“In Search of . . . “
John Hansman, Ministerial Settlement Representative for the Joseph Priestley District
December 11, 2005

Reading For Service “in Search Of…”
The reading consists of excerpts from an essay written by an experienced UU minister who had recently completed a search process. The minister is the Rev. Dr. Peter Luton and his essay is titled: Tips on the Ministerial Psyche and How to Court It.

Rev Luton wrote:
“When I spent a weekend with a search committee, I wanted to find out if I could love these people. Are these people who respect and value the ministry? Are they self-conscious or caught up in a false self-image? I wanted to know if stylistically and temperamentally we fit. Do I like these people? Do they seem to like me, to welcome me, to be open to me and what I might bring to them…. And I had to ask myself, “How willing and able am I to change and adapt in order to meet and honor this congregation’s personality?”….

I trusted a Search Committee that was able to express differences of opinion, interpretation or emphasis in the course of the interview. I appreciated that the committee members were willing to disagree and be honest with one another and with me, that they were not putting forward an agreed-upon “party line” to create the appearance of unanimity. I was not looking to create fights, but to see how the congregation might deal with diversity and controversy. When a new minister arrives, there will be some disagreement, some rough edges, some tensions and frustrations, and I felt better going to a congregation in which those feelings and thoughts could be expressed openly and with love.
 

“In Search of . . . “
One of my quirks is that I cannot think about even the most serious subject for any length of time without seeing something absurd about it. So, when I started to prepare this presentation about the search for a minister, my mind wandered to the personals ads in newspapers or magazines like the Washingtonian. There you will find the abbreviation ISO, in search of… ISO will be found bracketed by other initials like DWM ISO SF: Divorced white male in search of single female. This sequence of initials will be followed by some description of characteristics and activities. For example, “DWM ISO SF with sense of humor and trim figure, for companionship and travel”. Now, if Frederick or other UU congregation were to place such an ad, it might read: “DLWC ISO GM”, or Divorced Largely-White Congregation in search of Great Minister”, to be followed by such hopes as, “with strong pulpit presence for spiritual journey. Physical stamina and management skills highly desirable.”

Actually, the Unitarian-Universalist Association does operate a personals column for the use of congregations and ministers in search. Since we are now so very up to date, so 21st century, our personals column is a website. One of the first tasks of your ministerial search committee will be to post Frederick’s ISO on this website. Unlike the newspaper personals, your posting will be seen only by your search committee, interested ministers, and UUA staff.

My function is to assist with that posting and the other elements of this search. I am a Ministerial Settlement Representative for the Joseph Priestley District of which Frederick is a part. This title means that I consult with congregations and their search committees on the process of finding and calling a settled minister. This consulting is one of the services to which member congregations of the UUA are entitled. The Unitarian-Universalist Association in Boston pays me a small honorarium for these visits, but I do this work because I treasure our church communities and I love being part of helping congregations find the ministers they need.

Let me emphasize a few of the elements of this consulting. I deal with process, not with the evaluation of applicants or candidates. The evaluation of ministers interested in serving Frederick will be done exclusively by your search committee. Your Interim Minister, Reverend Roberta, will play a similar role. She can assist the search committee in several ways with the search process, but he will not offer comment on the merits of the ministers under consideration.

Did you note the unusual terms used to describe the process? Call, settle, and settlement! Although old and perhaps quaint, these terms have meaning. The search is for a “settled” minister, one who will settle, reside, and live with the congregation for an open-ended period. Because settlement of a minister is such an important commitment by both minister and congregation, the congregation as a whole must vote or “call” the minister. The call is a spiritual commitment to shared ministry. And the minister must accept that call and thereby make serving this congregation his or her “calling”, also a spiritual commitment. By contrast, an Interim Minister is hired by the Board, not called by the congregation, and serves for a defined period of one or two years, not indefinitely.

The elements of the UUA search process have been refined by long experience and are followed, as well, by other denominations with self-governing congregations. As an independent entity, Frederick may call its minister in any way it chooses, but the standard process is recommended to you because it works for you and because the ministers you would wish to consider will expect it of you. What are the elements of this process? I will outline them and then discuss each element.

