Rev. Erica Baron  0:05  
Okay, that's not an option. All right, I'm just gonna tell the story and everyone who's in this room can hear it. So we have these three congregations in Massachusetts that got together to hire, collectively hire the same religious educator. So she had been working at one of the three congregations for I don't think it was full time, but more, you know, more time. And they were in a position where they had to reduce her hours because of financial reasons. At the same time, two other congregations in the same like, this is New England. So you know, our congregations are like, all right next to each other, two congregations in the area also, we're looking for a religious educator, very part time at the same time. And so the ministers were where this conversation started, was like, hey, maybe we should all work with this person. And then, you know, we sort of it was a very long series, as I'm sure you can imagine, of zoom conversations between the religious educator and the three ministers and the three boards and the three RE committees and like, How is this all gonna work. But eventually, they agreed to each hire her for a third of the time. So she was a third, a third, a third accepted. So that makes it one full time job. I don't know if somebody If Jan may have put this in the chat earlier. But for the purpose of benefits in the UUA, you can add up your hours for multiple congregations. So you can qualify for health insurance on the basis of your combined hours, not your basis of any given ministry. So the way that that works like logistically was that one of the congregations paid her and paid for in, like, administered her benefits. And the other two congregations paid that congregation, just because that made everybody only have to write one check in deal with one, you know, she only had to deal with one, treasurer and all that. And then in terms of how the programming went, like, I was saying this in the group, I was working in that there was some time, so they all agreed on, I believe it was two Sundays a month joint religious education programming. So I told folks that this experiment didn't end up working as well as we would like. And that ended up being because the three congregations had different sort of cultures around when religious education programming happens. And the three obviously, is a harder thing to put into a predictable schedule than four, because there are four weeks in the month. And so that like schedule, got to be a challenge. So, you know, there were things that that didn't go great. But the original idea was that all of the kids would come to one of the three, and it would rotate. And they would do that twice a month. And then she had additional time in each congregation. That was just for that congregation. Um, so, um, although this one, like there are pieces, two of the three congregations are still working with the same religious educator, one of them decided it wasn't working for what they needed at the time. And I would say, like, especially in the world of religion, I know we're talking about ministry today. But in the world of religious education, I would say, including adult religious education, which is often the job of the ordained person. It's very true that it's very hard to get critical mass in a lot of our little, little congregations. So one of the big benefits of collaborative programming like this is that you, you know, if you have three congregations that all have, like five kids, that's not really enough to do something with individually, but you get the three of them together. Now you have 15 kids, now you're closer to critical mass. So that part of it works really well. I think we're going back into her yes, I'm gonna go back into the ministry room, and I will see you all in there.

Hello, hello. Thanks for answering for the group. I was I was sad when it didn't want it sort of didn't work as we had imagined because I think it's I think it's so I mean, I think this is the way that religious education is going to be sustainable. I think that's also more and more true of ministry in general that like the more that we can serve have little congregations at the same time, not just, you know, driving back and forth. Like the more than everybody. So one of the things that the religious educator in the story kept saying during the negotiations, which was very true was, the more of my time that you share the more of my time that you get. Yeah. You know, then I have time for other stuff.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  5:22  
So yeah, yeah, I would love to run to jump in and answer, from my perspective, something you asked earlier in the previous workshop, Mike, which was about hiring a bunch of little, little bits of ministry instead of one. I'll tell you, I think that that could have merit. But let me tell you how it's gone badly. The times I've seen it, the cautionary tale. Which is, we don't want any, we don't want a minister who's going to boss us around. So what we're going to do is we're going to have several ministers that part time who don't talk to each other and aren't allowed to collaborate. And then that will keep them disempowered so they can't boss us around. And I've seen some pretty disastrous things that way, frankly. So that's my cautionary tale is, is I think that that the co-ministry can work well, when it's very, very, very collaborative. But if every each of you have several quarter time ministers, they're going to spend half their time collaborating. So it's, it's not not necessarily efficient in that way.

Speaker 1  6:30  
I just in thank you for that. Answering that question. And in going back to a point Erica just made, that a lot of times, these part time ministers are serving small congregations. And I think that's, that might be the, the assumption or the kind of the default, and maybe most typical scenario, but I met a congregation that had over 100 Kids in RE at one time, and then went down to five or six maybe. And and so we had ramped up that, that that role of DRE while we were rolled up from having an RE part time person to having a DRE to having an MRE to going back to a DRE and then wondering whether we should have a religious educator as a congregation. And I think it's the lifeblood, it's key, but but the idea of part time ministry may be a part of a solution towards addressing the modulating levels of of, of have children in a program. Yeah, so thank you.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  7:47  
Modulating levels is a good way to describe that. Yes.

Rev. Erica Baron  7:53  
Yeah. You're gonna give folks one more minute to get here for this conversation, although we're just basically still talking. We're just gonna keep talking. It's great.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  8:03  
I'm looking at the list a lot of people have jumped into here, Christine, because the search stuff is complicated. I think I really think that the fact that we now have a search process as a supporting search process for part time congregations, is the best thing since sliced bread of the UUA. It's a huge asset to our caring agents.

