Rhetoric Race and Religion
I am a retired pastor’s wife of 31 years, and I have seen, experienced, and survived the challenges that come in ministry. With my spouse, I have served two congregations, one that was small and grew large and one that was already large and established. One was in the North and the other in the South. One was in the center of the city and the other in the suburbs, and they both had their own set of challenges. Though they were from two different denominations, they both thrived in their communities. They were well known and respected churches that made efforts to participate in and meet needs in the lives of their people and the greater community as well.
Both churches had multiple services on Sundays, and I went to all of them, not knowing that I could choose one and that would have been enough. They were both successful churches, and each had their own expectations of the pastor’s family. I was expected to come to every church event, shake hands after each service, participate in birthday celebrations and special events of certain people, have dinner at a different member’s house each Sunday, and have my own set of keys to the church so that I could help with the opening of the church, just to name a few. As hard as I sometimes tried, I could not meet every expectation because I had other things to do and other people to look after, mainly my family.
It was through my experiences with these two churches that I developed my passion to support clergy spouses. I realized that I was carrying a lot of weight, and maybe other spouses were too, trying to live up to every expectation, especially when it was not the spouse who had a signed contract with the church. What I came to know was that I was accumulating large amounts of stress from participating in all the church activities, as well as dealing with endless criticism of me, my husband, and family and the loneliness from lack of real friendships in the church. I knew of other spouses who were encountering the same issues and decided that there had to be something to help our situations.
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