c. 2006 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) When Amanda Adams was growing up, she considered a number of professions: doctor, nurse, writer, teacher, psychologist and bareback rider.

She eventually became a Presbyterian minister because it includes all the things she wants. “Ministry,” said Adams, 26, “is an extraordinary balancing act between what we do every day _ the mundane paperwork and meetings, sitting at people’s beds when they’re ill _ and personal time, time for our own devotions.”

Adams and two other young ministers arrived at First Presbyterian Church in Ann Arbor, Mich., last September, committed to two-year residencies. They’re part of the Transition-Into-Ministry Program funded by the Lilly Endowment.

As an Indianapolis nonprofit focusing on education, religion and community development, Lilly in 1999 began a number of pilot programs to help young ministers move from seminary to full-time pastorates. Transition-Into-Ministry has been part of Lilly’s larger effort to improve preparation of pastoral leaders. The foundation has invested $38 million in the program and made grants to 31 institutions.

First Presbyterian, which includes about 2,200 members, was one of the first congregations to host Transition-Into-Ministry residents and has since had nine.

Working about 50 hours a week, each resident rotates through a series of areas, including evangelism, stewardship, adult and children’s education, special projects and administration.

Each learns not only the specific skills that go with such things as a good sermon or a good Sunday school lesson but the relationships that make ministry work.

Adams, along with the two other residents, Meghan Gage and Andrew Parnell, came to ministry as the result of relationships with people already working in the field.

Parnell, 31, is a `PK” _ a preacher’s kid. Reared the son of a Presbyterian minister in Parsons, Kan., Parnell thought ministry was his dad’s profession, not something for him. But a church youth program and a friendship with a young Baptist minister that grew out of it led to the seminary.

Gage, 28, planned to be a psychologist, but realized during her senior year at Ohio Wesleyan University that secular work didn’t fit her properly. A campus chaplain and a pastor of the church she attended said go to a seminary; get a master of divinity degree.

Adams was about 15 when her pastor in Alexandria, Va., noticed her interest in God and church. He suggested ministry.

“I thought he was nuts, and went home,” Adam recalled.

But the idea took root, and by senior year, Adams had focused on a seven-year path to ordination.

Ministry, say the three residents, allows one to witness some of the most important, most intimate moments of people’s lives. “I’ve had people share things with me that they won’t tell their spouse or their children” Gage said. “I just feel it’s an absolute privilege the things we’re able to share and are asked to share.”

The flip side is that after seminary, a newly ordained minister often takes a job that requires great skill but doesn’t offer much support, particularly if he or she is serving a small church.

The results can be serious mistakes, burnout and in some cases, rejection of ministry altogether.

“Being a minister is more than sermons,” said Gretchen Wolfram, spokeswoman for the Lilly Endowment. It requires leadership and administrative skill, not to mention nuts-and-bolts things like basic knowledge of accounting.

The Rev. Eldon Beery, who supervises ministry residents at First Presbyterian, said about 20 percent of men and about 40 percent of women in ministry drop out within five years. “It’s one thing to be a student writing good answers at the seminary, something else to work with people in a parish,” Beery said. “We immerse these young seminary graduates in parish ministry so that they experience and experiment in a protected atmosphere.”

“There are hands out to catch us,” Gage said. “Ongoing supervision.”

Gage has helped a group of First Presbyterian teenagers prepare for confirmation. She initially wondered how to take them from her “thick book learning” to feeling the faith in their bones. Using a 6-foot strip of butcher paper, she eventually wrote key words and phrases and symbols from her own faith statement. Words like, “I believe in the Trinity” and “I believe God calls us to serve.”

She encouraged them to experiment, to try out what they believe. It’s all part of a faith journey.

DSB/JL END O’DONNELL

(Catherine O’Donnell writes for The Ann Arbor News in Ann Arbor, Mich.)

Editors: To obtain a photo of the Rev. Amanda Adams, Andrew Parnell and the Rev. Eldon Beery, go to the RNS Web site at https://religionnews.com. On the lower right, click on “photos,” then search by subject or slug.