Discussing this with colleagues yesterday, one (in his eighties) could only bring one into the discussion from his fifty-plus years of ordained life. Others could do no better until we came to the 21st century and then the stress phenomenon appeared and we found a fair few who had been hit by it.
Interestingly, I have been told (perhaps cynically) that the CofE is beginning to get its act together when it comes to dealing with clergy stress and burnout. The cynicism comes from the aside which said, "It helps them to not fall foul of employment law rather than real concern! Being 'church' I would hope that this is not true and would consider the view to have much to do with their desire to see all clergy taking union membership (something I struggle with)..
Mind you, considering the fact that many clergy are being asked to write a job description (whoops, I of course meant 'role' description) and the reality that those who run the show are looking at performance management, potential for redundancy (you get a year's stipend and are shown the door) and other secular practices I can understand that unions do fit into the secular model being embraced.
Perhaps the letter to the Church Times (May 2008) from the Revd. Philip Clements, sheds some light in that he claimed to be, "One of the 22 per cent who were off sick owing to stress." His resulted in a heart attack and retirement. Was this a correct figure? Twenty-two percent is an incredibly high number and if almost a quarter of all those absent have their illness related to stress, then we must surely be doing something very wrong with our workforce.
So why is this new phenomenon appearing (or is it an old one?) and what can we do to remedy it?
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