The emotional labor of leaving a call
Recently I was talking with a coachee who is leaving her current call. “I’m exhausted,” she said. “No one tells you how tiring it is.” She wasn’t referring to all the mental work of details she’s preparing for her successor or the physical efforts involved in cleaning out the books and files she’s accumulated over a long tenure. (Those are very real too, though.) She meant the grief work - her own and others.’
So let’s talk about it.
It is emotionally taxing to manage the time between when a pastor announces a departure and when the exit actually happens. You are feeling a range of emotions, and so are your parishioners. You might be deeply sad to say goodbye to some people you’ve grown to love. You might feel relieved to leave behind those who have antagonized you or taken up a disproportionate amount of energy. You might be thrilled to go to a new challenge or to take a much-deserved, much-needed break. You might feel scared because you don’t know what is next. You might be miffed that people seem largely unaffected by your news.
On the church members’ end, they might be excited for new opportunities for you. They might feel lost and anxious because they have benefitted so much from your ministry and from your steady presence. They might be angry at you for leaving and even more so for setting boundaries around contact with church folks after you go.
So you have your big emotions and they have theirs. But they are not one-and-done feelings. The process of bringing closure to relationships happens over and over in that pre-departure window. And even with some sense of finality, the tenderness does not go away. So how do you navigate this span of weeks, or even months?
Know that this will be hard. It is hard because you have invested significant periods of time and parts of yourself in this holy work. Thanks be to God for what you have done and who you have been in this context!
Feel the feels. Honor what is going on in you and in others. You are in a thin space, where the buffer between you and God and between you and your people is less substantial than at other times.
Focus on relationships more than details. Yes, it will be good for the next minister to know who the homebound members are and what signature events for the congregation are coming up. But those are notes the new person can get elsewhere, if needed. Your successor cannot bring good closure to your relationships with parishioners.
Take good care of yourself. Don’t fill your last weeks too full. Set up emotional supports such as a video call with a non-church friend or some time with your watercolors so that you can recoup enough energy to do the relational work your soul and others’ must have.
Pray for your people. Pray for them to be ok without you. Pray for them to love their next pastor (and vice versa). Pray for them individually, since you know their specific situations. You will soon no longer be their minister, but you will always care about and want good for them.
I am a firm believer that we do as much ministry in this time between announcing our departure and leaving as we do in all the time leading up to the transition. On behalf of church people everywhere, thank you for wanting to wade through that time thoughtfully and compassionately.