episcopal church, and a rabbi in the throes of a psychotic episode.

Each of us had our own reasons for being there, but what I experienced most deeply was the sense of togetherness and connection that emerged, not from our conversations, but primarily through the space shared in silence. We got to know each other while knowing very little about each other. This was intimacy minus the exchange of information. It runs completely counter to the style of relational building that our culture has trained us to pursue (which could be described as the exchange of information without intimacy).

There is a similar kind of ministry that grows among us at North Presbyterian Church, where I serve as pastor. Most of the people we do ministry with have some kind of serious, chronic mental illness. Some of our people are barely verbal in their cognitive expression. I stand up to preach every Sunday, but it’s not the main event of the service. My sermon could be good or bad, short or long, and the ideas would still go over the heads of several people in the congregation. They don’t come for the sermon.

Instead, they come to sing their hearts out (loudly and off-key), to share a hug and a smile (maybe the only one they’ll get all week), to voice their weekly joys and concerns in words that are sometimes unintelligible (but known to God in prayer), to receive the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist (which we celebrate weekly, a rarity among Presbyterians).

Our liturgy is messy and rowdy: quite the opposite of Benedictine silence and Presbyterian “decency and order.”

Our worship and ministry at North is not about the exchange of information, but the intimate connection of heart to heart in the gospel. It happens in music and touch, in bread and wine.

The following video illustrates this beautifully. While none of our members are as impaired as Ms. Wilson, the principle of ministry is the same. St. Francis of Assisi is thought to have said, “Preach the gospel always; use words when necessary.” This video shows how it’s done:

In Defense of Pronouns

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized7 Comments

A couple of years ago, I wrote a blog post on my ideas about church growth and pastoral leadership:

A Growing Church is a Dying Church

As it turns out, this post said what many others were thinking. I watched as it made its way around the theological corners of the blogosphere, sparking an enthusiastic “Amen!” from many of my colleagues in ministry. The response, however, has not been entirely positive. A small minority of commentators have branded me as a ‘Leftist’ whose heretical views are responsible for the decline of mainline Protestant churches.

Why have I been so labeled?

  • Have I blasphemed against the doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation, or the Atonement? No.
  • Have I called for Christians to stop praying, throw out the Bible, or cease & desist from celebrating the Sacraments? No.
  • Have I discouraged churches from engaging in mission, serving their communities, or speaking publicly about their faith? No.

I have done none of these things. To the contrary, my call in the article is for more prayer and Bible study, more frequent celebrations of the Eucharist, and more community outreach, all of which are activities that even the most theologically conservative Christians could get behind with their whole hearts.

The issue that has repeatedly stoked the fires of anger in some of my readers is my use of a single, three-lettered pronoun: She. The hypothetical pastor in my article is a woman.

It was a relatively minor editorial decision that I made on the fly. When I wrote the article, I didn’t set out to make any kind of deliberate statement about feminism or gender equality through my use of pronouns. Honestly, I didn’t give it much thought because it didn’t seem like a big deal to me at the time.

I serve in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), where we have ordained women to the ministry of Word and Sacrament for over half a century. In every single congregation I have served, women have not only been my colleagues, but also my predecessors at the table and in the pulpit. My wife was ordained several years before I was and it was through her, in part, that I began to discern my own call to pastoral ministry.

I have been shocked that this minor detail seems to have drawn out the sexist attitudes that still poison our church life and do violence to the gospel itself, no less than the arbitrary distinctions between Jews and Gentiles that St. Paul sought to overcome in his time.

It seems ridiculous to me that this particular article could have sparked such a hateful reaction.

Even though the article itself only advocates for things that could be affirmed by all Christians, detractors point to my use of feminine pronouns as evidence for a liberal conspiracy to undermine, subvert, and destroy the church from within.

Gender equality had nothing to do with the main thrust of my article, but it has emerged as an important issue in the way that the article has been received by its critics. To me, their unexpected vitriol highlights two important realities:

  1. That our sisters in ordained ministry are being compelled to carry the cross of mainline decline.
  2. That some versions of the conservative vision for ‘renewal’ in the church have little to do with fidelity to the gospel and much to do with returning to a nostalgic ideal of a specifically American way of life, dominated by straight, white men.

In the time since the article’s initial publication, I have received numerous requests for it to be reprinted in church bulletins and newsletters. Some churches have asked whether they could change the pronouns from feminine to masculine. I have refused to authorize any such changes.

I think it’s important to keep the feminine pronouns as they are. So long as it is up to me, I would rather there not be a second version of this article in circulation that could be used to remove the scandal for sexist ears.

(Reblog) A bivocational minister warns against bivocational ministry

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized3 Comments

I don’t normally post one article after another, but this was too good to pass up.

I have been a bi-vocational minister for the last five years and am getting ready to begin my first full-time position in September.  As one who has tried it, I can whole-heartedly agree with the author of this article.  Bi-vocational ministry (a.k.a. Tentmaking) is downright tricky.  If we’re going to hold it up as a viable option for ministry in the mainline denominations of the future, then we absolutely must re-evaluate how we practice and support it.  Especially for young(ish) pastors like me, simultaneously starting two careers and a family without retirement or healthcare benefits from either job is straight up unsustainable.

