Moving on, but mindful of what’s left behind

It is summer at last; time for long and lingering sunlight, angry growls of thunder on sticky days and blessed trips to the roadside ice cream stand.

It is what we have all been waiting for through those dreary, brown days of late autumn, dark December nights and tedious, muddy March.

Summer is also the season in my denomination and many others when ministers move on to new assignments. Unlike Presbyterians, Congregationalists and Baptists, who can hold onto the same clergy (if they wish) from seminary graduation to retirement, United Methodists deploy their pastors on a regional basis.

The strength of our system is that theoretically every pastor has a church and every church a pastor. The weakness is that sometimes moves come at a time when all is going well locally, when the needs of a sister parish down the road simply require a change.

Such has been my experience this year, as I leave Aroostook County after eight years to move to our congregation in Augusta: Green Street United Methodist Church.

In addition to curtailing my contributions to the Voices column – I’ll be an occasional foreign correspondent from the “other” Maine – my departure has given rise to reflection upon how religious leaders leave their communities of faith.

It is perhaps the hardest and most painful moment of a pastorate: leaving the keys on the counter, closing the pulpit Bible for the last time and turning off the lights from a switch that our fingers can easily find even in the dark.

Leaving a congregation is so difficult because from the moment we walk out the door with a complex mixture of feelings – doubt, regret, guilt, sadness, contentment – we know that our time as pastor in this place is finished.

Pastoral ethics (and common sense) require that when we move on we leave the title “pastor” behind. It’s necessary in part because we’ll be just as busy down the road as we were before.

More importantly, however, we know that a pastoral relationship is woven from the threads of significant life experiences. A funeral, a baptism, a timely or well-worded sermon all cohere over time into that moment when a person can meaningfully say, “She is my pastor” or “I go to his church.”

By swooping in at a tragic or painful moment, determined to make everything better again, we former pastors can only disrupt the natural process by which the pain of our departure is healed. Staying away is the best thing for the church, but so difficult to do.

As so many clergy move on to other communities this summer, I will be mindful of the parishioners who are left behind. I will hope and pray that they will recognize their former pastor’s silence and absence during the coming months for what it is: a gift of love.

The Rev. Thomas L. Blackstone, Ph.D., has been a United Methodist pastor in Presque Isle and is a brother in the Order of St. Luke. He may be reached via tlbphd@yahoo.com. Voices is a weekly commentary by Maine people who explore issues affecting spirituality and religious life. His columns will continue on an irregular basis.