I work in public education, but I’m not a teacher, administrator, custodian, social worker or a member of the cafeteria staff. I’m something far stranger, or, according to at least one student I met during the course of my work…
Q&A: Is that grief or depression you’re experiencing due to COVID-19?
People are recoiling from multiple aspects of the reality that’s impacting their lives on social, emotional and financial levels.
I was a pastor struggling with depression. The evangelical community offered virtually no helpful resources
Depression stole my soul and buried it so deeply that (with apologies to the Apostle Paul) for me, to live was not Christ at all, but to die most assuredly would have been gain.
If we truly believed in God, how could we be sad?
Christians with a “winter spirituality” may wonder if they really do believe because the mountaintop is never a part of their faith journeys. Yet, as Martin Marty argues, their faith is just as real and valid as any other, just sung in a different key.
Listening to depression as a spiritual and political practice
The bad news that our world isn’t fine, that life is profoundly unfair, misaligned and wobbly and violently broken should tell us all something important about depression – namely, that depression isn’t wrong to declare life on earth uninhabitable; it’s just terribly misguided about what causes our maladies and exactly what solutions provide their remedy.
The ranks of ex-pastors grow as some join ‘nones’ and ‘dones’
Between the notoriously long hours, the unrealistic expectations and the severe stress on health and family, church ministry often becomes too much for many — in fact most — ministers to handle. For some it results in being fired, quitting or…
Positive mental health: how can clergy tap into it?
As the minister for care ministries at Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas, Tiffany Wright’s job is to support people who are experiencing crises in their lives. A year and a half ago, however, Wright’s father died and it was her…
How can clergy achieve positive mental health?
A study has found that certain conditions correspond to both a lower likelihood of depression and anxiety and to higher levels of positive mental health. By promoting these, churches can help their clergy thrive.
People-pleasing pastors risk health, families and callings
Besides preaching and visiting the sick, too many ministers also are skilled at denying themselves vacation days, putting in extreme time at the office and scaling back on family time. “We are well known for overworking,” said Merianna Neely Harrelson,…