For months now, I have been meaning to update friends with what’s been going on for me but somehow haven’t been able to find the words. I think I’ve been waiting for the future to become a bit clearer so that I might have some good news to share. Truth is, I’m still waiting for the fog to clear ….
A bit over 18 months ago, I met with the Methodist Stationing Advisory Committee (SAC) to talk about the future. For those unfamiliar with the British Methodist Church, all ministers must make themselves available to be deployed by the church unless they are granted permission either to retire or temporarily make themselves unavailable. In most cases, individuals seek permission to minister in other sectors such as chaplaincy or education, but there are consistently about forty or so who are given the designation ‘Without Appointment’, and I am one of them. Those given this designation find themselves in a host of different circumstances; what unites us is a lack of stipend or manse.
When I last appeared before the SAC, I had just left a job I’d held for nearly six years and, unlike previous occasions, had nothing lined up to go to. I was still coming to terms with being diagnosed neurodivergent and was slowly recovering from the psychological and emotional effects of the pandemic lockdowns. It felt a bit weird to appear before the Committee without a clear idea of what was coming next, and this was the first time I was aware of the effect that ADHD might have on my life and ministry. The conversation was, therefore, at least from my point of view, deliberately open and exploratory. I hoped and prayed that I would gain some valuable insight and wisdom and that the outcome would provide some much-needed clarity.
Lockdown had afforded me a significant amount of time to reflect on my vocation and so I used the opportunity to share with SAC where I thought God was calling me. As it happened, I had also been in conversation with a Circuit about providing some part-time cover for an absent presbyter and so sought the Committee’s advice.
The outcome was permission to be Without Appointment for a period of five years up to September 2028. It wasn’t a designation I had specifically asked for and it has given me pause for thought since. The conversation with the Committee focussed on vocation and the possibilities that might exist for future ministry, not on whether I needed a break. However, because the type of ministry we discussed didn’t ‘fit’ any of the Church’s categories, the only response open was: you must do it without our backing. Let me be clear at this point – I don’t think that SAC had the power or authority to offer anything other than the designation Without Appointment. But my experience has forced me to question how many others have ended up in the same boat for the similar reasons – discovering that, in order to follow God’s calling, they must forego the support of the Church. The plethora of conversations I’ve had since with individual ministers confirms my fear that it is more than a few.
All this means that, since September 1st of last year, I have been Without Appointment, what the rest of the world calls unemployed. I grew up in a workless household on a working-class estate where virtually every adult was on the dole. I saw the devastating effects of long-term unemployment and vowed never to be unemployed, a vow I have broken for the past four months. If I’m honest, it’s been a pretty hard slog. Even though I undertook, in the Covenant Service:
‘Let me be employed for you or laid aside for you,’
the laid aside bit is difficult to accept. Neurodivergent folk find it far from easy to maintain a healthy level of self-esteem at the best of times, so the experience of unemployment has given my confidence a lot of knocks. Thankfully my GP arranged a course of CBT last year and I am trying to use the skills learned there to maintain some sort of balance.
The biggest challenge has been learning to accept that, for a number of reasons, Circuit ministry is closed to me. Those who know me well will understand how hard it is for me to make such a statement. It breaks my heart to say it but the way that Circuit ministry is currently constricted and supported means that, to engage in it, would damage my health and wellbeing more than it already has. For 25 years, I’ve struggled with a pattern of anxiety, overwork and overwhelm, and eventually burnout that has been particularly apparent whilst serving in a Circuit-based appointment. For most of that time, I have blamed myself and accepted a (mis)diagnosis of depression and anxiety as the explanation for my problems.
I can now see that I have exhausted myself in trying to fulfil others’ expectations which, as a neurodivergent person, was never going to be possible. I am now beginning to understand that I – and others – had linked my competence to tasks that I was never going to be good at, no matter how hard I tried. For most of my life I have lived with a seeming contradiction – being extraordinarily good at things others find difficult and completely rubbish at stuff others consider easy or simple. More than that, the hard stuff has caused me more joy than stress and the easy stuff has often left me feeling completely overwhelmed. Not only was this scenario difficult to understand but also left me with feelings of inadequacy and even shame. I now understand that this a common experience of people with ADHD and also helps to explain what it is so difficult for others to comprehend.
My experiences of ministry have taught me that those things I find most difficult and stressful are what many prize in a presbyter. That is not to say that my other ‘gifts’ haven’t been acknowledged or even prized by congregations and colleagues, but never to the extent that they make up for my shortfalls in other areas. I had thought that the progress made in disability awareness and legislative protection would mean that I could at last been freed from some of those expectations which had left me feeling guilty or inadequate and receive the right kind of support. Sadly, I have instead been met with an unwillingness to take my difficulties seriously, resistance to requests for adjustments or providing support and, to my utter surprise, even open hostility.
Now, most people know that I am not one to shirk a fight, but there are some battles that are simply too costly. So, I am confronted with the choice that Moses laid before the people in Deuteronomy 30:15:
See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity.
I know that makes me sound like a drama queen, but the choice I face feels that stark and the consequences that serious. In order to choose the life-giving path, I must try to separate out the vocation to ministry that is still so central to my life from the form of presbyteral ministry offered by the British Connexion. In many ways, this process gives shape to the decision of the SAC to designate me Without Appointment, which I understand as both an affirmation of my continuing call to presbyteral ministry and an acknowledgement that the Connexion currently cannot find me a place to minister.
As we begin a new year, I wish the future were most secure, but there is enough in Scripture to suggest that we can only receive God’s future if our hands are empty, having let go of the past. I am writing this, in part, to acknowledge what has happened and to seek to let go of it. I have also been working an a ‘Liturgy for Leaving Circuit Ministry’ that I hope to share when it is ready. I know others have reached a similar point to me, although their journey has been different, and many have already trod the path which, for me, lies ahead. I thank them for their courage and inspiration to take the tremendous risk of falling into the hands of the loving God.
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