Recently, I was talking to a couple of lawyers who were lamenting the intergenerational aspect of their work. Things have shifted so much in law offices that the older lawyers are frustrated with the younger lawyers because they did not think they were actually doing any work. The young lawyers were getting the assignments done, but the actual process looked different, and it irritated the older lawyers.
I listened, amazed. So much of what they were going through is also happening within our congregations. Work looks different. And sometimes it pesters the intergenerational tensions like a chigger just below the skin. There is something annoying and wrong, although we can’t figure out just what it is. Older generations of people cannot point to anything that their younger pastor is not doing. In fact, the church might even be growing, but there is a difference in the manner in which she is getting it done that vexes them.
What are the shifts that are occurring? What is causing the tensions?
First, our studying looks different. I have a sign on my office that says “Pastor’s Study,” and when I crack open that door, there is a big desk, a comfortable chair, and a ton of bookshelves. This whole office is a symbol of how ministers are to conduct their time: by spending hours behind that desk in the comfortable silence of their study. For many people in our congregation, if we are there, then we are working. If we are not there, then we are not working.
Yet things have shifted for many pastors now. We don’t really need all of those books physically present because we have a Kindle that holds most of our recent theological purchases and we can search Google books for our passages. The busy atmosphere of the coffeehouse just might be a better place for us to concentrate. In fact, I don’t know many pastors who can focus in their offices. Although it can cause tension, it is still a wonderful thing for the church. Relationships form in public spaces. People begin to know who the pastor is as he pounds out his weekly thoughts in the corner of the coffeehouse. It allows for people to connect with the pastor in a completely different context, and we begin to make friends that we would have never met in our office.
Second, communication looks different. Pastors used to communicate on the telephone and face-to-face. Home visitation was extremely important, because it was one of the only ways that pastors could have time with their parishioners. Now, as we shift in a new generation, home visits are often a source of anxiety for the pastor and for the people with whom we minister.
Young families don’t keep clean houses any longer. Moms and dads both have to work, and no one is home to dust the mantel just in case the pastor makes a call. Instead, we are communicating with email, texts, Twitter, and Facebook.
It is difficult when in our pastor’s reports we are asked how many home visits we made. People don’t understand the constant, round-the-clock communication that is now taking place. Current communication may seem frivolous and shallow to non-participants, but it is actually rather intense.
Third, our work looks different. There has been a shift from caretaking the congregation and waiting for people to walk into our doors, to an outward focus on attracting people into our communities. The change is hardly perceptible, but it’s almost like an evolutionary thing that is happening. We are changing our patterns instinctually.
Church is no longer an expected part of our society. So a new generation of pastors actively evangelize through blogging, setting up Facebook sites, creating Yelp profiles, and encouraging good reviews on Google Maps.
As we participate in social networking, put our sermons on iTunes, and stream our services on YouTube, it may seem like a ridiculous waste of time to many in our congregations. Yet we know that if our congregations do not change their habits quickly, if we do not move from caretaking our members to reaching to a new generation, then most of our churches are going to empty in 20 years.
The shifts in our pastoral roles are extremely exciting and important. Yet it means that our work looks different. We’ll need to communicate and support those shifts as well as we can, so that we might become a church with a faith that is vital from generation to generation.
