Here’s a wildly unpopular thing to say. Churches don’t owe ministers a living.
And, look, I’ve been in ministry my entire adult life. There is no fallback plan. I was a youth minister at 19 and, with the exception of a stint in interior design during the UU credentialling process, my only real professional experience is in ministry. So, if my church were to decide that ministry is unaffordable, it would be a thing.
But, they don’t owe me my job.
UU churches – and I know this is true in other denominations too – have become so institutionalized we’ve forgotten our mission and instead focus a lot of our energy and attention on doing-what-we-do and paying our bills. We’ve lost the fire. We’ve lost the wild, crazy, life-altering passion that once drew people in our doors. Most – although absolutely not all – of the new people who join us these days are looking for something simple. They like the music. They want to make friends. They want to raise their kids within a community-supported ethical system. They’re not on fire with the UU spirit, which is good because most of our churches aren’t either.
In this “we’re-just-plodding-along” congregational reality, we have a professional ministry and we do our best to offer a living and just wage replete with health care and a retirement package. It’s good and right.
But, ministry isn’t just a profession. It’s a calling. And congregations at their best, aren’t just institutions. They’re communities of liberation, ablaze with hope steeped in the power of Love.
If we’re just churning out weekly worship and providing pastoral care and building some kind of community for kids and adults, we should hire good people and pay them in a way that aligns with our values.
But, if we’re tearing through the world as a bonded group setting people free of hate, transforming cultural systems of oppression, preaching and singing the good news, building a collaborative of hope held together by love, our ministers are the ones at the front of the line on fire with our faith. Give me that church to lead and I’ll find a salary somewhere else.
To be clear- I’m not saying that churches can underpay their ministers because this is a calling. No, if you want a minister to support your current models and to do All The Things, pay them well. But, if a church is On Fire With the Spirit reimagining and reinventing and living into Possibility, then there might be less cash in the future of ministry, but we’ll be better for it.
I feel like, okay, why not entertain this as a thought experiment, but my question is how that would actually look in practical terms- how would it be done in a way that doesn't look a lot like, I don't know, unpaid internships or the publishing industry where the only people who can afford to do the work are people who are independently wealthy or have a lot of generational wealth behind them? Who in 2024 is earning enough to make a living and put in this kind of work on the side?