Rev. Erica Baron  8:46  
All right, it's 3:05. So I'm

Rev. Sarah Schurr  8:49  
gonna Are we recording? Yes,

Rev. Erica Baron  8:51  
I am. Anyway, look, thank you. So for those of you who were not here in the last hour, my name is Erica Baron. I currently serve as one of the congregational consultants for the New England Region of the UUA. Previous to this, I served in three different ministries that ranged from quarter time to full time. I had one that reduced the time while I was there, and other that increased time while I was there, served two at once for a while, so I did a lot of part time stuff. The two that I served at the same time were Rutland, and Bennington, Vermont, which are about an hour and 15 minute ish drive apart. So Sarah, let's hear a little bit about you.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  9:38  
So, as their as Erica telegraphed last time. I've also I to begin with, I am the Pacific Western region, field staff. So I do what Erica does only in the in the northwest, or the West, I should say because, you know, we go from where she's got like New England and we've got everything west of Denver of, So big, it's a big place. Um, previous to this job, I served as a part time minister for several years at a congregation in Portland where they had had not had professional ministry in 35 years. So I was like, you know, the person who like, help them get used to having ministry. And then I also here's the one that with the commute, I lived in Portland, Oregon and serve two congregations in Alaska. So if everybody says, oh my gosh, well, what if you can't find somebody to live in your town? I did not live in Fairbanks, Alaska, I lived in Portland, Oregon, I've served Fairbanks, Alaska before the days of zoom. So and I did that with Alaska Airlines, as my as my partner. So I'm happy to talk about that model. One of the things I want to just begin this time with is something we've been saying all day, which is that part time ministry is real ministry. So many people sort of historically have thought of it as less than. Both people in in congregations and frankly, other ministers have thought of it as, as not real. And I, I'm just willing to say it's, it's as real as it gets.

Rev. Erica Baron  11:19  
Yes, thank you. Um, when I Yeah, so my first ministry right after seminary was these two congregations, that I served them together for five years. So I always felt like I basically got 10 years of experience in five years, because I had been to twice as many board meetings, and twice as many committee meetings. I had, you know, preached in two different very different, you know, sort of congregational cultures. And so, yes, it was, it's definitely real. Ministry. I also because that was my first ministry, the fact that they were really different was actually a really great introduction to ministry. The thing I think I learned most from that experience, is viscerally how much it wasn't about me. Because one of the congregation's was sort of in the vein of like, anything that went wrong was my fault. And the other congregation was in the vein of like, anything good that they did, they gave me the credit for and so it was really easy to see. Like, I neither deserve as much credit nor as much blame. And so like, that was a that was a good early lesson. Um, so yeah, it was we talked a little bit about last hour, I tended to drive back and forth. I basically, more or less alternated Sundays. And then during the week, I just went to whichever congregation had a thing that day. I, it was not unusual for me to actually serve some function in both congregations in a given day, like do something in Rutland, and then drive to Bennington and do something there, or vice versa. And my folks could also come to each other so very occasionally, we got everybody together and that worked. But Sarah, you had a really different so can you? Yeah,

Rev. Sarah Schurr  13:15  
and for those of you who aren't familiar with just how big Alaska is, it's not like you could go from Juneau to Fairbanks. It is a three hour plane flight from Juneau to Fairbanks. And the road, well there isn't actually a road between Juneau and Fairbanks. And I'm not kidding, if there's not a road. There's a ferry and then a road that's only open some of the year. So in the winter you have to have special certification to drive on those roads as a truck driver who specializes in Arctic driving. So you fly. What I did is I served a 10 days at a time. So I was quarter time in Juneau, quarter time in Fairbanks. And so I would go up to Alaska to someplace in Alaska for 10 days every month. So I go up on Friday, work all the way to two, so two Sundays. So Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, then Monday, I would fly home, and I did would do. Fairbanks one month. Juneau you know the next month, Fairbanks next month? Juneau the next month. So everybody got 10 days of intensive ministry every other month. And one things I loved about Jeff's presentation about not siloing the minister in just two little jobs is that when I was in my settings in Alaska, I did everything that a minister would do. During that time. I went you know I lead prayers at the Alaska you know state house. I visited local homeless shelters. I attended local ministers meetings. I went to the fundraisers, I did all I visited families that just had babies. I did all those things during my 10 days. But when I wasn't there, I wasn't there. As I was there in Emerg, I was there for emergencies, there was the only contract that if there was a tragedy, and they needed me, they would fly me up. But other than that, I was, I was not there, other than a very, very occasional phone call when I wasn't there. And this worked well for them, because they had been lay lead for a long time. They were very proud of their skills and their and their abilities. And actually, they were very friendly. They're worried about a minister taking over. But they knew that 10 days, every other month, I couldn't take over, all I could do was surf. So it worked really well that way, because I wasn't very threatening. In fact, one of the leaders said, in in the most loving possible way, well, this is great. It's like we have a minister without you know, having to have a minister. So what it did is it got them used to what a minister could do without intimidating, without threatening, now they have full time called ministry. But it was, you know, a way to get, get a taste of what that can be like. And when I then when I served in Portland, where I was only a 20 minute drive away, I maintain that meant that memory of these people really likes doing it by themselves. They're proud of how they can do it by themselves. I never want to undermine their confidence in their abilities. So I was always there to help them do their work the best I could rather than just take over their jobs. That was important. One of the things I want to say about congregations that have traditionally been lay led, and then coming in with ministry, is that what they often had before was they had what I call super members. They have one or two members, and Erica's, nodding your heads probably have congregations that have had ministry for centuries, do one or two members who do a lot that people really count on, really trust the go to people and sometimes they even get a stipend because they're doing so much work, that they'll get a stipend because they've been doing so much. And people mistakenly believe that when you bring in a part time Minister, what you're doing is hiring a very highly trained super member. And and it's not the same, that I'm not saying that ministers are a different species. I mean, but it's but we're not members. We're not that super member that everybody knows this is one of you. We're in a in a different role. And we won't overextend and overworked ideally, like the super member will and we aren't getting a stipend, we actually get a professional salary with benefits, which is a lot more than that stipend they were giving the super member. So I think that's really important. And that is that and that comes with the boundaries is the clarity that yes, you have the super member, you have Dolores, who has done this thing forever, and always have a great job. And that's great. But I'm not just a paid Dolores.

