Emerging Models Challenge Ministry Formation Programs
Study of Resource Needs of Lay Ministry Formation Programs
by Marti Jewell, D.Min.November 30, 2008
The Spirit has led us into an unanticipated future! Some saw it coming. Others are just now catching on. Pastoral leaders find themselves ministering in changed parish structures, facing complex challenges that require new skills and different mindsets. What is the invitation to those who are forming men and women for this emergent reality?
Certainly, being successful in parish leadership is in part gift and, in part, formation. Pastors and parish life coordinators bring the gift of ‘presidency' as they preside over the life of one or more parish communities. Parish staffs, lay ecclesial ministers and deacons, bring the gifts of collaboration and service. Their formation must ensure that they come to this work with personal maturity and a strong ministerial identity in order to move through the challenges they will face. Their work must be rooted in solid theology and pastoral praxis, with appropriate skills for evolving leadership roles. And, as systems shift, today's parish leader will increasingly need a sense of how to move communities through change.
In order to support lay ministry formation programs as they respond to this emerging vision of parish, I developed a project to study their needs, in light of these changes. During the fall and winter of 2007/2008 a survey of lay ministry formation programs was conducted along with focus groups of program directors and staff. The results provided a unique opportunity to understand the concerns and needs of program directors, professors, and staff.
In language that is both theological and pastoral, those forming lay leaders speak of the role their students will have in supporting the pastoral community. They have a strong sense of the theological studies and pastoral preparation needed by lay leaders, and want their students to be professional in the roles that they will assume. They hope for a healthy development in the areas of personal and spiritual maturity, ministerial identity, and professional practice, and are looking for support in developing these areas.
Ministry formation program directors are also concerned for their students. They worry about graduates who find themselves in settings where they are not assured of acceptance, or possibly even recognition, and whether or not their students will be treated justly. Those directing academic programs focus on future employment issues, especially self-care. They wonder what impact parish ministry will have on their students' family life. Those directing certificate programs are interested in how their participants will integrate into parish systems.
MFP directors are working under the constraints of little money and less time. Like their counterparts in seminary formation, theirs is a full curriculum and much needs to be taught in the time available. The key issues they name are diversity - whether educational, ideological, or cultural, human development, support, time, finances, and availability. In a recent survey conducted by the Catholic Extension Society, Home Missions' bishops described similar challenges.
For the most part requests made by program directors focused on lay ministers, their professional skills and character and asked for resources to support their work in these areas. They are looking for:
•· formation processes for developing maturity in their participants,
•· resources on ministerial identity,
•· training material for professional development, especially in the areas of collaboration and
conflict management, and
•· bi-lingual resources that are theological grounded and accessible to the range of educational
backgrounds their students bring.
Interestingly, there were few requests for resources about the changing nature of parish or for information on skills for working with community systems, empowerment, strategic planning, or accompanying communities though change and grief. Each of these areas, however, will play an important part in the future of pastoral ministry.
Educators and formators are being called to develop leadership within changing systems and paradigms. They sense that change is happening in parishes, but what it looks like and how it impacts their participants - and their programming - is not fully understood. This is a challenge. All of us who work in forming and educating people for ministry must become, ourselves, what we are hoping our students will be - adaptive leaders. We must take on the difficult task of re-framing our understanding of pastoral work and the paths needed to get there. As we explore what's possible, we are called to exercise a pastoral imagination, exploring new and different partners and practices. We are being asked to extend our boundaries and think in new and larger ways.
In curricula that are already full, how do we make the adaptations necessary? Those responding to the surveys and focus questions on this topic gave some indications of what must be done. A plan has been developed that combines theologically solid, bi-lingual, on-line and print resources that will meet a variety of needs. And they let us know that NALM, along with other national organizations and universities, must continue advocacy for lay ministry.
As pastoral leaders are living into the new realities that face them there is a palpable sense of longing for hope and support. They have a growing understanding - sometimes more accurately described as the barest of glimmers - that the answers will not come from outside of themselves. The Church, the Mystery of God, is not yet complete. Until all of God's people have been called, initiated, and sent, the search will continue. What this will look like remains unknown. We cannot know ahead of time what will emerge but we can be assured that paradigms will shift, parish systems will change, and the Spirit will continue to invite us deeper and deeper into the kingdom of God. Our thanks goes to the formators of both lay and ordained who have taken on the challenge of responding to this invitation.
