What makes this work so hard is precisely why Substack Seminary exists.
Like my colleague Fr. Cathie Caimano, I am—by necessity and calling—a kind of “free-range priest.” I work across multiple contexts and roles, many of them outside traditional parish structures. Another pastor recently suggested I call myself a “New Era Pastor.” That phrase tracks in more ways than one.
I work part time as a hospital chaplain. I work part time for a ministry nonprofit. I podcast. I read. I write. I teach. I do this work here on Substack.
None of this is accidental. It’s adaptive.
What makes it difficult is that even as churches and denominations acknowledge institutional decline, most still operate as if institutional stability is the norm. The structures have changed. The assumptions have not.
The lingering assumption of institutional margin
Here’s a simple example.
In my role as a part-time hospital chaplain, I work on-call overnight shifts. Most nights, I’m not called in. I earn a very modest stipend for being available. When I am called in, families or patients often ask, “What church are you from?”
The assumption is telling.
They assume I’m a community pastor—employed full time by a congregation with enough institutional margin to absorb late-night crisis care. And, to be fair, the hospital system assumes something similar, based on how little it pays for that availability.
This same logic shows up in denominational and church contexts.
Cathie has shared stories of awkward conversations when she explains that she charges for her time. I’ve had those same moments—the pause, the raised eyebrow, the confusion—when I explain why a church or judicatory should hire me rather than assume my labor is already subsidized somewhere else.
The problem with fractional ministry
This exposes a deeper issue with how part-time and fractional ministry roles are framed.
Even when a church funds a part-time position, it often assumes the remaining income needed for a full-time living can be easily made up elsewhere. In reality, those remaining hours are almost impossible to replace with stable, meaningful work—especially on a one-to-one basis, and especially with work that aligns with a clergyperson’s training and vocation.
Ministry does not scale cleanly into fractions.
A 1/2 or 3/4 role still carries full-time emotional, cognitive, and relational demands. Schedules are inflexible. Emergencies don’t respect job descriptions. And the remaining income often has to be earned in work entirely outside one’s specialty.
What looks like flexibility on paper becomes precarity in practice.
This is why cobbling together part-time roles so often fails—not because clergy lack creativity or effort, but because the work is being measured with the wrong formula.
Why the contractor metaphor matters
This is where the language of a contractor becomes helpful—not as a redefinition of ministry, but as a metaphor.
When you hire a contractor, you are not paying for the number of hours they spend on the job. You are paying for their experience, skill, and judgment—the ability to build something correctly the first time, avoid costly mistakes, and respond when things don’t go as planned.
Pastoral work often functions the same way.
Churches are not simply purchasing time.
They are engaging formation, discernment, and lived experience.
This helps explain why fractional ministry so often fails. A church may pay for “part-time hours,” but still expects full-vocation availability, wisdom in crisis, and long-range pastoral judgment.
The contractor metaphor tells the truth: churches are not buying hours; they are paying for expertise.
Why this space exists
This is why Cathie and I keep pushing for different ways of imagining clergy employment—and why Substack Seminary exists.
We are trying to help leaders navigate ministry after institutional certainty has faded. To name the mismatch between expectations and reality. To advocate for fairer, clearer, and more sustainable ways of structuring clergy work.
Substack Seminary is not about restoring an institution that no longer exists.
It’s about forming leaders who can live faithfully within real limits.
If you are navigating ministry across multiple roles, wrestling with fractional employment, or trying to articulate your value clearly and honestly—this is the conversation you belong in.
Join us.
it’s true that most congregations are small - mine is. they could never afford to pay me full time. or even half time.
but they do pay me appropriately- because they pay me for the work I do: 2 Sundays a month worship leader and other specific tasks they contract with me for .
they get the ministry they need and I get paid humanely - and can easily do more work elsewhere.
I think we need to change this conversation from ‘small churches can’t afford clergy so clergy work for vey little’ to ‘clergy do the work we’re called to do in the ways congregations can afford’.
As a formerly bi-vocational priest, who now has a part-time parish and the luxury of a secular pension and Social Security, I like the metaphor of contractor ministry. One reality of small parishes is that the number of hospitalizations, deaths and other parish emergencies is correspondingly small. In the past six years I have had only three funerals of currently active parishioners. My earlier parishes never requested an hourly accounting and they knew I could not receive phone calls during my secular working hours (as I was a full-time bus driver). Furthermore, I never lived closer than 20 miles from the church building, so I was never asked to check if a door was locked or to wait for service personnel to perform repairs. They could not expect full-time service and accepted what I was able to provide. In addition to consistent worship leadership, they appreciated my input with Vestry, Finance, and Parochial Reports and my connections to neighboring parishes and the diocese. (On the other hand, I used to describes myself as redefining bus ministry. My secular employment presented ministry opportunities far beyond the parish walls. I did hospital visits and even funerals for bus passengers and co-workers, who had no church membership. And no, I did not impose ashes on passengers when they boarded my bus on Ash Wednesday.)
Despite the post WWII suburban expansion of the church, the relative abundance of clergy (Baby Boom and the ordination of women) provided sufficient clergy for many smaller churches to have their own clergy and for weekly Eucharist to become expected after the 1979 BCP was released.
Actually, parishes with a low ASA and a small budget have a long history in the Episcopal Church. The guidance of full-time clergy was often an unavailable luxury. While cities and wealthy patrons supported cardinal parishes with multiple full-time clergy, rural areas often were part of multi-point ministries with ordained clergy who might only preside once a month (or were missions of large nearby parishes who provided some limited clergy leadership). (Over sixty years ago, I knew one priest who taught Latin part-time in the local public high school to supplement his parish salary.) Ministry was not delegated to clergy; everyone was included. Music might be provided by volunteer instrumentalists, as well as volunteer choristers. The norm of Morning Prayer on Sunday meant that worship could be lay led; Eucharist was not expected. Most fellowship, outreach and pastoral care were directed and performed by laity. So long as donations covered utilities and repairs, the parish could be a Christian witness to their community.