Stepping Aside Moving Ahead Spiritual And Practical Wisdom For Clergy Retirement Harper by Harper, Steve; instant download after payment.

Henri Nouwen's statement that too many clergy are "lonely ministers practicing lonely ministry" can be amplified in the years leading up to and immediately following retirement. And although there are books about retirement in general, clergy have unique personal and professional dimensions to retiring. This book provides a clergy-oriented context. The author begins with letters from clergy nearing retirement about the issues they are facing, and structures the book in the following way: Opening Letters from clergy Foundations (the formative dynamics that create a good retirement) Movements (the formative transitions that lead to a good retirement) Actions (the specific behaviors that produce a good retirement) Outcomes (the attitudes which emerge from a good retirement) FROM THE INTRODUCTION Every day, an average of ten thousand people retire in The United States. Obviously, some of them are clergy. As human beings, we face the same challenges as anyone else. But as women and men who have spent decades in positions of leadership, there are additional factors which make retirement feel both like an opportunity and an obstacle. This book is about those dynamics. Of course, the fact that we are clergy should not and must not eclipse the fact that we are human, so the distinctive elements of our ministries will be woven into the larger and more-general elements. We retire as people. In terms of our humanity, it is important to explore retirement in the context of spiritual formation. We are made in the image of God, and that reality along with the fact that retirement is a major life transition, immediately makes it a truly spiritual experience. That is one reason why I agreed to write this book. I have spent my professional life as a clergyperson, appointed mostly to serve in theological education, and teaching for more than thirty years in the disciplines of Spiritual Formation and Wesley Studies. And soon, it will have been ten years that I have been seriously considering retirement and living in it. On a very personal level, I have found that the decision to retire and the life which follows when it happens are truly matters of the soul.