1. The congregation elects a search committee. I hope you will do this by March.
2. The search committee prepares materials to describe this congregation and its hopes and priorities for the next minister. One of these items is a survey of the congregation.
3. The Board sets the amount of compensation for the next minister.
4. After key items have been published for review by interested ministers and the UUA Settlement Director, the search committee receives from the UUA information on every minister who wants to be considered.
5. The search committee reviews carefully the record and qualifications of each minister, with reference checks and telephone interviews to select three or four finalists. Then the committee spends a weekend with each finalist, including personal interviews and observation of pulpit performance. At the same time, interested ministers are studying Frederick with similar diligence.
6. The search committee keeps the congregation well informed of its progress, but keeps absolutely confidential the identities of the individual ministers.
7. The search committee selects the best minister it can and recommends its candidate to the congregation. The candidate spends nine days with the congregation, preaching on two Sundays and meeting with as many members as possible, in groups and individually. On Frederick’s schedule, the candidating period will be in the spring of 2007.
8. At a congregational meeting at the end of the candidating week, the congregation votes on whether to call the candidate as its minister.

Let me now go back and comment on some of these elements. The congregation entrusts the search committee with the critical task of finding a minister who can serve the entire church. Therefore, the search committee should consist of members who are interested in the welfare of the church as a whole. Although the committee members may have particular programmatic passions, such as RE or social justice, they must not see themselves as representatives of those constituencies. Their job is to find a minister with a balance of abilities and interests. Also, they must be devoted to working with their colleagues to achieve consensus. Individuals whose attitude is “my way or no way” will disrupt and delay the committee. The good people you will pick need to have the flexibility to commit many hours to this task. Such service is a challenge, but those persons elected to represent the congregation can look forward to what I believe is the most satisfying church work possible. They will learn a great deal about ministers and about other churches, which will provide a new perspective on their own. They will have the satisfaction of congregational respect for their role. Especially, they will have the pleasure of working together on a shared task that is important, has clear objectives and real deadlines, and a definite conclusion date. This is not your average church committee!

My enthusiasm for search committees is based on happy personal experience. Before I became a settlement representative six years ago, I had served on two ministerial search committees at my church, River Road in Bethesda. One was for a Minister of Religious Education in 1991 and the other for parish minister in 1997. Both were great experiences.

Back to the search committee. Once elected, the search committee prepares its version of that personals ad. The committee describes the congregation and what kind of minister it hopes to attract. Now, many of those personals ads in the Washingtonian are not asking for a long-term relationship, they are not engaging in courtship. But the search committee and prospective ministers are courting each other, as noted in the reading from Peter Luton. They are hoping and testing for a deep and mutually satisfying long-term relationship. In this courtship, if the committee fails to adequately describe the congregation, it may mislead the prospective minister. If the committee fails to thoroughly explore and understand the minister, it will mislead itself.

Let me make an analogy to personal experience. I am sure that there are some people here like me, who got married in their 20’s without really understanding themselves and what sort of person would be a good partner, and then discovered that they had married a good person who did not meet their needs. Yet, that good person would have been right for someone else. Such mismatches can happen to churches and ministers, but a careful search process will minimize the risk. My second wife would want me to note that the second time around, I think I got it right. I met her at church, and I recommend that!

I digress. Back to my outline. You will elect a search committee of savvy people who already have some sense of the congregation. However, the congregation must work with the search committee to do a truly thorough and honest assessment of your strengths, problems, and needs. This process has already started in your relationship with your Interim Minister and will take a special focus under the leadership of your search committee. You should not worry that presenting your problems will scare off prospective ministers. They are looking for a challenge; not for just any challenge, but for the particular challenge that matches their skills and interests. Ministers value a congregational self-assessment that is thoughtful and honest. And ministers know there are no perfect congregations….just as you know there are no perfect ministers.

What, no perfect ministers?? A minister should be, should be:
a dynamic preacher,
a good administrator at ease with personnel problems, budgets, and building maintenance
an empathic pastoral counselor
a recruiter and facilitator of lay leadership
a sage advisor to the Board
a respected voice in the community for social justice
and on and on.