Let me be clear that I don’t intend this as a slight or knock to the congregation I have served for the past several years.  They have struggled and bent over backwards for me.  They have provided every ounce of support they could muster.  I have been blessed.

These words should be directed to churches and denominations at-large as they seek to blaze a trail for future generations in ministry.

In my opinion, bi-vocational ministry is a more viable option for second-career clergy and commissioned/licensed lay ministers who don’t bear the burden of seminary student-debt.  Our denominations should also continue exploring options of merging and yoking congregations.  I do not recommend telling first-career seminarians that they should expect to never have a full-time job.  Frankly, that would decimate the church.

Reblogged from the Christian Century:

I know that we cry about not having enough money, and we certainly don’t have enough money to be doing things in the same way, but our denominations have great abundance. We have property, assets, and foundations. We have wealthy members. In many denominations (like the PCUSA), there are great income disparities among our clergy. One pastor is living off food stamps while her neighbor makes six figures. Sometimes they’re on the staff of the same church.

To be starving off our leadership seems like a determination to dwindle. We can do without a lot of things, but it would be difficult for us to thrive without our pastors. We have enough, can’t we learn to be creative and support our clergy?

Click here to read the full article

(Reblog) How seminaries and the ordination process leave theologically “liberal” Christians behind

On By J. Barrett LeeIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

This article makes a good and true point, although the empathetic part of me suspects that evangelical candidates for ordination face a similar fear of rejection by their committees.

I’m becoming more and more convinced that mainline Protestant denominations are neither conservative/evangelical nor liberal/progressive in their theological orientation (much to the chagrin of conspiracy theorists on both sides), but are trying to hold both perspectives together under the umbrella of their true agenda: maintaining the survival of the institution.

Theologically, this means trying to occupy the Barthian-Niebuhrian middle ground that dissatisfies evangelicals and liberals alike.  Evangelicals fear that the denomination is pandering to political correctness at the expense of gospel truth.  Liberals fear that the denomination’s appeasement of cantankerous reactionaries is blunting the edge of prophetic witness.

My experience of the process left me with the sense that my committee and examiners just wanted to know that I was able to articulate that middle-ground perspective using the language of our denomination’s polity and historical confessions.

I think the main thrust of this article is true, but it could equally apply to our sisters and brothers on the evangelical end of the spectrum.

Reblogged from Crystal St. Marie Lewis:

“Many denominations require candidates to obtain a graduate degree involving work in the areas of theology and philosophy. In those graduate programs, professors spend countless hours training students to think outside the theological box, only for their ordination committees to demand that they put God (and their capacity for exploration) back inside the box. Seminaries are often free and open spaces where people are encouraged to draw their own conclusions about sacred matters. Yet, students endure rejection after the academic stage of their ordination processes–ironically for drawing unapproved conclusions.”

Click here to read the full article

Human Dignity in the Service Sector

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized4 Comments

Last year, Pastor Alois Bell of Truth in the World Deliverance Ministries in St. Louis, MO famously stiffed her server at Applebee’s of her tip.  This event made headlines as Chelsea, the server in question, was later fired for publicizing the event with a photo of the receipt:

Image

The icing on the proverbial cake was the arrogant note Pastor Bell scrawled on the paper before signing it with her name and title: “I give God 10% why do you get 18”.

Why?  I tell you why.  First of all, because it’s company policy for parties that large.  If you don’t like it, don’t eat there.  Second, and far more important, is because your server is a fellow human being, made in the image of God, worthy of respect and dignity for that fact alone. 

The role of server is one that Jesus blessed and took upon himself when he washed his disciples’ feet at the Last Supper.  Jesus, of all people, had the right to lord his status over others, but he didn’t.  He came to give and serve.  After voluntarily completing this act of degrading service, he commanded his followers to do the same, saying, “Just as I have loved you, so you also must love one another.”  Who are we to then treat our servers as anything less than the very presence of Christ in our midst?  Jesus also said, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”

Finally, professional clergy who act in this way absolutely ruin our collective witness to the power of the gospel.  Like it or not, people see us as representatives of the tradition we follow.  If we want to encourage others to love and follow Jesus, we must demonstrate that same love in our words and deeds.

Pastors, priests, ministers, and other clergy, hear me loud and clear: The way we conduct ourselves in public and the tips we leave our servers preach more than a thousand sermons ever could.  And don’t stop with your dollars either.  Make an effort to remember their names, especially if you are a frequent customer.  These people are treated like machines all day long, imagine the effect it will have on them when you make an effort to build community, nurture relationships, and love like Jesus!

As an act of collective repentance for what Alois Bell did in the name of pastors, I would like to share the following photo from a recent visit to Applebee’s in Rome, NY, where many of the staff members, including Alison, Lester, Matt, Amanda, Heather, Michelle, Natalie, Liz, Destiny, and Tristan, have become precious friends to our family, even though we only see each other in this one context.