Rev. Erica Baron  18:20  
So I served in that first ministry. Benington had no ministry for the first, I don't know 50 years of their time, and then had increased to quarter time ministry for just a couple of years before I was there. So they were going up. Whereas Rutland had had everything from no ministry all the way up to full time ministry and they the amount of ministry in the congregation changed on a very regular basis. So and then in Kingston, which was the next ministry I served. But I started full time and went to three quarter time, had also started as a lay ministry, lay lead congregation, and then had halftime ministry and then had full time ministry, and that was going back to three quarter time ministry. So in terms of the boundaries thing, which we've we've talked about last hour, too. I think it's helpful to know your congregations history with how much ministry they've had. So like knowing whether what you you represent a bump in time, and then therefore they might like, like, it took Bennington I think three years to ask me to do memorial services because they'd always just done them and like, I always attended when there was a memorial service in the congregation, but after like the third one, I was like, you know, you could ask me to do this right? And they were like, really? Yes, I could do this for you if you wanted. Whereas in Rutland, there was a sort of expectation of full time ministry. Um, that I was, you know, sort of under I was represented a decrease. So I think it's helpful to know that because the pressures are going to be different, right. So if you are the most ministry this congregation has ever had, then there's some education around what you actually are able to offer, and how they might be able to work with a minister. If you are serving in part time in a congregation that's used to full time ministry of education is going to be sort of in the other direction, like, I'm only doing half of this job. That's not the half of this job that we negotiated. So and then I would say the particular challenge in Rutland was that because they changed the level of ministry so often, the expectations in the congregation actually ran from people who really didn't think there should be a minister at all, and wanted me to go away, all the way up to the people who thought I should be full time and wanted me to be at everything and coming to their house regularly. And sort of finding a way through that, like, really diverse expectations was a real challenge. And it wasn't until I was leaving the congregation that I looked up their history of sort of amount of ministry, and learned that in their second year, as a congregation, they changed from full time to halftime because their minister got sick. And in the entire, like 200 year, history of the congregation, there was only the nine years was the longest amount of time they had been at the same level of ministry. So I'm like this is this is just built into this congregational system, right. And so I would say take some time to look at that, and just know what you're heading into, because earlier than when you're leaving, that was really helpful, I could have used that information sooner if I had thought to look for it. Um, I think that we could be fairly open to folks putting questions in chat or just unmuting. And asking, if you don't want to keep talking. But

Rev. Sarah Schurr  22:07  
I have another sort of issue I want to throw out. Erica and I are a team, we've talked about this before in workshops, and something that comes up a lot about if the minister doesn't live in your town, and I'm helping some of the congregations I work with right now who are in search, we're like, oh, boy, can we get somebody to move to our town, because we love our town, we want somebody who lives here. And I appreciate that. I mean, it's nice. But I think a lot of times what people really want is they want to feel like that person loves them and cares about them and that they belong. And so somehow that if they live in that other town, you know, an hour away that the minister doesn't really understand them, or care about them. It's it's not quite like ownership, but it's a little bit more like, are they in my tribe, kind of thing. And I think that one of the things that a minister can do when they live away, and serve in a congregation is to really become familiar with that community and interact with that community the best they can read the local news in that community where they're going to be serving, get to know the other ministers in that community. Take part in a couple of municipal events. I remember when I was in Juneau, I attended the blessing of the fishing boats, you know, because that's a really important local event that all the clergy go to, things like that. Even if you don't live there, if when you're available. You can spend a little bit of your time doing those things, then they feel like you're really their minister and the talk to get back to what Jeff was saying. So good information about not just being stuck in the preaching and pastoral care, but some of that lifeblood stuff to outreach, that visibility, go ahead and do that stuff in a town you don't live in, because then they know that that you're really their minister.

