“The Country Parson is generally sad”

St Peter’s Church, Fugglestone. (Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Trish Steel under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License)

Just recently, I had the privilege of getting published in the Center for a Just Society’s new online journal, The Statesman. Being the rather churchly fellow I am, I focused on the shifts in the expectations of and ideals behind pastoral ministry today. Just this past quarter, I got to study George Herbert and his little book, The Country Parson, in depth. The contrast between the two is most jarring.

In my article, I observe,

The expectation that congregational leaders give off the “right vibe” has become standard in some religious circles. Some churches today assert that a pastor should be an enthusiastic, extroverted purveyor of hilarity, therapy, success, or optimistic activism. These pastors are supposed to be casual, invested with “big dreams” to do “big things for God,” handy at enabling a good time during congregational worship, “innovative” with outreach (i.e. the kids find the pastor sufficiently hip), and—perhaps most important of all—adept in the vocabulary of self-help and therapy. In other words, people want to feel good spiritually, and the pastor is to model that in his own life.

I deliberately juxtapose this with George Herbert, who wrote,

The Country Parson is generally sad, because he knows nothing but the Cross of Christ, his mind being defixed on it with those nails wherewith his Master was; or if he have any leisure to look off from thence, he meets continually with two most sad spectacles, Sin and Misery; God dishonoured every day, and man afflicted. Nevertheless, he sometimes refresheth himself, as knowing that nature will not bear everlasting droopings, and that pleasantness of disposition is a great key to do good; not only because all men shun the company of perpetual severity, but also for that when they are in company of perpetual severity, but also for that when they are in company, instructions seasoned with pleasantness both enter sooner and root deeper.

Read the full piece here.