Many thanks to our beloved server, Alison, for posting this photo and helping us redeem the world a little from the stain of hypocrisy left by Pastor Bell.

310144_621673100698_1206880434_n

Alison posted the photo to Facebook with this comment:

J. Barrett Lee I put it up finally!!!!!! Thank you for being an amazing customer and more importantly an amazing person and friend! To everyone else: I didn’t know Barrett before I worked at Applebee’s. He came in one night (a particularly rough one) with his daughter and sat in my section. He treated me like a person( a concept that we have talked about many times since) an they made my night 1000 x better. They have now become friends of mine and I love seeing them. It doesn’t hurt that Barrett and his wife Sarah produce amazingly beautiful children

Anyway, my point is that servers are people too, along with the cashier who rang up your groceries wrong or who couldn’t let you use your coupon. Everyone has a story and sometimes they just need someone to listen to it! Spread the love!!!!!!

Out of Order

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http://vimeo.com/50776589

Hell has frozen over. Someone outside the Presbyterian Church has shone an interest in our polity. Apparently, they’ve now made movies on every other conceivable subject known to humankind. We’re down at the very bottom of the list, right after that thrilling expose on the mating habits of slugs.

Seriously though, this is a documentary, made by a non-Presbyterian, about LGBTQ people pursuing ordained ministry in our denomination. My wife tells me that one of the subjects was a seminary classmate of a friend of ours. Small world? Nah, just a small denomination.

They’re looking for financial help to complete post-production. You can learn more about supporting the film by clicking here:
http://www.outoforderdoc.com/

A Priest Forever

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized5 Comments
This is the card my bishop gave me at my ordination. I keep it hanging in my office as a reminder.

Four years ago today, I became a priest.

It was a big step in a long journey.  It wasn’t the first step, for years of prayer and hard work had led me to that moment.  It wasn’t the last step either, for things didn’t turn out exactly as I’d planned.

I served the denomination that ordained me for a grand total of three and a half years: first as a lay chaplain, then as a deacon, and eventually as a priest.  I wish I could say that I was still serving there.  That church’s commitment to servant ministry among marginalized people is amazing.  It’s what first drew me to pursue my calling with them.

Unfortunately, there were problems as well.  In a group that small with a hierarchical structure, there was no accountability for people at the top of the chain of command.  Church policy was determined by the bishop’s bad temper.  My bishop was particularly prone to manipulative and abusive behavior.  When that behavior was eventually directed at my wife, I decided that I’d had enough.  I left my position in that denomination on the ides of September 2010.

My bishop made the process as difficult as possible.  In spite of the fact that their church constitution recognized the indelible mark of ordination (i.e. “once a priest, always a priest”) and the validity of holy orders without apostolic succession (a rare belief among sacramental churches), my bishop insisted that I wouldn’t be given my walking papers unless I officially renounced my holy orders.  In other words, I could only leave once I had declared that I was no longer a priest.

This was not strictly necessary, as the Presbyterian Church had already stated their willingness to receive me as one of their own.  Asking me to do this was my bishop’s way of twisting the knife into my back one last time.  In terms of my career, this was not a tremendous setback.  The Presbyterians told me, “Just give [the bishop] what [the bishop] wants.  We’ll ordain you again, if we have to.”  And that’s exactly what happened.  I started serving one of their congregations immediately and was eventually ordained as a Minister of Word and Sacrament on Pentecost 2011.

I’m glad to have found a home in my new denomination, but I have missed being a priest.  Liturgical and sacramental worship feeds my soul in ways that few things do.  Being disconnected from it feels like spiritual suffocation.  I continue to be a voice for high church renewal in the reformed tradition, but many Presbyterians still resist liturgical worship and weekly Eucharist on the grounds that such practices are “too catholic” or “too much work”.  Ugh.  It’s just not the same.

When I last met with my spiritual director, I mentioned that I have now been an “ex-priest” for as long as I was a priest.  My director (a progressive Roman Catholic) gave me a confused look and reminded me of the “once a priest, always a priest” theology.  My bishop had no right to ask that of me.  In ordering me to un-ordain myself, my bishop was asking the impossible.  I might as well have written a letter stating that I would no longer submit to the law of gravity.  A priest can resign (or be removed) from actively functioning in an official capacity within the organization, but one cannot be un-0rdained anymore than one can be un-baptized.

It is as my bishop said to me at my ordination: “You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”

Something funny happened at church on the very Sunday after I met with my spiritual director.  During the Prayers of the People, there is a spot where the layperson leading the litany offers prayer for “Barrett our pastor”.  But on this particular Sunday, the liturgist misspoke and accidentally prayed for “Barrett our priest”.  John Calvin must have rolled over in his grave.

It was an accident, but I think it was a holy one.  I take it as God’s way of reminding me about who I really am and what I am called to be:

A priest forever.