Rev. Erica Baron  24:12  
Yeah, thank you, um,

Mike has a question in the chat, the traditional model is for an inter individual congregation to call a minister and pay them changes in size and financial strength of a congregation could lead to the, to the variations in the amount of part time or full time ministry that can be afforded. Are there any experiments going on with a different model? So I mean, the short answer is yes. That I think not just in the area of how much ministry you have, and and how you structure it, but like everything about congregations right now, I think this is a moment to be experimenting boldly, because we are in a moment of shift and we don't know exactly where it's headed, and the only way to find out what's going to work next is to experiment. So yes, I think we can do doing a lot more experience experiments, but a couple of different models. We, we did a series last year of webinars about collaboration, which I recommend, I'll put the link to them in there. But there were. So there's a difference, a couple of different ministers in those different webinars talking about various ways that the congregations they served were connected to each other. So we heard in the last hour, another another version of the same story, which is three congregations who share a minister that started doing a lot more online programming during the pandemic. And that brought them a lot closer. Then there's also a another sort of model out there where there is a large congregation that has a small congregation nearby, and the Minister is mostly working in the large congregation, but also serves the small congregation a bit. So that's another model. I think that really the, you know, the, the limits on the possibilities are endless at this point. Because we're in this time of zoom, right, we learned between 2020 and 2023, that you can do the entire life of a congregation online, we also learned that we don't love that, we want to be in person. But I think we can get really creative about which parts we do in person and which parts we don't. So you could have like a group of say five congregations that contracted with a minister to do their online Sunday morning worship services, and then did their way of being in person at a different time in a different way. We've also talked about like three congregations that share religious education programming so that they get more so yeah, I, um, I have.

I talked in the last hour about these two congregations that are both working on making the minister and the religious educator equal leads of the congregation instead of having the minister be the religious educators supervisor. That's a new model. So yeah, there's stuff out there and and there should be more. So you know, if you can think of it try it

Rev. Sarah Schurr  27:14  
There is a really great model for small congregation in in Southern Oregon, where the the larger congregation down there has their in, their intern, what they do is their intern serves as minister to three tiny congregations within driving distance, driving distance in Southern Oregon, by the way, still two hours. But but so there's no way these little tiny congregations could have a full time minister, or even maybe that would be hard for them to have a part time Minister of their own. But it's great when the intern at the bigger church can just work on a circuit rider kind of thing between these three, and then they can do some projects together. That's I thought, a really great creative way of handling things these days. Yeah, and if you have a question from Sue

Rev. Erica Baron  28:03  
This is a great question. 

Rev. Sarah Schurr  28:04  
I'm interested in experience. Each of you have a serving more than one congregation at the same time. My congregation is currently searching jointly with another congregation, just half an hour east. So that's easy for you to search looking for a minister who's willing to serve both congregations and equal bases, probably be able to offer full time position that would be attractive minister, find each, you'll encourage and facilitate increased collaboration between our congregations. What advice do you have about what we can do to best prepare a minister to be successful in this transitional situation, offer the two year contract position, ultimately, they could eventually become a settled position. I love that. There is a lot of there are a lot of congregations talking about doing these yoked ministries. The people in Laramie and Cheyenne and Laramie and Casper, were both having the same minister for a while. I think one of the things that's handy, especially if you have somebody who's newer in the preliminary fellowship, where they need to have those supervisory paperworks turned in, is to have a joint a joint supervision process with the committee on ministry, because that way, they're getting feedback that's consistent. And in general, I think having a joint committee and ministry even for ministers who have more experience helps that person reflect on their ministry in general, and not in silos of two different congregations. That's one thing I would bring up right from the start. 

Speaker 2  29:44  
Thank you. That's that's helpful. That's exactly what the mean, I've heard enough today to know that although the concept is really exciting, interesting to everybody in both congregations, the devils in the details, yes. And making it work and That's that's exactly the kind of thing like having a joint team to do this. That's a great, anything, anything along those lines you guys want to add would be terrific.

Rev. Erica Baron  30:09  
Yeah, I've got a couple other things. So one is if part of it sounds like part of your goal, and this is more collaboration, so be intentional and explicit about what the Minister is doing for both congregations at the same time versus what they're doing for one or the other, like, make me make that super clear. At the start, um, Darrick talk in the last hour about an annual renegotiation of what part of the ministry the Minister is doing, which I also highly recommend, just like an annual, how's this going? What are you being pressured to do that is outside of your contract? What do you want to do? That's, you know, what's not taking as much time as we thought that kind of conversation. One of the things that I did separately, that would have been really nice to do together, when I started was sit down with the two worship committees and say, What holidays Do you want me for? I'm in the age of zoom, we can do some of that more jointly. But like, that's an important conversation to have early. And when when the minister says, When do you need me for specific things in my, in your congregation? Like, really stop and think about that whole list? Because, for example, in my first year of ministry, when I asked the worship committee that, they did not include the big, like, fundraising weekend that they have every fall. And so I wasn't there, because I was in the other congregation. And people were annoyed. And I was like, Yeah, this is why I asked to like, be really intentional about that. And then the other thing I would say, is what we have learned in New England, I don't know, where are you? Where are you? Karen?

