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pmpope68 1 year, 2 months ago.
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I find a lot of truth in the following quote taken from the article http://www.ministrymatters.com/all/blog/entry/4253/clergy-anger-the-urgency-of-a-true-spiritual-life:
“The reason many clergy are depressed is that they are angry. And the reason that they are angry is that they are consistently victimized by dysfunctional bullies who wield power inside the church. Victimization is about emotional, physical, and moral abuse. In the current collapse of Christendom (when many healthy Christian members have died, retired, or given up), the vacuum has been filled by dysfunctional and fundamentally self-centered individuals who intimidate, manipulate, and denigrate in order to shape the church around their personal aesthetic tastes, political viewpoints, amoral biases, and petty ambitions.”
Just goes to show that the abuse flows both ways in some churches.
AnonymousI heard someone say once that the definition of depression is anger without enthusiasm! So true. I agree with the first half of the article – that church members can and do abuse their pastors which causes pastors to suppress anger and become depressed. However I disagree with the article’s solution which is unrealistic, dysfunctional and abusive in itself because the solutions it promotes are not only not effective, but will prolong the anger and depression.
The article said (my comments are inside the brackets):
“What exactly does Spiritual Life do for the pastor who wishes to overcome chronic anger and low self-esteem? [Not much probably.]First, the Spiritual Life encourages emotional detachment. [Does emotional detachment sound like a healthy solution to you???] The more the Christian turns attention away from the world and toward God alone, the more the Christian lets go of emotional entanglements that strangle his or her life.” [Isn't emotional detachment just another form of suppressing your true feelings? When has distancing oneself from their true feelings, pretending, and denying how you really feel been an effective solution for overcoming anger and depression? Um. Never! You have to deal with reality and your true feelings in order to find healing!
And "just turn to God alone"??? How does isolating oneself even further from people help ANYTHING, when we are relational beings who need contact with other people in order to be a healthy person? It's the same old dysfunctional spirituality of suppressing and pretending - just take your burdens to God and everything will be fine. If you just pray enough or read your Bible enough that will solve ANY problem you have. Talk about magical thinking! (GAG!) ]
The article also said: “Second, the Spiritual Life fills you with a new and different pride. This is not human pride, a false pride that clergy sometimes try to create for themselves with advanced degrees, pompous words, or the trappings of institutional success. This is pride in being loved by God. It is the pride that comes of being nothing, and by the grace of God being given everything. Your self-esteem rises because you are God’s. Accepted by God, you can accept yourself. [Just view yourself as a worthless worm and then your self esteem will rise when you realize God accepts you in spite of the fact that you are worthless worm. Yeah right!]
The article ends by contradicting it’s own solution. “The Spiritual Life is not a magic pill that will remove clergy anger after a short treatment. It is not even a psychotherapy that restores health in a prescribed regimen. I’m afraid that the harm of victimization will take a lifetime to overcome. Once robbed, self-esteem is difficult to rebuild. The Spiritual Life is a lifetime commitment. But gradually, yes, the chronic anger will lessen and self-esteem will be restored. Then clergy who have been beaten up can again become healthy, happy, hopeful instruments of God’s realm.” [Yep - It's the church's same old dysfunctional advice of "just take your burdens to Jesus and everything will be fine." Problem solved. NOT!]
I agree with emotional detachment, but in a little bit different way. For me, I felt lower than low when I left the previous church. After about a year though, with me feeling so beat down and worthless, the cloud began to lift and I really did feel closer to God after it occurred to me that much of what I experienced was similar to what Christ experienced not being accepted by people and having His good works virtually spat upon. That brought me comfort and I knew I was not alone. The detachment came in seeing the bullying for what it was and learning that I was not the horrible things that I was made to feel and I could distance myself from them. But that took time. As a result, I’m a stronger person. Did/have I isolated from people? Yes. But I’m slowly coming out of that shell. But the isolation in part was feeling like no one would understand as I got a lot of the poo-pooing of my issues or people who just wanted to smooth it over. I also didn’t want to be hurt again (and I still don’t). But I eventually found myself in a church I like and where I feel accepted. I’m not actively involved other than a midweek class that I go to where I feel real conversations take place. There still is some distance on my part, and admittedly, that is kind of lonely. But little by little, I’ve opened up. For some, the isolation may be needful just to get alone with one’s feelings and sort things out. At least that’s how I’m wired. But isolation that never moves out of that place is not healthy and would seem to just perpetuate the feelings of anger.
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