What does a Church of Ireland Minister do?

This is a topic I have been asked to speak about at a local school over the next couple of weeks ... It's a good question ... and I'm sure lot's of people would have their own answers to it.  So I thought I'd blog a wee bit of it ...

Some may jokingly say ... uck sure you only work one day a week ... let's laugh that one off immediately! ;-)  .. haha ... and move on. :-)

Some may genuinely wonder ... not knowing at all ... apart from a sunday morning what clergy do when we're not at the front of church.

Well ... over the past 3 1/2 years + 3 years in Minister School! I have reflected on some of the tasks at length - Firstly it is a lifelong commitment, The vows which I took shape the task which I am currently doing.

So those are the theory: In reality over the course of the past few years, since arriving in Belfast and now Blarney I have been thinking about this question and would say that the role of Deacon, Priest, Presbyter, Minister ... whatever you wish to call what I do comes down in my opinion to 2 main things

• Communicating Good News 
• Providing Pastoral Care for anyone who is in need 

These are very much linked and takes the whole of my time as they mean diferent things in all sorts of ways.

Communicating the good news - of course means preaching & teaching on sundays, celebrating Holy Communion, taking services ... but communicating also means talking with people, being with people, writing, blogging, phoning, getting involved in all sorts of things at community level, building relationships with all sorts of people. You can't communicate if you are not out and about meeting people and doing practical things to simply help!

Providing Pastoral Care - In our world today there are many needs - in every community there are many needs, many issues ... As part of my work I am out and about chatting with people who have all the stresses and strains of life - we see the great moments of celebration in lives and also have the responsibility and privilege also to be invited into the most difficult and troubling issues of lives and situations. As a minister this pastoral aspect to work is so vitally important - simply asking "how are you?" allows people to say - what they normally say - "yeah - I'm good thanks" or actually say "mmm... not that great" and allows them the chance to chat openly about issues.

We do these things in the context of our understanding and experience of God & his word as written in the Bible as well as how the church has understood it down through the centuries. That's why my office is filled with books and why day by day I try to pray and read my Bible (it's not always easy - even for a minister!) ... But I  do want to  get to know God better than I did yesterday ... I want to apply the Bible to what I read in the newspaper.

I also want those who are in the church to grow in their faith and share it, and make an impact in their families, in their workplaces and schools again communicating the good news and providing support where they can.

So I suppose that's a start to understand what a Church of Ireland Minister does!

PS ... for this to happen there is of course all the necessary meetings, admin, form filling..  housekeeping and all the rest of the things that are necessary for any organisation to do but those do enable the above to be done!

Any of my facebook friends like to give their own answers???