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PREFACE

Eighty-four calls.

Since I began this work of transition ministry several years ago, we’ve midwifed more than one hundred calls for rectors, vicars, priests-in-charge, and deacons-in-charge in this diocese. Add in the facilitation of appointments of a number of interim rectors, and it’s safe to say that almost every possible mistake has been made, a great number of unusual situations have been faced, a range of all possible emotions felt.

So consider this book, based upon research as well as the lived experience of transition in Episcopal churches of incredible variety, your way to avoid repeating mistakes you don’t need to make, a way to navigate the usual pitfalls, a way to see the goal clearly and move toward it confidently.

What’s the goal?

Here’s what it is not: hiring a priest. You’re not contracting with a plumber (although many of us have plunged a few toilets in our parishes). You’re not figuring out who the best heart surgeon is to fix your ticker (although many of us have sat with and wept with and prayed with parishioners with broken hearts). You’re not hiring a lawyer to sort out who owes who what when someone has cheated you (although many of us have facilitated knotty and painful conversations between those whose relationships have been torn).

You’re seeking God’s will for your parish in the next chapter of its story, and discerning what spiritual leader will help you write that chapter.

That might seem a bit intimidating—how do we hear God’s voice?—but this book will help you get there. Through process, prayer, wisdom from those who have done this before, you will find the priest you need, and you might find that as the process evolves, this experience will be spiritually transformative.

The title?

The metaphor of journey is often used to describe the call of a new ordained leader, and sometimes jokingly people say that they felt like the Israelites in the wilderness, searching for the Promised Land over a forty-year span. That’s a dark image, and a frightening one.

So perhaps another journey metaphor is more helpful, and more apt. Consider the two disciples walking to Emmaus after the resurrection (Luke 24:13–35). Cleopas and a companion are walking home. Jesus has risen from the dead, but they don’t understand that yet. They’re talking about everything that had happened, perhaps feeling a little traumatized by it all. They encounter a stranger. They share this weird story, and how disappointed they were that things didn’t turn out the way they’d hoped. The stranger instructs them to think about it differently. They still are distracted and can’t wrap their minds around it. It is only later that evening, when they eat dinner together, when the stranger breaks the bread and blesses it and shares it with them, that they realize what is happening, WHO is happening . . . and then he’s gone. They reflect on it: “Were not our hearts burning within us” when he was with us? They go back to Jerusalem to the other disciples and proclaim what they’ve experienced, as they hear of Peter’s encounter with the risen Lord.

When a parish is in transition, it does feel like a journey. There’s grief at the departure of the prior priest if it has been a good tenure and grief at dreams unfulfilled if it has not. There’s concern about what the future might hold. There’s worry about how one does this work of managing the parish and how one secures another priest.

But there will be moments of hearts strangely warmed, if the level of anxiety about this transition can be addressed honestly, appropriately, and prayerfully. God’s will—not individual preference—will be the thing you seek. God is always doing a new thing (Isa. 43:19) and now God is doing a new thing with and for you and God’s providence is sure. The wisdom of the great cloud of witnesses who have navigated this journey can inform you. May the best practices and tools contained in this book be a road map and a comfort as you journey.

Blessings,

The Rev. Dr. Mary Brennan Thorpe

Canon to the Ordinary

The Episcopal Diocese of Virginia