{"id":6858,"date":"2013-10-10T07:00:18","date_gmt":"2013-10-10T14:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/?p=6858"},"modified":"2015-02-02T16:03:14","modified_gmt":"2015-02-02T23:03:14","slug":"church-and-professionalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2013\/10\/10\/church-and-professionalism\/","title":{"rendered":"Church and Professionalism"},"content":{"rendered":"

Quite some time ago\u00a0Msgr Pope<\/a>\u00a0from the Archdiocese of Washington DC wrote a blog entry<\/a> about\u00a0the wages of Catholic employees, noting that a recent study at that time suggested that their pay now finally comes close to matching that of their non-Catholic counterparts. Great news!<\/p>\n

However, unfortunately in my personal experience I have found this not to be the case. Many of my friends are employed by the Church in some capacity or other and the question very often isn’t whether their wage is competitive<\/span>, but as to whether it is\u00a0even a\u00a0living wage<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\"professionalism\"<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Paying the piper<\/h2>\n

I understand that the cashflow in parishes is tight, but in the past\u00a0I’ve found the issue of money\u00a0extremely frustrating when dealing with those who hold the parish purse-strings. Now, I’ve never seen an official parish budget, and I’m sure that there are lots of hidden costs involved in running a parish of which I’m unaware…but I’m consistently left with the impression that there are virtually no funds ever set aside for music, catechesis, evangelization,\u00a0youth or young adult\u00a0ministry.<\/p>\n

The result of no money for these ministries? It means that music ministers, youth workers, catechists etc. are not hired\u2026and then people wonder why which the music sucks, the congregation is poorly formed in the faith and people start to leave, especially the young.<\/p>\n

If you think the situation is bad here in the States, let me assure you that it is even worse elsewhere. Back home in England I was never been part of a parish with a paid youth or young adult minister. I remember the time when there was a big fuss and fanfare because the Diocese had hired a Young Adult Coordinator…for a whole six months (gasp!).<\/p>\n

Beggars can’t be choosers<\/h2>\n

With no budget set aside, these ministries (if they exist at all!) are typically staffed by volunteers. I see several potential problems with this.<\/p>\n

Firstly, the unfortunate thing about using volunteers is that, although enthusiasm might be there in\u00a0abundance, the necessary skills\u00a0might be absent. It’s a perfect example of getting what you “pay” for. Those volunteering will be giving of their time and energy, but typically they will have no formal ministry training and will have limited time they can devote due to the commitments of family and a full-time job.<\/p>\n

Secondly, I would suggest that it is fairly common that some of these volunteers will remain in a ministry even when they should not. Volunteers don’t have yearly performance reviews.\u00a0I think we’ve all been to parishes with\u00a0appalling\u00a0cantors or thoroughly uninspiring youth\u00a0ministries. Yet, since those doing the work are doing it free of charge, the\u00a0pastor will be loath to ask them to step down since beggars can’t be choosers.<\/p>\n

Finally, as I mentioned in another post<\/a>, once on the pastor’s radar, those\u00a0parishioners who volunteer in one ministry are likely to be “tapped” again and again for all the other jobs which need to be done in the parish. Obviously, it’s hard to blame the pastor for this. If someone has proved himself or herself willing and able before, the pastor is much more likely to ask again when new needs arise. Unless these\u00a0parishioners\u00a0are restrained and are willing to say “no”<\/span><\/em> when necessary, resentment can set in and burnout will soon follow.<\/p>\n

The Servant Kings<\/h2>\n

Let me be clear, in case I am misunderstood. I am not belittling parish volunteers. Not at all! In my adult life I have served as a volunteer in a number of different\u00a0ministries and\u00a0I know how demanding it is, especially without training and particularly while trying to hold down a full-time job.<\/p>\n

