By Kelly Rhodes Adams

If I had a dollar for every time in the last seven months I’ve been asked, “What’s the ‘Clergy Support Ecosystem?” I’d call Shauw Chin Chapps, CBF Foundation President/CBF Chief Development Officer, to make an endowed gift. CBF has three primary ways of supporting clergy: Fellows, Peer Learning Groups and the Thriving in Ministry grant from the Lilly Endowment, Inc. These three initiatives make up the ecosystem. While ecosystem usually describes a biological community, it can be any network that has “complex interdependent parts.”

There is plenty of interdependence and overlap in these initiatives that support our pastors. As we prepare to launch a new cohort of CBF Fellows in the spring of 2024, we will encourage Fellows participants to form Peer Learning Groups at the end of their two-year experience. Peer Learning Groups help pastors by encouraging them to stay connected to their fellow ministers throughout mid- and late-career ministry. The ecosystem seeks to provide opportunities for clergy to feel supported throughout the entirety their vocational calling.

Another important point of interdependence for the clergy support ecosystem is from Thriving Congregations. The two are inextricably intertwined. It’s hard to have a thriving congregation without a thriving minister. We could spend one million dollars teaching pastors healthy habits and equipping them with all they need to thrive in their ministry, but if they return from Thriving in Ministry retreats to congregations who do not encourage them to practice those teachings, then our work is for naught.

As our Director of Thriving Congregations, Chris Aho, reminds us when he quotes James Clear, “We do not rise to level of our goals, we fall to the level of our systems.” The same is true for our ministers and their well-being. They will not rise to their healthiest habits if the church they lead is pulling them back into a constant state of over-functioning, like weeds choking healthy plants at the roots.

If we want the ministers whom we have called to our churches for their giftedness and expertise to blossom into sustained well-being, we will have to have a greater sense of congregational self-awareness. That is, churches will have to consider how they relate to their ministers and get some compelling clarity on whether they are helping or hindering their pastors’ thriving. How might your church start to critically think about how you support your pastor(s)?  If you know you need to start, but don’t know where to begin, our Congregational Ministries Team would welcome a conversation. October is Pastor Appreciation Month, and there’s no time like the present. What better way is there to honor and show appreciation for your pastor(s) than to cultivate a culture that empowers their holistic well-being? A clergy support ecosystem with thriving ministers requires relationships that are healthiest at their roots. Let’s make our churches the healthy soil where our pastors can flourish in congregational ministry.

Kelly Rhodes Adams serves as the Director of Clergy Support Ecosystem with CBF.