Speaker 2  31:52  
West? Lake County, Illinois. Yeah. So

Rev. Erica Baron  31:58  
what we have learned is that when this is when two congregations are intentionally sharing one position over time, the hardest thing is when something changes in one of the congregations and not the other. So we had a situation, for example, where there were two congregations, who had jointly called the same minister. One of them had was like growing, and their financial situation got better. And the other congregation was still, like, financially plateaued. So the congregation that was doing better wanted to be able to give the minister a raise, but their contract was that they both paid equally. And so basically, even though one congregation could afford it, and the minister really needed it, they kind of decided they couldn't, because of this structure. So I would say like, whenever there is a significant change in one or the other congregation, like bring everybody back to the table and talk about it like you were starting again, because you basically are,

Rev. Sarah Schurr  33:02  
like, even just regular renegotiation.

Rev. Erica Baron  33:04  
Yeah. Regular isn't. Yeah, yep. And I'm like, yeah, just a lot of communication. And make a space, where you where the minister can honestly answer the question, like, what's working? What's not, what do you need?

Rev. Sarah Schurr  33:24  
Yeah. Karen we will get to you, I promise. But I do want to throw in one other thing, which is that one of the things that I've seen happen, that that can be a problem, when two congregations share a minister is i, the collaboration is a really good thing. But you have to be careful that it isn't, the collaboration doesn't turn into being subsumed. Because of congregation A, feels like they're being subsumed by congregation B, then they're going to get really unhappy, and you're gonna take it out on the minister, they're gonna take it out on the other congregation because nobody wants to feel discounted, and like, they don't matter. So make sure that if you have some joint services that not all your services are joint services. That, that you may do some events together, but do some of them separately and make sure that that I guess, you know, like any good relationship, you have your separate times as well. So that no congregation feels like they're being subsumed by the other or nobody feels like well, they're the real congregation and we're just the, you know. Cousin.

Rev. Erica Baron  34:36  
It's kind of amazing how like, it's almost a sibling rivalry dynamics that can emerge where like, there becomes a narrative of like, the other congreg, the minister likes the other congregation better than they like us. Yeah. And so yeah, again, especially if one of the congregation's just happens to be doing really well. Like this thing that I was talking about, like one of them just happened. To be on a better financial footing, it wasn't like, you know, they were the same minister was serving both congregations and they were pretty close geographically. It's not like they were, you know, dramatic differences, but one of them happened to be doing better. So then it becomes a narrative of like, are we the bad child versus the good child, right. So like, again, make sure you alternate locations. And then just being able to talk openly about that, I think is super helpful. So like, if the Minister is noticing that, make sure that the minister has the space to say that and get help, because that can be a hard dynamic to manage.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  35:40  
Thank you. Oh, Karen, Karen had her hand. So good Karen.

Speaker 2  35:48  
Okay, so this is a little bit different situation, but I'm in my congregation. We have been having budget deficits. And our, some of us are very concerned about that, and thinking that maybe we better you know, move to a part time minister, even three quarters may be, but of you know, at least attempting to keep the same Minister but you know. Reduce. And, and there's already quite a lot of tension in the church anyways. And I just wondered if you had any thoughts or suggestions of how we might make that transition? Or we're not certain yet if we're going to be able to, but that's what we're thinking.

Rev. Erica Baron  36:51  
Yeah, I actually wrote a whole article, which I will, after I'm done talking find you a link, because I can't talk and type at the same time about this, because this is exactly what I did in my congregation. So what there? Yeah, there's a couple of things. Gosh, I could really answer this question for an hour. So I'm gonna try and be concise. So the the first question, I think, really, in this scenario, is, how does your minister feel about reducing their hours? So if the answer is, as it was, for me? Yes, please reduce my hours because I'm about to have a kid and I don't like think I can do it all. You're in a really different situation than if the Minister is like, I don't think I can live on that salary, or I'm just not interested in doing three quarter time ministry. So because you're gonna have a different, it's gonna be a very different conversation, right? If you're a minister is like not at all interested in doing three quarter time ministry. That doesn't necessarily mean you can't go that direction. But it does mean that you should separate the decision from how of how much ministry you can afford, and you need from the particular minister who is serving the congregation. Expecting a minister who has been serving full time to be okay with serving three quarter time, it is dicey, partly because in a lot of our congregations, that makes the difference between whether the minister can afford to live in that place or not. So start there. And then I would also say, I'm gonna say this, I know that this is hard to like, live this all the time. But I would say, a situation where the congregation is in conflict with itself is not the time to be having this conversation if you can possibly avoid it, because it's gonna become us. My experience is, when there's significant tension in a congregation, anything that you try to do becomes part of that tension. Right. So like, if, if you reduce the ministers time, that's going to be faction A against faction, B, if you decide to sell the building, its faction, a faction B, like anything you bring up becomes about the conflict instead of whatever the the thing actually is. So when I reduced my time in Kingston, things were good. I had a good relationship with the congregation, they had good relationships with each other. It was relatively I mean, no congregation has ever, like, perfectly keeping its covenant all the time. But you know, we it was good relationships within the congregation that the conversations involved in in reducing my time would have been oh my goodness, so much harder if people had had like, us versus them attitude going into it. Then, um, one more thing I want to say and then I want to let Sarah talk one, which is when I had been in ministry for like, For 10 years,

