Local churches collaborating to address pastor shortage

As with much of rural America, the Hi-Line is facing an ongoing shortage of pastors, but local churches and their leadership have been discussing a number of ideas that may address the issue, like sharing pastors and increasing lay participation.

Among the denominations discussing the issue are the Presbyterian churches in the area, which Cory Pierson of Havre First Presbyterian Church said are looking at the possibility of creating a combined inter-denominational parish in the area along with their fellow Christians of the Methodist and Lutheran faiths.

Pierson said the various churches in the area have always worked together extremely well and some already have experience sharing pastors.

Pastor Jack Mattingly of the Harlem United Methodist/Presbyterian Church and the Chinook United Methodist Church echoed Pierson's sentiments and said the talks going on are optimistic in tone despite the difficult situation.

Mattingly will be retiring soon, and said he hasn't been a big part of the discussions because he doesn't want decisions being made based on his personal preferences, but those in his faith who are more involved are very positive.

Pastor Michael O'Hearn serves Kremlin Lutheran Church and Goldstone Lutheran Church in Rudyard. He said local leadership in his denomination, including lay leaders as well as leadership from other congregations, have also had a meeting about ways to address the shortage but they're still in the early stages of discussing it.

He said a second meeting of area churches' leadership is taking place this week, and if they continue to adapt they can address these issues.

The shortage and its causes

The shortage of pastors in the area and countrywide are not new, but recent losses on the Hi-Line and its surrounding areas have made the shortage more dramatic.

The recent death of Pastor Valorie Putt of American Lutheran Church in Chinook, the departure of Pastor Maggie Lewis from the Chinook and Havre Presbyterian Churches and the impending retirement of Mattingly have called the issue into focus in recent years.

Pierson said his own churches have been in search of a new minister since April of last year, in response to Lewis' departure, and they still don't have any prospects, but this shortage seems to be increasingly common in rural areas.

Indeed, he pointed to the fact that the area being rural is one of the barriers to recruiting qualified ministers.

"You hear the word 'rural' and it scares a lot of the ministers from coming in," he said.

He said his denomination tries to match ministers and congregations, but people tend to get intimidated when they hear about a town with fewer than than 10,000 people.

Pierson said the larger Presbyterian Church's Young Adult Volunteer program was designed to help people between the ages of 19 and 29 looking to do mission work find places where they are needed and communities can sign up to make use of it.

He said the program did end up helping them, with Pastor Maggie Lewis having come out of it, but, until Chinook signed up, Albuquerque, New Mexico, was the closest thing to rural the program had participating.

Lewis left in June of last year and the churches she served have been looking for a new pastor ever since.

Mattingly also said the rural nature of the area is a barrier for attracting potential pastors, many of whom become nervous at the idea of small-town life.

"Rural scares people," he said. "... It's so different from what they know, the lack of anonymity, the fact that everyone knows who you are, that scares a lot of folks too."

He said for people like him who grew up in Montana it doesn't seem like a big deal, but it's a prospect that makes people who didn't grow up in that environment a little bit nervous.

O'Hearn said there are other cultural differences between people who've grown up in such communities and those who are used to more urban environments.

"Part of that is that they don't really know the farming-ranching community, the culture," he said. "... Not everyone is prepared to come to a rural area."

Pierson said the open positions they have get one or two references a month, but none of them have ever gone beyond a single conversation.

He said he suspects the solution is finding a young person with some fire, one who wants to reach rural communities.

In the meantime, on top of sharing pastors, Pierson said, his denomination is also using lay pastors to fill in the gaps.

He said lay pastors need to go through a study program to work at churches, but one that isn't as intense as the one for becoming a full pastor or certified ruling elder, and much of it can be done online making it much more accessible for people who may not be able to commit to the more involved process of becoming ordained.

Lay pastors are subject to some restrictions like not being able to perform communion, but can be extremely helpful in other capacities, he said.

The involved process of becoming a pastor is one of the primary barriers O'Hearn sees for his church as well.

He said the cluster of Lutheran churches in the area, which he is the dean of, have three vacancies they're looking to fill, and among the issues he sees that might be causing the shortage is the time and investment that needs to be made to qualify for the position.

