buzzardwhiskey
New Member
I've moved the following over to the UU area of the forum. Sorry for the confusion.
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I have been very involved with a UU church for about 6 years now. It's my first church ever (I'm 45) and I'm pretty atheistic. I've served on the Board, the worship committee, the budget committee and in CUUPs (an interest in "nature spirituality").
My beliefs about the logistics of my UU church are changing. Essentially, I am coming to the understanding that a full-time paid minister is toxic to the long term viability of a church that I would call my spiritual home.
Our church has many wonderful leaders and great human resources. We are nothing if not grassroots. The minister of the past seven years has attempted to be a visionary CEO. In that lies the problem. Many have been bitter about his lack of warmth and hands-off approach. He's just very high level.
So I've gone round and round with myself, the minister, and others about how to fill-out his roll. How do me make-up for this? Because in the end, I cannot ask him to love this place and these people - for the simple reason that it's just a job. We pay him.
If a committee is composed of congregants, and that committee fails in some sense, I can own the failure because I am them. But when the minister fails, I cannot own the failure, because I am not him - I am paying him to produce a thing.
Feel free to interject your thoughts.
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I have been very involved with a UU church for about 6 years now. It's my first church ever (I'm 45) and I'm pretty atheistic. I've served on the Board, the worship committee, the budget committee and in CUUPs (an interest in "nature spirituality").
My beliefs about the logistics of my UU church are changing. Essentially, I am coming to the understanding that a full-time paid minister is toxic to the long term viability of a church that I would call my spiritual home.
Our church has many wonderful leaders and great human resources. We are nothing if not grassroots. The minister of the past seven years has attempted to be a visionary CEO. In that lies the problem. Many have been bitter about his lack of warmth and hands-off approach. He's just very high level.
So I've gone round and round with myself, the minister, and others about how to fill-out his roll. How do me make-up for this? Because in the end, I cannot ask him to love this place and these people - for the simple reason that it's just a job. We pay him.
If a committee is composed of congregants, and that committee fails in some sense, I can own the failure because I am them. But when the minister fails, I cannot own the failure, because I am not him - I am paying him to produce a thing.
Feel free to interject your thoughts.
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