During
the ten years I was a minister and in the thirty-five years since, I have met
and talked with a number of clergy of various denominations. They are a breed
apart because the general public chooses to view them as uniquely different
from their fellow beings. This arbitrary estrangement from the general
population is not wanted, welcomed, or appreciated by many.
Two
examples from my experience suffice to illustrate this. I have been in groups
where the conversation included profanity or sexual innuendos that proceed
uncensored until someone in the group called to mind that I was a clergyman
(albeit inactive). Immediately there are apologies for the language and content
and a sanitizing of the discussion from then on.
On
another occasion, I was conducting a workshop for single parents on the topic
of how to deal with their teens that object to their parent's having intimate
relationships. Near the end of the discussion, a woman mentioned how difficult
it was for her gender to find partners. A man immediately said he had no
trouble finding one, which prompted a heated rebuke from another woman who
agreed with the first. She quickly counted heads and then said, "In this
room are fifteen eligible women, but only seven eligible men and
a minister. With that note, she apparently dismissed my sexuality.
There are clergymen who are
bombastic egotists treating others as inferior to themselves. There are those
whose humility and self-effacing demeanor make them almost invisible. Some are
very pastoral, having superb person skills. Others are talented administrators,
or fund-raisers, or educators, or builders. Some are extremely hard working;
others are lazy. Some are physically attractive, others not so much. Some are
tall, some are short, some over weight, some almost cadaverous. Some exemplify
the best of human behavior, some the very worst. In other words, there is
nothing innately different about members of the clergy that set them apart from
other human beings. To treat them as if they are a separate species is to do
them an injustice and limit their effectiveness.
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