I am single, divorced. I have been hoping to meet a ministry minded, kindred spirit to be my best friend, love and husband. I want to be his help meet and him mine.

So, I have gone to all the singles events at my church. There are mostly all women and only a few men in these groups. We actually joined together in a group of about 10 and went to other churches singles events… Nada…

Where on earth does a child of God go to find a mate? My church is 1500 strong and yet???

My birthday is tomorrow, I will be 54 and it seems that life is getting short. It is getting really lonely these days…

Anyway, God bless you all.

Linda

CC

I’m sure I’m not the first woman going through a painful divorce to develop a crush on her intelligent, compassionate single minister. (Every minister probably has embarrassing stories about this.) I’ve been an erratic churchgoer at best, in part because I didn’t want to exacerbate the problems in my marriage, but now the emotional and spiritual support is really helpful. But to be honest, I am much more interested in my pastor as a man than as a minister (although he is quite good at the latter).

This is complicated by the fact that my husband doesn’t want a divorce, but he doesn’t want to give up his (much younger) girlfriend, either. This has been going on for some time, and it’s starting to look like the situation will be permanent unless/ until I decide to move on.

Sigh. Any advice? Shall I stop going to church and wait until my divorce is finalized, then ask him out? Or shall I tell him my dilemma? Or stay silent but keep going to church, then bring up the issue after the divorce? (If the latter, I probably shouldn’t be turning to him for advice right now.)

Confused Congregant
[oh girl, what a hot mess you have going on!!! Two things you should know: (1) We are not supposed to date parishioners, no way, no how. ESPECIALLY parishioners who are in any way vulnerable and whom we are counseling. It’s called sexual misconduct and it could get your Rev. Dreamboat into a lot of trouble if he feels similarly attracted to you and decides to see you on the sly. Lead him not into temptation if you care about him. (2) Your situation at home is a nightmare!! Get a lawyer, get out, kick that cheatin’ dog to the curb!! What the hell!!!?? Honey, you DO have a therapist, I hope? If so, and if he/she hasn’t helped you to realize what a sick environment you’ve tolerated for this long, get a new one! (3) My advice is: Keep going to church. You need the support and the community. Get your divorce and get healthy. Date others if you want to. If after a year or so of being single (because you really need some time for you) you find that you still want to date Rev. Dreamboat, tell him so. Tjhen the two of you can figure things out from there.

Consider the uses of all the energy. Crushes are a GOOD thing. They mean that our hearts are open and our libidos alive. God is in eros as surely as God is in agape love. Use all that good juju in a positive way and don’t worry so much about whether or not you’re going to get to snog with your Rev. in the near or distant future. Also, take it from me: he’s probably way less of a dreamboat in real life than you’ve made him out to be from knowing him in church.

That will be $10.

Good luck!! - PB]

[Oh, that’s an ugly situation, and I’m sorry. To date a member of our congregation is also considered a violation of collegial guidelines in our movement, but people still get away with it — an infuriating hypocrisy (do we have a code or don’t we? Do we honor it or don’t we?). My friend, I don’t think there’s a thing you can do but stand by. Anyone who thinks that they can “love someone out of their alcoholism” is not living in reality. This sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. Good luck. - PB]

When did asking a question in a civil tone become “insulting”?

I also think you read way more into my question.

I never said anything about the financial and personal costs of becoming a minister being a waste. I never said there were no positive benefits of having UU ministers in our movement.

All I asked is for an examination of the costs vs. benefits.

I do think we as an association of congregations should ask if the current model for ministerial formation fits our needs.

Are we totally wedded to a system that leave a minister and his/her family with $60,000 of student debt?

Does ministry require seven years of education?

Could we create different models for ministerial formation?

Could we also explore the possibility that ministry may be something that many congregations cannot afford?

Are we wedded to a system that demands this type of sacrifice?

Are there ways that one could get the same or nearly-the-same benefits without these costs?

There may be a way for us to create liberal religious communities without the personal and financial costs of ministry that I’ve read about here and elsewhere (which is why I mentioned the Quakers).

The other example exists within Untarian Universalism — the fellowship movement used by the AUA, UCA, and UUA after WW II.

Implying that any mention of the reality of the “stresses of being the minister” shows that it’s just too much burden for a person to bear, so we might as well just throw in the towel — that is just a low blow. You might as well say that ministers, who went through a minimum of seven years of school along with field education and the many hoops of denominational criteria, accumulating an average of $60,000 in debt along the way, to answer a deeply held conviction that they could make some positive change in the world are all just wasting their time.

Ministry is hard, yes, but also immensely rewarding to both individual ministers and to the congregations they serve.

The point is not to paint ministry as a completely rosy experience, because, let’s face it, there are human beings involved here. But if there were no ministers, I for one think that liberal religion would not even exist. I thank god every day for ministers of many faiths, that they are willing to make the sometimes incredible personal sacrifices it takes to devote their lives to serving other people and the greater good.

Thanks for pointing the Programmed Quaker variation out … My apologies for suggesting accidentally that all Quakers were of the Unprogrammed variety.

The only reason I mentioned Quakers was to point out that it’s possible for liberal religious communities to survive without requiring any person to endure the stresses of being the minister.

Most of us are familiar with the other type of Quakers; they are the Unprogrammed ones.

Whether a meeting will be Programmed or Unprogrammed is entirely up to the meeting.

One argument that UK repubicans voice against the hereditary monarchy system is that it condemns members of the royal family to very stressful and abnormally unhealthy lives.

Perhaps a similar thing can be said about clergy.

Putting a person in the role of minister may be unfair to the minister.

Is it fair to put a person into that position?

Perhaps it’s time that we followed the example of the Quakers — an example of one liberal religious group that doesn’t have clergy.