Of course, no minister is great at all of these roles. Ministers have different strengths from natural ability, interest, and training. The task for you and your search committee is to decide where your priorities are. Are you willing to trade off some pulpit presence for real ability to mobilize volunteers? Is a gift for empathy and personal relationships more important now than management skill?

Your role in this assessment of the congregation’s needs and priorities for ministry is to show up and to respond freely and honestly when your search committee asks you to participate in group and individual discussion. And you must fill out and return promptly the congregational survey the search committee will give you. Your individual opinions need to be part of the tallies and a high percentage of participation is important to prospective ministers. They want to see that the congregation is fully engaged in support of the search.

Children and youth can also be brought into this process. For example, several years ago at Silver Spring, one RE class posted on the bulletin board its hopes for the new minister. Of their list, the two I liked best were:
Funny but not wacko, and
Either a man or a woman.

I told the search committee that the kids had a sure bet on “either a man or a woman”, but only two chances out of three on “funny but not wacko”.

The next point is Money! The Board sets the budget for the minister, which includes salary, housing allowance, professional expenses, pension, and insurance for health, life, and disability. People do not choose a career in ministry to become wealthy, but they need to live reasonably. Naturally, the higher the pay offered, the more attractive Frederick will be to ministers in search. So pledge generously this spring. The Board can then equip your search committee with an honorable and competitive financial offer.

After the search committee has published on the UUA search website the financial package, the description and analysis of the church and its priorities for your next minister, and done some other homework, the committee will get information on ministers who want to explore this opportunity. The search committee is pledged not to reveal the names. Should any of you inadvertently discover the identity of one of the applicants, I hope you will keep that information confidential. Keeping the names secret may seem to go against the openness we value as UU’s; however, there is a good reason. A minister who is currently serving another congregation would have his or her effectiveness undermined if it became known prematurely that he or she wanted to move on. A breach of confidentiality is a serious injury to the courtship that leads to the minister you want.

In the course of getting to know the applicants, the search committee will explore personal questions that would definitely not be asked of an applicant to be the executive director of a secular non-profit service organization or to be a corporate executive. But a minister has a different relationship to a congregation than the executive has to his or her board. The minister has a calling to nurture individuals in their moral dilemmas and spiritual journeys as well as to lead the church community. For a congregation, their minister’s personal example in all aspects of living is important. Now tough stuff, like divorce or errant children, happens to ministers just as to the rest of us mortals. The search committee’s questioning must be directed beyond the event to how did the minister handle the problem and what personal growth may have resulted.

Once the search committee and a minister have concluded their thorough courtship, then the committee will brief the Board and announce the candidate to the congregation. The candidate will inform her or his current congregation. Then the candidate will come to Frederick to meet you and preach to you, hoping and expecting to make as good an impression on you as she or he did on the search committee. Then you vote yes or no to call this minister and to settle her or him among you. The vote must be overwhelmingly favorable or the candidate will -and should- withdraw. Happily, it is very rare for the search committee and the candidate not to persuade the congregation.

The points I want you to remember are:

First, Show up at the congregational meeting and elect to the search committee consensus builders with a commitment to the church as a whole. Then trust them to bring you a good candidate.

Second, Think honestly together about the needs of the church and your priorities for ministry. And fill out the survey!

Three, Pledge generously for a good financial offer.

Four, Help the search committee maintain confidentiality.

Finally, Get to know the candidate during his or her week with you and vote at the congregational meeting.

Losing a minister and then finding and welcoming a new person in that role is a major change in the life of a congregation.

Sometimes there is difficulty and pain in the process. But there is also the excitement of new opportunities and I urge optimism and enthusiasm upon you. You are already well engaged in the process of change with your interim minister.

Understanding your challenges as a congregation and your priorities for ministry are part of interim ministry as well as necessary to launch a successful ministerial search. And I am confident that your search committee will bring you a good candidate. As the old Quaker hymn affirms: “You will come round right.”