Exit interview: why pastors leave

Pastors in Transition: Why Clergy Leave Local Church Ministry. By Dean R. Hoge and Jacqueline E. Wenger. Eerdmans, 271 pp., $21.00 paperback.

WHY DO PASTORS leave the ministry? Several common issues emerge from the research of Dean Hoge and Jacqueline Wenger: preference for another form of ministry, the need to care for children or family, conflict in the congregation, conflict with denominational leaders, burnout or discouragement, sexual misconduct, and divorce or marital problems. Of these factors, which form the basis for the central chapters of Pastors in Transition, two are especially important: conflict and a preference for specialized ministry. A close third is the experience of burnout, discouragement, stress and overwork. As the authors explore these factors, they provide significant insights into what can be done to help people stay in ministry.

Hoge and Wenger's study is part of the larger Pulpit and Pew research project on the state of pastoral ministry, based at Duke Divinity School and funded by the Lilly Endowment. Hoge has authored two previous volumes (one coauthored with Wenger) on the status of the Catholic priesthood. Pastors in Transition is the first book-length Pulpit and Pew publication to examine the state of Protestant clergy.

The authors conducted extensive interviews with clergy who have left parish ministry, voluntarily or involuntarily, and with denominational leaders from five church bodies--the Assemblies of God, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the United Methodist Church. The narrative is peppered with numerous quotes from clergy and enhanced with helpful graphs and concise summaries of the findings.

Hoge and Wenger learned, first of all, that polity matters. This finding is most dearly illustrated by the high degree of dissatisfaction expressed by United Methodist clergy in relation to their denomination's deployment systems and the level of support they received from judicatory officials. Among the denominations included in the study, "the United Methodist Church stands out for the level of centralization, supervision, and commitment to its clergy."

The denomination sets up a standard of dependence between clergy and denominational leadership that is hard to live up to. Furthermore, social trends such as greater freedom of choice and the tendency of pastors' spouses to be working outside the home have made the itinerant model increasingly difficult to implement. The authors conclude that "the more a pastor's career is determined by his or her denomination, the more conflict that pastor will potentially feel with denominational leaders."

Conflict in the parish also looms large. The top five conflict issues cited by pastors who left ministry were pastoral leadership style, church finances, changes in worship style, staff relationships and building projects. Organizational and interpersonal issues, rather than doctrinal differences or hot-button issues such as homosexuality, were the most likely to motivate pastors to move on. "Most notable about the main conflicts experienced by ministers who left parish ministry is their "everyday,' prosaic nature." As they reflected on this finding, Hoge and Wenger "came to believe that the conflicts most often experienced by our participants are ones that could probably be resolved and in the process offer growth experiences for both pastor and congregation."

The importance of collegiality to pastors' flourishing emerges in several places in this study. Isolation and loneliness contributed directly or indirectly to pastors' moves out of local ministry. Of those who left due to sexual misconduct, 75 percent indicated that they were lonely and isolated. In all five denominational groups, the top motivating factors for leaving were the same. Pastors reported:

"I felt drained by demands." "I felt lonely and isolated." "I did not feel supported by denominational officials." "I felt bored and constrained."

Furthermore, Hoge and Wenger discovered a consensus among judicatory officers regarding pastors who have left local church ministry: "These pastors tended to be loners in the district or presbytery, for whatever reason not part of ministerial friendship groups or action groups."

Leaving ministry is hard to do, and ex-pastors said "there are at least parts of ministry" that they miss. "Their accounts were remarkably consistent: they most missed leading worship and being a meaningful part of people's lives." Pastors who had left ministry under circumstances not of their own choosing or who felt that they had in some way been mistreated mourned the loss of pastoral ministry most intensely. The researchers note that "several interviews were interrupted when pastors cried." Former pastors who were content with their new vocational setting also told of their love for local church ministry. The sense of loss says something important about the good that is intrinsic to the work of pastoral ministry and about how this work shapes a way of life that is not easily transferable to other vocational contexts.