the congregation that I was serving since also Kingston, Kingston, New York, began to think we needed a capital campaign. And so while I was sort of I didn't serve with them through the whole capital campaign, but while I was still there, we had the first step in that process with consultants, which is called a next step weekend. And they come in and they basically talk to as many people as they can in like three days, and then tell you like, yeah, you basically have the way forward here, or yeah, you're, you're kidding. Like, don't don't do this. So, in one of those meetings, somebody said the thing to the consultant, the thing that everybody had been saying, in every casual conversation about this for a year, which was we always have a slightly deficit budget, there's no way we can afford a capital campaign. And the consultant said, Are you still in deficit at the end of every year? And we said, No, you know, new members join. Unfortunately, people die, and they give us gifts in their estate. Something's never used the money that we thought they were going to use. Like, it basically always works out in the end. And he said, Yeah, that's what happens. Congregations are supposed to spend all the money we raise. That's our model. So it is very, very common for congregations to start every year looking like they're about $10,000 short, and it always works out by the end of the year. So I was like, why didn't somebody told me this in seminary, like I could have use this? Like, I have been biting my fingernails every budget season for 10 years? Like why didn't I know this? So I make it my business to say this to everybody. Now, because it was so helpful. Um, but basically, the message and this is, before you freak out about years of deficit budgets, the thing you want to look for is how do we end the year? Now? We start there. So yeah, I think I'll stop and let Sarah talk.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  42:02  
Yeah, um, thank you. And I do wish somebody told me that in seminary as well. Many things that they don't teach us. We could do exegesis, though we can do exegesis, right? So here, one of the things I'm thinking about is the dynamics and the relationships around this decision. Not not the money, but the decision itself. For instance, you're in a public forum saying out loud, we're deciding whether or not we're going to cut our ministers wages. Does your minister already know this? Or are they going to hear about it from somebody who was at this, this event? How is it being talked about around the congregation? And again, like in Erica's situation, are they excited, they're great, because they've got other things in their life, and they could use some more space or this or this is going to be very difficult for them. And what I'm concerned about, is that the decision about should we go to three quarter time versus should we stay at full time ministry will somehow morph into how much do you like the minister, and then you'll have a public congregational decision at a at a congregational meeting, about how much we do or don't like the minister. That's devastating, even if the minister stays a full time that ministry is pretty much over if you've had a public debate about how much you do or don't like them. So I would be really, really, really cognizant of your process, so that it does not become a public referendum on how much people like this minister, because that's really, hopefully not the decision you're trying to make. And so if you are trying to make a decision about money, just really try to make sure it doesn't turn into a public referendum on this person's service with you.

Rev. Erica Baron  43:46  
And if the other thing is true, which is that this really is a conversation about whether it's a good fit between you and your minister, have that conversation, because there are good ways to have both conversations. But it's helpful to be clear which conversation you're holding.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  43:59  
That's absolutely true, Erica, because I I've been in situ I remember when I was serving and there was a discussion about whether I should go from quarter time to halftime which I did. The people who didn't want to have me go because they were think they didn't want ministers in the first place. Kept saying, Oh, if only I'm sure Sarah is really nice. We just can't afford it. And they'd say the finance people say yes, we can afford it. And they all but if that was just their way of talking about they didn't want it. So don't let money be the mask for a different conversation if that's what you need to do. But again, be careful how you do it and really, really be cognizant of the damage that can be done by public debates about somebody's job performance.

Rev. Erica Baron  44:45  
Yeah. Darrick, very helpfully put the article that I wrote about this in the chat so the link is there for you. And it sounds to me this is also a situation just a little bit that you've just described I would say, call your regional staff people, because one of our jobs is like helping you figure out what conversation you actually need to have. And like, if you can't, if you need somebody to help you have that conversation, who's like, not invested in it at all? That's part of our job. So like, this is this is exactly the kind of situation where calling one of us would be super helpful. And if you want to put your Where are you Karen, see me get back to the minute thing. No, no, I can hear you.

Speaker 2  45:34  
Okay, South Bend, Indiana.

Rev. Erica Baron  45:37  
Okay, so that would be Mid America. So it's Phil, who's running today. So I will put his email in the chat for you. Um,

Speaker 4  45:47  
okay. Thank you.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  45:49  
If you if you're a small congregation, it's Phil. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just a few people over 100. And, Mike, you have your hand up as well?