As Christians, we are all called to be servants and to offer our gifts and talents to the Lord.\u00a0If you’re a volunteer at your parish, thank you! Thank you so much for all you do for all of us!\u00a0Volunteers\u00a0are the lifeblood of every parish and I wish there were more! However, what I am suggesting in this post is that our volunteers should be led by adequately-funded leaders who have been properly trained in that particular ministry.<\/p>\n

Excellence in the Protestant and Secular Worlds<\/h2>\n

There is a wonderful mindset in many non-Catholic congregations that one must always give God the very best. This is reflected in the time and money invested in different ministries and those who lead them.\u00a0Quite frankly it makes a lot of Catholic parishes look rather amateurish and halfhearted in comparison.<\/p>\n

I think we can also take an example from the secular world. I work in the secular world as a software engineer. I studied for many years and worked hard to attain the necessary qualifications for my job. There are high expectations concerning the quality of my work, but for maintaining this standard, I receive a good wage from my employer. I think we can learn from this in the Church.<\/p>\n

Getting down to brass tacks<\/h2>\n

I know I’ve spent a lot of time in this post complaining, but I’d now like to point to what I think to be the solution to this problem.\u00a0As Msgr Pope pointed out in his article<\/a>, money is the key issue here:<\/p>\n

“Money is a sign of what we value<\/span>. Catholics who regularly toss down $50-100 to take the family to the\u00a0movies, or even more to go to\u00a0sports events, and then toss $10 in the\u00a0collection basket\u00a0are saying something about what they value<\/span>”
\n<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Where a parish chooses to dedicate funds indicates what it considers to be important:<\/p>\n

“Further, parishes that pay significant wages for\u00a0administrative leadership,\u00a0music\u00a0and\u00a0catechetical ministry are also saying something\u00a0about the value associated with these works<\/span> in God\u2019s house.\u00a0Money does have something to say about what we value<\/span>”
\n<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Quite some time ago I did wrote about tithing<\/a> and I mentioned that I rarely hear the subject of personal finances being addressed from the Catholic pulpit. In my opinion, this is the first thing which should change.\u00a0I think that if our priests challenged us to greater generosity on a more regular basis, we’d see collections rise considerably.<\/p>\n

Additionally,\u00a0it can sometimes feel as though the money we put in the collection basket just disappears into some great Diocesan void. If, however, it is evident where the money is going, I would suggest that parishoners are much more likely to give generously to their parish.\u00a0Here’s what the Msgr had to say:<\/p>\n

“[My parish is]\u00a0<\/strong>well formed in their understanding of what it takes to run a parish<\/span> where we pay just wages<\/span>, and strive for excellence<\/span> in the service of the Lord… Biblical tithing<\/span> has been embraced by most of the parishioners here who though small in number<\/span>, yearly generate an offertory income of almost one million dollars<\/span>“<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

I’ll leave the final word to the Msgr:<\/p>\n

“But there must be a proper balance or proportion at work. Music and liturgy, parish administration and catechesis are essential and important posts that ought to be staffed by well trained and well paid individuals<\/span>. It will surely be the job of such individuals to engage volunteers, and train good leaders to assist them<\/span>. But in the end, we have to be willing to have well trained people in essential posts<\/span> and be willing to pay them wages commensurate with both \u201cthe market\u201d and also with the value we attribute to their work. And that value is significant”<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

What are your thoughts? Agree? Disagree?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Quite some time ago\u00a0Msgr Pope\u00a0from the Archdiocese of Washington DC wrote a blog entry about\u00a0the wages of Catholic employees, noting that a recent study at that time suggested that their pay now finally comes close to matching that of their non-Catholic counterparts. Great news! However, unfortunately in my personal experience I have found this not to be the case. Many<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[2969,1820,103,364,1819,1754,1821],"class_list":["post-6858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","tag-featured","tag-ministries","tag-money","tag-msgr-pope","tag-parish-employes","tag-tithing","tag-volunteers"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6858"}],"version-history":[{"count":29,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6858\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54919,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6858\/revisions\/54919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}