It is taking me a while to adjust to my role as a retired pastor. To be fair, when we first retired, I wasn’t really ready to be retired. I feel so lucky we were called to serve for two years in an interim position - in which I worked half time - as a way to ease the transition. Since the end of July, however, we have been fully retired and I have been learning that there is a place in the church for retired pastors. It is something that I knew in theory before. Retired pastors have been important parts of the congregations we have served. At one time, we had ten retired pastors participating in our congregation in Rapid City. I often felt that their participation was critical to my being able to serve the congregation. The job of being a pastor is much bigger than any individual. There was always one more call that needed to be made, one more task that needed to be done. I struggled to find pulpit supply when I needed to be out of the pulpit. Retired pastors provided much needed support and feedback to me as a pastor.

For many years I participated in and often facilitated a clergy book discussion group in which the majority of the participants were retired. My role in the group was a challenge to me. Clergy groups are often places where pastors can let their hair down a bit. It isn’t usually very dramatic. Clergy often don’t have very long hair. But we turn to each other for support and there can occasionally be a complaint or an expression of discontent with some of the struggles of congregational life. That clergy book group, however, was not a place for me to engage in that kind thinking and talking. There were plenty of meetings when the majority of those present were members of my congregation. They were colleagues, to be sure, but they were also members of a congregation I had been called to serve.

Now the roles are reversed, so to speak. I am the retired clergy person trying to find appropriate ways to participate in the life of the church. Moreover, I live in a place where there are a lot more people and a lot more congregations than were I served for most of my ministry. There are four United Church of Christ congregations within a short distance of our home. Each has its own pastoral leadership and style. One of the new roles to which I think I am called is to be supportive of pastors leading those congregations. I try to pay attention to them, to find out when there is something I can do to help make their ministries succeed. That might mean providing pulpit supply from time to time. It might mean providing a listening ear, offering a shared cup of tea or coffee, or taking a pastor out to lunch. I don’t know all of what it means, but I am trying to learn.

One thing that I am sure is not needed is criticism. As much as I might want to serve as a mentor, the younger pastors I know don’t want mentors. They are not looking for constructive criticism. They don’t need to have their sermons critiqued. They feel no need of advice on how to use their time, plan their work, or set priorities. I have resolved to eschew the role of critic. And that is not easy for me because things are very different for this generation of clergy than they were for me. I am aware that I am a relic of another time. It isn’t easy for me to think of myself that way, however. There is much for me to learn.

Recently I heard the report of a pastor who had returned from sabbatical. The pastor is younger than I was when I received my first sabbatical. Times were different then. Although I received regular sabbaticals in the 25 years I served in Rapid City, it was the first call of my career in which I had access to sabbatical. I served congregations for 23 years before I was able to go on sabbatical for the first time. This was not because the congregations I served were negligent. It was because times were different. Sabbaticals during my career were times of Sabbath and rest, to be sure. But they also were times of study and preparation for the service that was to follow. Sabbaticals included a recommitment to the call of ministry and to the congregation being served. One of the marks of sabbatical for me was professional writing.

Earlier in our careers, when Susan and I received an extra two weeks of study leave one year after having served for several years, we wrote a significant professional paper and submitted it to seminary faculty for review. When I went on my first sabbatical, I completed and submitted for publication 26 weeks of curriculum for Christian Education of youth aged 15-18. My second sabbatical was funded by a generous grant from the Lily Foundation and included a post-sabbatical time of study and writing. Each sabbatical of my career, of which there were four, included a significant reading list, the production of professional writing, and an extensive report to the congregation. We came out of an academic model and pastoral sabbaticals are based on that model. Study is a major theme of that model. Reading, writing, and following spiritual disciplines is incorporated. This journal grew out of a sabbatical. I began the discipline of daily writing during a sabbatical in 2006. In 2007 I started to publish those daily entries on the web and I have maintained that discipline ever since.

The sabbatical report I heard recently, however, didn’t involve any writing. There was no mention of a single book that was read. The report was rambling and unfocused and included the admission that much of it has been prepared at the last minute. It was hardly a reflection that had grown out of three months of professional leave. My reaction was to feel very critical. I couldn’t understand how the report served the congregation at all. It was hard for me to see how the congregation’s investment in the sabbatical had benefitted anyone except the pastor who seemed to have just used the time as paid vacation.

I’m pretty sure that part of the role of a retired pastor is keeping my mouth shut. It is likely that I have gone too far in writing about the report in my journal. Times have changed. The current generation of pastors is different than mine. The old academic model is no longer relevant. I do pray, however, that the emergence of new leadership does not require forgetting the lessons of the past. There were great benefits to the church and to professional ministers from the old ways of doing things. It would be a shame to lose all of those benefits. Enough said.