Speaker 1  46:01  
I did. Yeah. So kind of Springboarding off of both. Sue's question in the conversation there. And Karen's, I was wondering about the UUA actually playing a role in, in the determination of where there may be needs, increasing needs or decreasing needs for ministry. So that when a congregation like Karen's comes into a situation where there's concern about being able to maybe afford full time ministry, and rather than putting the minister into a challenging, potentially challenging financial position, whether there there may be some role that the UUA plays in, in being able to, you know, provide opportunities, which might be more virtual, or or local, depending on what the needs are within an area, I

Rev. Sarah Schurr  47:00  
mean, job opportunities for this person to make more money.

Speaker 1  47:04  
Yeah, or, you know, to fulfill full time ministry, kind of a role. And, and then, kind of relating to Sue's, raise my hand actually, before switching to Karen, because I was wondering about, for trying to manage a yoked ministry, the idea of having a joint committee on ministry that staffed by two congregations, rather than thinking that the boards are going to like somehow duke it out or something to knit

Rev. Sarah Schurr  47:36  
recommending as a joint committee on ministry? Absolutely.

Rev. Erica Baron  47:40  
I would say, because this is a simpler question to answer. Yes. Joint Committee on ministry, and also a conversation between the minister and both boards at the same time, like what do both of those things? So the Committee on ministry is ongoing all the time. And the board's annually have a conversation? Right? But yes, okay. And then the other question. So this is the other reason to talk to us. Because, like, if everyone is talking to us, then we know that, you know, this congregation is thinking about reducing to three quarter time, while the congregation a half an hour away is thinking of adding quarter time, and we can like tell you about that. So the the actual like. So this is just, you know, who we are as an institution and as a faith, that there are three different groups who would be who are involved in this conversation, and they operate independently. Right. So there is the congregational life staff, that's us. And we are the ones who hear when, like there's a conflict and part of the conflict is whether the ministers time is changing, or whether the Minister is changing, like, we don't, you know, negotiated resignations sort of situation. Meanwhile, there is the transitions office of the UUA. That's Keith Kron, and Christine Purcell and some other folks. Their job is to help congregations and ministers in the process of searching for each other. And then there's the congregations who no matter what we say, can do whatever the heck you want, because that's how congregational polity works. So the coordination can get a little bit you know, tricky, but one of the this is one of the reasons why we have Christine Purcell is that she is the bridge between the congregational life department, which is us who work with you in your regions, and the transitions department. So she's also if you are like especially, yeah, so if there's a situation where you're like, we really need to do something to change our ministry, what else is around us for opportunity? She is the person who like has that in her head and can and can answer it. But really, if you talk to if you reach out to any of us, right if you reach out to Karen if you reached out to Phil or or Christine or Keith So, like, we'll help you get in, you know, assemble the right people into zoom to talk it through. And then, you know, one of the things that I do is watch for those, like cool models that are emerging so that I can lift them up. So also that means if you're trying something cool, like totally original staff, even if you don't need help with it, because that's how we like, are able to like, yeah, we do. And then we can share it and be like, Hey, everybody, these three congregations in Massachusetts, haven't figured out like, talk to them. They're awesome. Or whatever. So yeah.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  50:39  
And also, there is a little bit like what what Jeff was talking about earlier, there are some current some ministers who have their other gig economy thing as not in ministry. My My brother is president of a very small Lutheran congregation in a very small town in the middle of nowhere. And their part time minister also teaches history at the junior high. And that is how they afford to do this. I've known some UU ministers who did grant writing on the side. So not, sometimes they they choose to do something that's not ministry.

Rev. Erica Baron  51:20  
I don't know if this is true everywhere. But it was really, really obvious in Kingston, New York, that basically all of the churches in town that were majority, white, had full time paid, like by the church ministers. The vast majority of the churches in town that were majority, black, had ministers whose primary income came from somewhere else. And they were the, but they were the minister of the church. And they did that part time. And they were paid, but not, you know, full time. So I say this, because there are like congregations that have always done it that way. And, you know, learning from those folks would be helpful. And they might be as close as like, the next block, but you haven't had a chance to be in the same room like this. In Kingston, New York, this cause this sort of weird historical thing where they were two different clergy groups, because the white ministers didn't, wanted to meet during the day during the week. And the black ministers were like, had another job. And so there were two, like racially segregated clergy groups, which is like, really not ideal, not ideal. And so while I was there, there was a group of the white clergy who were like, This is not okay. And we need to find a time that everybody can meet. And that's what we did. And it was great. But anyway, I'm just saying all this to say like, in that situation, there were I don't know, at least five congregations who had part time ministers who were full time doing something else and there's something else is range from like, yeah, teaching, running businesses. In a different community that I was in there was a full time chimney sweep, who was the part time Minister of their congregation like, like, so, you know, look around you to locally in other denominations and, and communities for how people are doing it. When when, you know, in congregations that don't have the resources to pay somebody full time with benefits, right?

Rev. Sarah Schurr  53:32  
It is just such a different mindset for UUs. Yeah, we're, we're so highfalutin. We need to deal with that.

So I'm aware that it's 10 Till Erica and we have what we're finishing up at five till as if

Rev. Erica Baron  53:53  
we got five more minutes. So any other any other questions or comments or weighing in or?