"We just plain have a shortage of pastors," he said.

He said there are a number of different ways people can become qualified, but they take three or four years and can be expensive, especially for a position that generally doesn't have an especially high salary.

"I've known pastors who have had 150, 170 thousand dollars of indebtedness," O'Hearn said. "How are they gonna pay that off with the salary they get as a pastor?"

O'Hearn said he's been ordained for 27 years and, back in his younger days, the expectation for getting into the ministry at all was to already have a four-year degree in something before even starting, so the barrier used to be greater.

Now, he said, anyone with a high school education is welcome, and while those that start training without college experience often have more trouble adjusting to the kind of work they're doing in the program it can be done, so adaptation is possible.

Like their fellow Christians in the Presbyterian faith, they have been able to rely on the laity through their Lay Pastoral Associate program, O'Hearn said, which takes less time to complete and is less expensive.

He said this program is especially useful for remote areas that have trouble attracting full pastors and every year they get a few people in the area starting the program so it is one of the things they can use to address the shortage.

Mattingly echoed Pierson's sentiments regarding the cost of seminary training and said the fact that so many positions in the area are part-time and require at least one other job to make ends meet is a complicating factor as well.

In his own experience as a teacher, he said, even with multiple sources of income there's not a lot of money being made.

The fact that these kinds of positions tend to attract people looking for a second career adds another wrinkle into the matter as well.

More general difficulties

Beyond the cost of seminary training there are other barriers making it hard for rural areas to find pastors, everyday problems like transportation, housing, the harsh winters and the general difficulty of pastors having to move their families to a new and unfamiliar community.

O'Hearn said one of the churches he serves is 63 miles away from his home, and while he only has to make that trip every other week, it is a long trip.

Mattingly said the fact that everything that isn't in town takes so long to get to is another thing that makes people hesitant to come, whether that's a large airport or a concert.

"I've had friends I knew when I was doing my seminary training that couldn't believe the distances we were talking about."

He said the hours are sometimes difficult to work around and many of those hours are spent working with people going through crises like death and illness, making it a stressful job, even without some of the aforementioned complicating factors.

Mattingly and O'Hearn said all of this takes place amid a general decrease in the number of people joining the ministry, decreasing church attendance and fewer young families getting involved.

Mattingly said the role of the church has changed substantially in the last 50 to 60 years as mainstream religious institutions hold less influence over everyday life.

"Sunday morning's are no longer sacred time ... most grocery stores didn't open until the last church service was over," he said.

O'Hearn said that, in more recent times, COVID-19 has caused a lot of problems, as well, with many churches doing the best they can to operate amid a pandemic.

He said some churches have the technology to do remote worship but others may not have the resources, or tech-savvy staff to do it effectively.

He said some good things are coming out of it, however, with online services drawing in new people who aren't able to leave home as easily or aren't available during worship times but can watch the service later.

However, he said, there is also a chance that people going to service online because of COVID-19 may never come back to in-person service.

"There's both good and bad with that," O'Hearn said.

How this plays out in the long term is unknown, he said, but the pandemic has certainly made things more complicated.

Optimism persists despite current difficulties

Pierson said despite the difficulties his church is currently facing he's confident short- and long-term solutions will be found, even if it takes some time.

He said the area's churches have always been fantastic to work with regardless of denomination and he's known a lot of the people at them for a very long time, so cooperation is rarely a difficulty.

Mattingly said the people he's talked to that are involved with these conversations are similarly optimistic, with participants confident that they will be able to solve the problem and may be able to do it in a way that can be a model for other communities in similar situations, despite whatever growing pains may come with change.

He said the denominations in the area have so much in common with each other that they rarely encounter differences beyond the structure of their churches' governing bodies, and his congregation in Harlem often can't tell whether he's using Methodist or Presbyterian material during service.

"They've been working together for 52 years now, and the only time they're different is when they're doing some of the paperwork," he said.

O'Hearn said the shortage is the result of a number of problems, but they can be addressed with creative thinking, and overall he is optimistic as well.

"Nothing is unsolvable if people can be flexible and think outside the box," he said.