The Whisper of Time
I’m closing in on a month since the committee meeting, though I don’t feel I’m much closer to discernment over what the decision means.
The reality is that I’m two years out from any possible ordination. This poses two sets of issues: logistical and motivational.
Logistically, I have to work in the requirements from the COPM In those two years I have to complete an internship (ten hours a week for 3 or 4 months) and do CPE, which even doing part-time will require 20 hours a week for three or four months. So, let’s say I do these two things simultaneously. This would mean not working for about four months (a loss of about $18,000 in net income). One option would be to try to do these in the spring, so I would work through the end of the year and then begin in Jan ’07. Once I’ve completed these requirements, I would then have to find another job (while having to explain why I took 4 months off to do something completely unrelated to my current career) to carry me for the next year and a half or so when I could finally be ordained. It’s possible that I could find work in a church setting or ministry position so the explanation part wouldn’t be difficult, but the salary wouldn’t be as good. Another option would be to build my own business or practice of some kind, possibly at PCEC; try to get it going now and by the time I’m done with my Internship/CPE I’ll be at a point to be self-sustaining.
Motivationally, I have to keep my focus on reaching the goal of ordination. This may be more difficult than the thorny issues surrounding work and money. My sails lost a lot of wind when the COPM passed down their decision that I needed to do the entire two year candidacy. It had been almost two years from the time that I began exploring the possibility of going into the ministry and a year of that had been based on a fully realized decision to do so. So, for quite some time, I’ve been mentally, intellectually, personally and spiritually preparing for going into ministry. And for ten months I’ve been preparing for the meeting in June hoping against hope that that meeting would open the gate to a rapid movement toward ordination. And basically just the opposite happened. Rather than give the green light to ministry, affirming what I believed about myself (and what I believed the committee would recognize), the brakes were put on rather hard. I was given maximum sentence.
What was the committee trying to say?
Don’t think you’re going to come in here and tell us what to think or do, buddy! We’ll make our own decisions.
Oh, so you think you want to enter ministry? Well, we’re going to show you what kind of friction and difficulty you’re going to face when you get into the pastorate. If you can survive us, you can survive the ministry.
Besides, if you’re really called, you will still be called two years form now. Let’s just test that out a bit and see.
Part of the problem has been trying to read the minds of the committee, trying to figure out just what they are attempting to communicate to me. It may be nothing more than them just feeling like they have to do their job, that it is their due diligence to see I go through the entire process. There is this piece of me that feels it necessary to prove to the committee (and to the watching world) that I can endure the test and cross the finish line. Yet I have to know that it isn’t defeat or loss to move in another direction if necessary.
Time will tell the answers, although time seems to be whispering more softly these days.
The reality is that I’m two years out from any possible ordination. This poses two sets of issues: logistical and motivational.
Logistically, I have to work in the requirements from the COPM In those two years I have to complete an internship (ten hours a week for 3 or 4 months) and do CPE, which even doing part-time will require 20 hours a week for three or four months. So, let’s say I do these two things simultaneously. This would mean not working for about four months (a loss of about $18,000 in net income). One option would be to try to do these in the spring, so I would work through the end of the year and then begin in Jan ’07. Once I’ve completed these requirements, I would then have to find another job (while having to explain why I took 4 months off to do something completely unrelated to my current career) to carry me for the next year and a half or so when I could finally be ordained. It’s possible that I could find work in a church setting or ministry position so the explanation part wouldn’t be difficult, but the salary wouldn’t be as good. Another option would be to build my own business or practice of some kind, possibly at PCEC; try to get it going now and by the time I’m done with my Internship/CPE I’ll be at a point to be self-sustaining.
Motivationally, I have to keep my focus on reaching the goal of ordination. This may be more difficult than the thorny issues surrounding work and money. My sails lost a lot of wind when the COPM passed down their decision that I needed to do the entire two year candidacy. It had been almost two years from the time that I began exploring the possibility of going into the ministry and a year of that had been based on a fully realized decision to do so. So, for quite some time, I’ve been mentally, intellectually, personally and spiritually preparing for going into ministry. And for ten months I’ve been preparing for the meeting in June hoping against hope that that meeting would open the gate to a rapid movement toward ordination. And basically just the opposite happened. Rather than give the green light to ministry, affirming what I believed about myself (and what I believed the committee would recognize), the brakes were put on rather hard. I was given maximum sentence.
What was the committee trying to say?
Don’t think you’re going to come in here and tell us what to think or do, buddy! We’ll make our own decisions.
Oh, so you think you want to enter ministry? Well, we’re going to show you what kind of friction and difficulty you’re going to face when you get into the pastorate. If you can survive us, you can survive the ministry.
Besides, if you’re really called, you will still be called two years form now. Let’s just test that out a bit and see.
Part of the problem has been trying to read the minds of the committee, trying to figure out just what they are attempting to communicate to me. It may be nothing more than them just feeling like they have to do their job, that it is their due diligence to see I go through the entire process. There is this piece of me that feels it necessary to prove to the committee (and to the watching world) that I can endure the test and cross the finish line. Yet I have to know that it isn’t defeat or loss to move in another direction if necessary.
Time will tell the answers, although time seems to be whispering more softly these days.
posted by bradster at 12:42 PM
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