Yes. Hi, Elaine Gilbert.

Speaker 4  54:08  
Hi. So I am in a kind of a weird position because I am a an ordained interfaith minister, and have just agreed to be quarter time minister for a UU congregation that is small. They have been together for a really long time. And they have been largely lay led for their entire life of the congregation. And they have had several part time ministers, some short term, some of the longer term but only like three of them. I might even just be the third and I don't know them that well. Right. They know each other and they seem to be a really well oiled machine like they were, you know, it's and somebody said one of them, one of the board members said Okay, so this is not a peacekeeping mission. We just want you to know that we like each other. We really love each other. We really, you know, and so this is not going to be that. And this is my first experience with congregational ministry. So I, you know, I just don't know exactly what I'm going to find. And it's going to be like this journey of patience and love and compassion and breathing and all of that, and trying to do a good job for them. And not. And I'm a little worried, like I, you know, I'd be lying if I said, I got this, like,

Rev. Sarah Schurr  55:33  
it'd be foolish to not be worried.

Rev. Erica Baron  55:36  
You know, I mean, like, it's good to, it's good to go in knowing that there's, there's stuff you got to watch, but I don't think you need to be like, terrified. So I would say it's awesome that they like each other, that makes your job so much easier. And so it's, it sounds to me, like when you say they're a well oiled machine, that you're not really sure, like, where you're placing the machine? Is that

Speaker 4  56:04  
kind of that I'm like, Well, why do you need me? Like, why do you want me any like what? You know? And they're like, well, because we kind of want to reset from when we wait for COVID. And I'm like, Well, what does that mean? And what is what we want to get our numbers back? And I'm like, huh, I don't know if that's, you know, I don't know if I don't know, you know, if that's gonna?

Rev. Sarah Schurr  56:25  
Yeah, yeah,

Speaker 4  56:26  
you know, stuff like that, we want to, we want to maybe have more, because they severely cut back there. They went from having a service every Sunday to having an every other Sunday, and most of the time, it's coffee, and one of only one of them's live, and the other ones on Zoom like that. But it's an they see, the worship team would like someone to have a hand like they're a little tired. So they would like you know, somebody to kind of hold them a little bit, because they felt unhealed for a little while, you know, we don't have any kids. But we'd still like to figure out how to build a, you know, youth program. Without kids. I'm kind of like,

Rev. Sarah Schurr  57:04  
love ideas.

Speaker 4  57:06  
So I this is what I'm saying, I am going to need some serious counseling, I'm going to need somebody who knows what they're doing to, and my minister in my home congregation is actually leaving as I'm going to start this other one. So he's not necessarily going to be there to help me with this. Not only that, he's his personality is different, totally different. So

Rev. Sarah Schurr  57:33  
I think you're so wise you do not want to do this alone, I would recommend you find a mentor, who is another small congregation minister, but you could that's not your minister, so you have a different relationship with them. Somebody who's just there to mentor you, who also serves a small congregation, so that they can like they've been down this road before. I think that that would be really important. And even if you aren't credentialed as a UU if you're serving a UU congregation, you can sometimes get kind of accessory membership and a local UUMA chapter. And that can give you the support of local UU colleagues. Yeah, that's a big help.

Speaker 4  58:17  
Yeah. Oh, are you? Um, Westchester County, New York. Okay.

Rev. Erica Baron  58:23  
Oh, okay. So you're in

Unknown Speaker  58:26  
with Evin?

Rev. Erica Baron  58:29  
Sorry, see that again? Oh, yeah. Yeah. So it sounds like you've talked to Evin,

Speaker 4  58:34  
I have talked to Evin and I just haven't talked at length about support networks. She's the person that sent me the link for this. So

Rev. Erica Baron  58:41  
yeah, I'm Evin's spouse is one of the co-directors of the UUMA. So you should have a way to get a definitive answer. Actually, Darrick is here to I don't want to put you want to say, Darrick. Yeah. Um, you're muted, though, Darrick. Oh, no, there we go.

Rev. Darrick Jackson  59:02  
Yes, but to say that when I was gonna go, I'm gonna put a link to our myth or mentor database. Because people were in that would be a good way to find someone who's has experience that would be helpful. But we also do have associated memberships for people who are serving UU congregations who are ordained, and other religions. So I will put my email in the chat. If you're free to email me, and I can help you kind of get some support. Thank you. Yeah.

Rev. Sarah Schurr  59:36  
Yeah, this is not this is not a place to to go it alone without some colleagues.

Rev. Erica Baron  59:43  
I would also say that you are asking exactly the right questions. So this like, we want to, you know, we want whatever and you're like, Well, what does that mean? That's exactly the right question. What exactly do you want me to be doing? That's exactly the right question. So I think it sounds like worship is a major focus for them. So like, you know, talk to them about what it means if you're mostly focused on worship and what that means you're not focused on and then just keep asking those questions like I think you're also right to be skeptical of this like we're gonna go back to pre COVID Because it's that's not.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai