Clergy Wellbeing Down Under

Families On Mission: A Conversation with Author and Global Mission Consultant Marion Knell

• Valerie Ling • Season 1 • Episode 16

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As our season draws to a close, I began to contemplate leadership in a wider context, beyond just Australia and parish settings, I was drawn to explore international issues of leadership in gospel work.

Marion Knell is a seasoned cross-cultural consultant and trainer with an extensive history spanning nearly three decades. Her expertise stretches across a multitude of sectors, but at its core, Marion's passion lies in fostering resilience and longevity in the lives of cross-cultural workers and their families.

Having worked extensively with families overseas,  Marion has garnered a wealth of experience and understanding in preparing adults and children for international assignments. This preparation is not just about the outward journey but also assisting them in their return, ensuring a smooth transition and debriefing experience.

Currently, Marion's work involves delivering  training to refugee workers in areas of trauma response, the cultural nuances of dislocation, and overall staff care.

Marion is also the author of Burn Up Splash Down and Families On The Move.  She has also been instrumental in establishing the MA in Member Care with Redcliffe College.

In this episode, Marion discusses the complex role of church leadership, burnout and the impact on pastors' children.

If you are a pastor and want to reach our for professional supervision, or counselling for yourself and/or your family, send me an email: valerie@effectiveserving.com.au

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Podcast Disclaimer:

Please be aware that the opinions and viewpoints shared on this podcast are personal to me and my guests, and do not represent the stance of any institution. This podcast aims to present findings for open discussion and dialogue, inviting listeners to engage critically and draw their own conclusions. While the content serves informational purposes, it is not a substitute for professional advice. Thank you for joining me on this journey of exploration and conversation!

Valerie Ling:

Hey, it's Valerie Ling. I'm a clinical psychologist and I'm your host for the clergy well-being Down Under podcast. I'm looking forward to interviewing an expert today to take you through my findings from my research where I asked 200 pastors down under how they were doing. Don't forget to subscribe, like and share. Buckle up and here we go. Welcome, friends, to another episode. I've got here with me Mary and Nell. Welcome Mary.

Marion Knell:

Thank you very much, Valerie. It's good to be with you.

Valerie Ling:

As of this moment when we are recording, you are actually in the UK.

Marion Knell:

I am. I'm in North London on a rather grey day, but that's kind of been symptomatic of the summer in the UK this year.

Valerie Ling:

Now, mary, I know you from Global Mission Member Care and particularly in the years when I was looking for material on kids in mission, and so two of your books are on our bookshelf. In the practice, as I say compulsory reading, I want to give children a transition, but I'd love for you to introduce yourself, because you've done so much. But I'd love for you to introduce yourself.

Marion Knell:

Thank you so much. So I've actually been to Australia now four times, so that kind of marked something. And I did a seminar in Perth once on well-being, member care for leaders. I've got a little bit of link in there. My background is I'm a teacher but for many years I've been involved in missions particularly so my husband and I were there at World Ministries so through that really became involved in missionary kids and families issues, because that was big, taking families into the Muslim world and out of that came families on the move which looked at the dynamics of taking a family overseas.

Marion Knell:

And then the second book is about reentry for adults and teens and through that became involved in the wider area of well-being or member care and started sounding the masters in member care at Radcliffe College to give some academic rigor to what we were talking about, and from there have saved into working with refugee workers. The head of the refugee highway partnership said to me about 10 years ago Mary and member care must have something to say to refugee area because workers are burning out like there's no tomorrow. So that's been an interesting journey, especially since now we've been looking after 400 Afghans in a hotel in our town. So it's really kind of right down to the nitty gritty of that sort of ministry. So yeah, it's been a good journey, varied, which I like.

Valerie Ling:

And hasn't finished. You were just talking about all the different places.

Marion Knell:

Yeah, so I was in. I did some stuff with the World Without Orphans, their conference in Bulgaria, naples for Refugees, and then at the end of September I'm going to Moldova to do something with teens out from Eastern Europe on stress, compassion, fatigue and burnout, having been for three years running to Ukraine some years ago. Homo Sovieticus is alive and well and the concept of self care or anything like that is just not in that culture. So we're having to come at it from a different angle really.

Valerie Ling:

I mean, you've been working in mission, and certainly in the international scene, for for a long time. What do you make of the current speak about burnout and self care and the stress? What do you make of that? Is it always been around?

Marion Knell:

I think it's been around. It hasn't been talked about because you weren't allowed to. There was very much a link, I think. If you go back some years between calling and sacrifice, god's call me. So I'm a sacrifice, everything, and that included my family. And if you dare raise a comment about the demands being made on you, then you quickly slapped down, particularly for organizations. Organizations tolerated incredible rates. I remember, about 20 years ago, one leader saying to me well, everybody knows that personally, my job burns out. Nice fact and accepted fact. So I think what we've done is the floodgates haven't given people permission to to be self aware and to be vulnerable, because, as a leader, you were not to be vulnerable. That was the last thing you were to be. You were the strength, strength, the pillar. So I think, in a healthy way, we're exploring it.

Valerie Ling:

And so let's say, in the times when we weren't a lot, and I think it's still there, when we don't, how does it appear on one of the signs and symptoms? You know what? What are the consequences if we accept that burnout is part of serving?

Marion Knell:

I think one of the major consequences that we damage the people we serve, people in burnout are usually the emotions are shut down, the ability to empathize, all of that sort of things got gone. So when we're teaching, we teach the foot. We don't want to do it now, but the full stages of burnout and making people aware of that, particularly in teams. I think that's what we've concentrated on. Whether it's a pastoral team or a church team or a mission team, if the team is aware of the impact of stress leading to burnout, then they can watch out for each other and I think that's really important. You know, because we're so, particularly in the worst, such an individualistic society that I'm responsible for me, you know, whereas this whole, you know the Galatians, bear your own burden. That's a little rucksack on your back, whereas bearable and others burdens is this 40 on this heavy load which we're supposed to share with others.

Valerie Ling:

I'm looking at some information you sent through to me which I'm very keen to ask you about in a minute, but you mentioned the four stages of burnout and it really mirrors what I see in our practice. So stay right, walk about an energy shortage. It's the exhaustion that comes up. Yeah.

Marion Knell:

Yes, well, I was just going to say I think that's where it's easy for people just to brush it aside. I'm just tired, you know, but we're not talking about just I'm tired, but you know I'm spent, there's nothing left.

Valerie Ling:

And you've written here to me saying that there's no satisfaction in the work or the ministry and it can lead to the sarcastic and verbal contempt for others or the work and ministry.

Marion Knell:

Yeah, and that's where it begins to impact the team, which is why I say it's important the team can recognize, because it's, I think it's a disillusionment, that's it that sits in, and so you go through the motions without any joy or return and then you very quickly turn to being cynical, and that then that's when it's deflected upon the team. Really.

Valerie Ling:

Yeah, Very similar to what we find in relationship, marital relationship research is. Once it hits that level of content, you know something's really really bad in the relationship. Yeah, yeah. The stage yeah, you've got. Then it becomes chronic symptoms and this is where bad behaviors can develop slowly or last a long time and I'm really interested in this through a narrowness of viewpoint and they can be anger, a sense of not being appreciated, intense fear of suspicion and a kind of a disorientation, even. Yes.

Marion Knell:

I think because the worldview is now, everything comes under scrutiny and under judgment and therefore bad behaviors can be the sort of verbal bad behaviors. But obviously people then start to turn to other ways of satisfying their needs and that's where you can get people moving into unhealthy addictions, which come into that as well.

Valerie Ling:

That's certainly what we see clinically. Marion, certainly see, that is part of the pathway. Addictions tends to be one of the key coping mechanisms, if you like. Yeah, so at stage three we're into crisis now a deep, abiding negativity, a sense that things cannot and will not change, feeling trapped, no way out.

Marion Knell:

And I think by this time the person really is not self aware. But this is where you're getting to the point of being in danger of committing suicide. We're into the really deep mental health issues. And yet very often these people are also in denial. So they just carry on in the ministry. And this is why I say it's so important that we look out for each other, because they just carry on and they become then destructive of others because they can't empathize with their whether you call them clients or the people they're working with within the ministry and that's when they start to do more damage and more harm than good.

Valerie Ling:

Yeah, so at stage four, I think, as a clinical psychologist, that's where we were seeing a lot of the impact. You call it the crash here in your paper. It's a Dutch hopelessness, and that's where we see the depression, the anxiety it eats into all the other aspects of self and others. I think it's not just about how you feel about yourself in ministry, but how you feel of yourself in general.

Marion Knell:

Yes, and I think one of the problems with Christian ministry and we're not just talking about Christian, we are talking about pastors as well is that so for so many, their identity is vested in the role. So if you take the role away, who am I without the ministry? And that's why people often cling on long after they should do because of that, yeah, that I have to fulfill this role. Self expectations as well, of course. With pastors, the huge expectations of the congregation that you'll do with unrealistic expectations we might add.

Valerie Ling:

So one of the reasons why I started the work that I do was in 2016,. I gave my first ever presentation about this concept of burnout in ministry and when it had finished, a 30 something year old individual came and pulled me and he said don't ever forget the kids. He said I'm a kid, I'm an adult ministry kid. As a group of us, we didn't make it. He says when you're talking about these things, don't forget the kids, and I know you have a heart for this as well. What do you see of kids in ministry, in mission, in general, and then when these sorts of stages of burnout sets in in the family, yeah, and I think this is something actually we've been aware, certainly within the missions community and subsequently in the in the past, some ministry for some time.

Marion Knell:

So there was a, a survey done in the UK in 2020 where they actually identified problems with the family as being significant in terms of ministers Saying 50 percent of them were concerned about the impact on their families. And what we see with the kids is what the message a lot of kids have is my parents' ministry is more important than I am. One kid said to me I had to queue up to tell my father I was getting engaged. I had to queue up with everybody else. So this the, the heresies they learned. Timothy Stanford wrote a book called I have to Be Perfect. He is, he's a, an MK, but writes it really from the PK response perspective MK, pk past kids. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean we put MKs together now under this banner TTCK. So cut kids. So past six kids don't have the, the complication of more cultures, but they do have these messages sent I have to be perfect.

Marion Knell:

Everybody views the pastors family. Everybody looks to see how they're behaving in church. People have talked about being in a pastors family is a bit like being in a goldfish bowl as a child. You have no privacy. People come to your home all the time. You have issues of trust. Who can I trust? Because if I tell my story, if I say anything, it's going to be out there. Who can I trust to say what's coming? And some of the kids talk about being was feeling responsible for their parents mid ministry. I could ruin my dad's ministry so I have to be perfect again.

Marion Knell:

I remember one small child. They were in Greece and she was going to Greek school. She was about eight and she really wasn't coping and they were going to have to take her out and put her to international court and she said but if that, if that happens, you know the Greeks won't hear about Jesus. I'm not a year old, she should be very. She was about eight, you know. So I think that feeling that you're, you're, you're really an encumbrance on almost, you know that you come last in the list. Other people's does the other message, other people's needs are always more important than mine. I mean first of all owning that, believing it, but then seeing that actually that's happening in practice and surely that shouldn't be. What shouldn't I count? Why don't I count? I remember Marjorie Fowler you may have heard of, who's done a lot of stuff with ministry, well, well-being.

Marion Knell:

She said it's not families or ministry, it's families in ministry, that when we do things in our ministry we need to take into account the whole family, and that involves, I think, in decision making. The older the kids get. We look at the teens and very often you've had decisions made of you in which you had no say but which have profound effect. I mean some some churches, the ministers move every three years or so. Not every minister stays in situ for a long time and each time, of course, the child has to uproot, has all the grief and loss of losing friends, has the strain of making new friends, is already labelled with a pastor's kid and therefore has certain other things labelled on him or her at school. Even so, and that sense of I have had no control is something I would be very interested to know.

Marion Knell:

Within the PK circle, what's true? In M cases we have a higher incidence of eating disorders. Oh, yes, that's a question. Yes, because it's one. That's. The one thing I can control is what I eat. Can't control where we live, what we do, what school I go to, but that's something I can control and that's really quite worrying.

Valerie Ling:

Well, I wonder whether you think there's grief, there's loss, there's also shame with kids, I think, mary, there's a kind of shame of not toughing it out, of saying that you're feeling sad or you're not coping as a ministry kid. Do you think? Yeah, yeah.

Marion Knell:

I mean there's there's a lot of oughts and shoulds in a ministry kid's life. I ought to know this. I should be able to do this, and of course you hear these platitudes that are dished out. I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me. Lulli, lulli, lulli, and that's really not not helpful. And I think when for ministry kids it's really hard, who can I talk to about this? If I am having struggles, because I shouldn't have struggles, but I am. You know, whatever area is, whether it's something big like sexuality or really something quite small, I shouldn't be happy. Who can I share with these struggles, with and, and, as you say, a sense of shame that I should not? So these shoulds ought all those loaded verbs that come into a PK vocabulary.

Valerie Ling:

I think it's challenging as well because, as the world of education has become more progressive in helping kids to identify and to be aware and accept, like you know, whether they have identity confusions or, you know, really strong emotions, I don't know that there's a space for ministry kids to be able to say that they feel angry or resentful or bitter or confused. I think that, even if they're in school, I remember seeing one child who could never forget for herself that her father was the pastor. No matter what she went in, she remembered and anything she said she'd have to filter. Now I don't think that that's what the parents told the child, but that was the responsibility, this the witness that this she was in primary school, that this child felt she needed to bear even at school.

Marion Knell:

Yeah, and I mean yes, you say it's not necessarily come from the family, but certainly it's coming from the congregation, those who employ her father. As I say, there is a sense, I think, when you're a PK, that you're under the microscope all the time. And what we found out with missions is that people felt that their ministry was being judged by how their kids were doing. So you'd have people stand up, say, you know, well, I've got three kids and they're all going on with the Lord and la, la, la, la, you know, and those of us who may be at that stage that wasn't true were kind of, you know, a bully for you. But the idea that in some way your kids validate your call is an incredibly dangerous one.

Marion Knell:

Yeah, I think that's that's. That's a lesson that they learn. And you know we don't bring, we use scripture wrongly because we say try to train up a child when it's the way it should go and it when it's all about department. That's from the book of Proverbs, that's a general observation, it's not promise, and I think it's very hard on the kids when they are seen as the kind of the standard. This is the seal on the ministry.

Valerie Ling:

And so when we have family. So one of the things our survey well, my survey found because it was a masters of leadership, I couldn't really do. Nonetheless, it came up as one of the top reasons why someone in ministry would consider resigning would be because of the impact on family. Mm, hmm, mm, hmm, yes.

Marion Knell:

Sorry.

Valerie Ling:

Carry on. Do you have some similar findings or observations where you are, Marion?

Marion Knell:

Yes, and I think the other. The other factor in that is that for many ministers their spouse is their accountability partner, their part. They don't have an outside mentor. Okay, Because the problem when you're the minister is who do I talk to?

Valerie Ling:

This is the midpoint break for the podcast. If you want to put a pause and walk away and come back with it, make sure you do check out the description for all the various downloads that we have for you, including my full report, research and reflections. You might also want to remember to like, share and subscribe. So stop now or keep going.

Marion Knell:

Who, who, who ministers to the minister. So the strain within a marriage is is huge on that as well as as the strain on on children, and certainly I think it was. There was a survey done in 2000 in the UK and that came up with 80. I think it was something like 50% of ministers were considering going because of the effect on on their family. Now that's in some ways it was heartening that they were aware of the fact that the family was impacted, because some ministers kind of say along as if you know well, nothing's happening because they're living in this you know other plane of of being. And we look at some of our missionary heroes like and William Carey, and the family was an absolute mess Because you know, I must, my ministry is the most important thing by calling is most important thing. So in a sense it doesn't surprise me that you've found that. But what is interesting is the level of honesty you've managed to achieve, I think, in this.

Valerie Ling:

I'm so appreciative, actually, of the 200 participants that I believe gave gave a voice to some issues that we don't see. So I remember every admissions conference I get to go to. I will choose to do the electives for children, as I often find there's not enough that we know about what's happening with children, but I also like to attend the ones where you know the people who have who are finishing off in mission, tell their stories and certainly attending mission member care conferences. So I know it's like how do you define mission member care? But it's actually terrible work.

Valerie Ling:

I just sit with my notebook and I categorize the stories grief, trauma, grief trauma, particularly the ones finishing off, and one of the things that I like to do is the number of times wives would talk about the grief and trauma, about their parenting or the issues to do with their children on the field. I thought that that was really interesting because, like you say, when we, when we think about missionaries and we think of these wonderful stories, but even today the reality is we're not talking about the grief and trauma. But even today the reality is I have yet to really go to a member care conference where there isn't some level of trauma to do with stuff that happens not just with the field, but what happens with families on the field. Do you think?

Marion Knell:

I think so and I was very interested in your research in the whole issue of the role of the organization, because I think organizations are not set up for the well-being of their staff. Very often there aren't good accountabilities, there's not good appraisals, it's boundaries. There's not. People aren't taught on boundaries. You know there should be boundaries to your ministry boundaries, obviously, and your marriage boundaries for your kids. Ruth Van Rieken did some research on kids in a healthy system and kids in an unhealthy system. That kids in a healthy system. You know you have your boundaries but the box is open. So there are choices to be made. There is freedom to go. A kid in an unhealthy is expected to conform and I think conformity has been a big thing in missions and of course, often the wives are the ones at home enforcing whatever the culture demands, and I think that puts an amazing demand on them. I think the other thing as far as kids is concerned is obviously the culture that you're serving in impacts. So if you want to shame on a culture, that will impact. So the culture that you're serving in and your family culture and increasingly, of course, our workforce within pastors is very multicultural, so we can't assume that everybody's coming at this from the same lens, in terms of how children should behave and how children should be brought up, we have our ideas, but other cultures do it in different ways and that's a challenge, I think, within the whole challenge of multicultural church, which I don't know how many multicultural churches there are in Australia, but that's a really growing phenomenon across Europe, and listening to somebody from Germany recently on how they were coping with I think it was 20 odd nationalities and six very predominant languages and the culture that went with it, so that's quite an interesting whole field really.

Marion Knell:

Within that, I think you talked about grief, trauma, loss with children. Well, I think it happens with adults too. It's easier to be angry than to grieve and what we do without. I think some of the things we do with our teens that return from overseas could be helpful to do with PKs when they get to about 18, you know, and you're trying to look back and trying to make sense of this life as a PK, the things you weren't able to look at, and so the one of the lifelong effects of being a PK, and how do you respond to that. You don't have to let it define you. How do you find yourself again.

Marion Knell:

We have a ritual we do with people on the whole area of grief and bitterness. Because it's not dealt with, anger, it'll go to business, won't it? And we have one of these little and tacit tablets, you know ready or whatever. It is in a bowl of water and we say this represents your bitterness. When you're ready, let the tablet go in the water and it slowly dissipates. But until you're ready, hold on to it. But if you don't deal with it, it will eat away at you.

Valerie Ling:

Yeah, yeah, actually, just as you are saying that, I'm thinking that you know, when you're a child in ministry, in the primary school years, you may actually not know what that is, but you will start to have shadows of it come when you're 1819, 2021. And that's the time we have the words to start to articulate, isn't?

Marion Knell:

Yeah and.

Marion Knell:

I think it's. Yeah, we, we just listen. Just reading your, your paper and the whole organizational approach, I wonder whether within churches, there's room for sort of debriefing and debriefing techniques for pastors, either regularly, obviously, when they leave a ministry and move to another one, but some sort of procedure which helps them to go through, as well as ongoing kind of monitoring so that people don't go down into that burnout phase. I mean, you've probably seen the stress and burnout, the stress and functioning curve, you know where we? We start at the bottom with with those stress and we move up to our optimum stress and functioning and then we have what I call the red zone and we can dip in and out of the red zone and it's okay.

Marion Knell:

But you spend too long in the red zone with too much stress and and you're down there. But finding ways for ministers, for ministers wise, separately, because very often, well, in some circumstances, the wife just goes along, she doesn't have a call, she's just following her husband, which is tough on the marriage. When it gets tough To have that ability to have a space on someone they can safely share with, yes, I don't know what you think whether that would.

Valerie Ling:

I think it's brilliant. So we we have a debrief process where we're involved, the whole family. We see every child and adult in a family with one particular agency over the last 10 years and we've really seen the benefits of that. So every home assignment, the whole family, and I think one of the beautiful things about that is the children intimately you know. We've seen them when we had a suspicion of something when they were five, and then you know, like, well, here it is again, and then at 12 we're like haha, this is what's happening. Yes, I think that's a that's. We've just found how validating it is. We've seen children cry.

Valerie Ling:

This is the missions community. When we say to them we want to know, when your agency wants to know, how are you doing? And you know you're going to be a service to Jesus. You know, because obviously nobody asked you to come along for the ride, just have to go, and that's just. You know when you, when you tell them that the ones that have been holding it in just the I think it's a great idea, but I don't.

Marion Knell:

I wonder, does does anything like that exist for pastors?

Valerie Ling:

Not for the whole family, I think. I think there are different things that sort of have the spiritual renewal, but probably not the sort of a well being check in for the whole family that I know of. Yeah, I'd be curious if anybody's listening to the podcast and if it exists With this section. Marion, what have you seen really help families thrive in mission and ministry? What do you think really helps?

Marion Knell:

I think. Well, there are various various things for people who are sent obviously, permissions thing, having a really supportive church that understands, because often people don't understand what ministry is like. And I'm thinking to myself now, how does that work out with somebody going into pastoral ministry who are you sent by? Do you have a close group of people who support you? Very often having another family with kids of the same age who aren't necessarily involved in the ministry but who you can stay with, talk to be part of that. So I think there's a big education process in terms of helping churches and sending bodies to understand what's going on, building up those personal links. You talked a lot about self awareness, I think, and I think that's important. One of the studies that was done in the UK showed that for the pastoral ministry you needed a lot of extrovert qualities because you were up front doing things. But the majority of people of Ministers in the survey were introverts, so they were working outside of their comfort zone the whole time.

Marion Knell:

Yes and they weren't aware of that.

Valerie Ling:

Yes.

Marion Knell:

So how do you build in self awareness? How do you train people in necessary skills? I mean, yours was membership, was leadership, and I think certainly in the Bible colleges here, when people are trained, people are not trained in leadership skills or management skills. For many people, running a church is almost like being the CEO of an organization and they have the same thing about mustn't take work home with you. And that's a big challenge for pastors because, as we said, the kids recognize that the home is also part of the hub of the ministry and people can call at any time. One pastor said to me my phone's on 24 seven and I'm saying, well, I didn't actually say it, but and for whose sake is that? But those sort of skills, I think can help.

Marion Knell:

Yeah, and having a whole business of self care and time, or following the Jesus principle of taking away time and having solitude and socializing, finding out who you can socialize with, because he was quite a fun animal, but putting in that that time is important. And sometimes, again, family wise, that the pastor goes off for an individual retreat for three days. But what happens to the rest of the family? Or to the wife? Does she have some sort of retreat time, do the kids go away to some sort of camp where nobody knows who they are?

Marion Knell:

I mean, that's the wonderful thing If you can go somewhere. Nobody knows that your ex's son or daughter. You have a right to privacy, to the being, and I think we could think a lot more about building that in that, that rest, recuperation, building that into as an expectation from an organizational point of view. You will take time off, not take it off if you want, but establishing that Sabbath principle that you know man was created on the sixth day and on the seventh day God rested. So the first thing that man did was was to rest and then went to work. So I think, establishing that, because often pastors and missionaries are their own worst enemies in that field.

Valerie Ling:

And I think kids model after what they see happening. In the whole I think, oh yes, I think what you said. We've got to recognize that. The privacy. I think ministry kids and mission kids don't think that they can have any privacy. Really it's, it's on all the time, unless you're out of the environment, that's right, that's right.

Marion Knell:

Another thing, another thing that the kids came up with not this is the PK thing was the heresies. I hear about God, that God's disappointed in me because I didn't live up to this. You know, and you know, the mirror image of the father obviously is very important within that.

Valerie Ling:

Yes, yes, we're seeing some interesting things in the practice because we now have a therapeutic modality, we use EMDR. So you know it helps adults. We haven't done it with children yet, but you can see how there are fragments of memories for ministry kids that when they were little, sort of maybe seven to nine, it was just frightening to overwhelming things people said or things been said from the front or being in the home, that a little seven, eight year old brain interpreted it in one way and then got stuck. You know, as an adult, sort of 18 to 25, it comes out and they're trying to make sense of. You know what are these memories and hence I think being available to you if you have children who are in that developmental phase. We have to be around to talk, listen, process, attend, protect, because we're the only people that they've got, because the church is not really always a safe place for them. They can't speak it out.

Marion Knell:

And on the speaking out too, I've had PKs and MKs who said you know, well, this happened to me. And the next thing I know it's in the sermon oh dear, yes, oh dear An illustration, you know. In other words, even my story is not my own. My story becomes public and that's a really tough because that then goes back to this issue of trust. The whole issue of trust and control is huge. If I grow up knowing that anything I say or do is likely to be brought out into the open, then who do I trust? How do I establish trust, which affects how people make relationships when they get older, relationships that matter because I have to be able to be completely transparent with this person, and if I haven't learned trust, then that's a real stumbling block to that.

Valerie Ling:

And it makes me think now about the level of conflict that I found in the church. Kids just absorb that. How many numbers of times we've seen it. They know something's not right. They may not be able to articulate it, but they can sense the tension, they can sense the anger, they can sense the sadness. They pick up all of those cues. So now I'm keen to get the message out that even if as adults we can't sort out our stuff, we really owe it to the kids who didn't have a lot of say about being in a ministry family to watch out for them really, yeah and that's one of the things that can turn them against God, of course.

Marion Knell:

because why are we here? Well, because God called us. I would say, be very careful of waving the vocation card, because if it's not right, then the ultimate person who's wrong is God. But if what's happening to me through the congregation, why are we here? Well, it's because God's called us. Then the child thing channels back to God being responsible, and it's very difficult, isn't it? For, I think, for ministers, because this is not just a job, it's more than a job. But is there sort of income as well? So if that blows up suddenly, the family, it has no home, no income. It's a tough one. And how?

Marion Knell:

Yeah, we've got a lot of education, I think, to do within churches, of the ramifications of having a pastor and good boundaries, as we said before, but also what our expectations are, because the expectation is in many churches is that the pastor will do everything, and if I haven't been visited by the pastor, then I haven't been visited and that very soon burns you out because you just don't have enough strength.

Marion Knell:

And they forget the Ephesians. You're there to equip the saints to do the work of ministry, not to do it all yourself and I think that misunderstanding of what we're about and what the kingdom work is about and how geez, that's how people get into that burnout because they think, well, it's all up to me. Like that little eight year old, how will people hear if I don't learn Greek? And it's not God in chooses to involve us in the work of this kingdom, but it's his work. It's not us, it's not about me and what I do. And we have that sort of do spirituality which is completely the opposite way around. What Jesus did we achieve in order to be accepted and love, and they have status, whereas Jesus knew who he was, acted out of that and then had achievements. So we work often a different way around, that sort of what I call square from the way Jesus worked.

Valerie Ling:

I'm thinking now about the paper that you sent me, some of the things we've already spoken about but are you in the process of creating leadership training or this is part of something you're doing, mary?

Marion Knell:

Well, leadership is certainly one of the modules. So I said about the masters in member care, ray Cliff, which is now called staff care and wellbeing, which I'm quite pleased they've changed. So that had kind of two sides One was the mission worker as a person and the other half was the member care provider, and so leadership came within that. Where does? Because in the past leadership and member care have been like this leaders have tended to think that we're just elevating them and we're just into sort of they're there, don't do that, whereas we're saying no, no, it's all about robustness. And I think you mentioned resilience, because that's we have also have a module on resilience, because for me that's been another crucial thing. That's come to the fore. It's a bit of a buzzword, but how do we test people's resilience before they start and how do we help them build resilience? And I think, well, you would know perhaps, but the second of under 40th generation here has not until recently, until COVID I would say has had a relatively easy life. They've not been part of a warfare or economic I mean. Everything's changed since COVID, but we build resilience through hard times. So how else do we build resilience and what does it look like Fraku Sheyfa in her book Trauma and Resilience, I think, identifies false sorts of resilience emotional, personal, physical and spiritual and she looks at what are hallmarks of being resilient in those areas. And then how do we build resilience, how do we build resilient leaders? And then how do we train leaders?

Marion Knell:

I think I've been very impressed with Operation Mobilization's program. So they identify potential leaders when they're young and start doing the training then in leadership. So when they step up to leadership they're actually trained in that. So I'm not necessarily doing it myself but, as I say, it's there in the masters and I think increasingly when we talk about stress and burnout, we look so what would prevent burnout? Because we talk about what happens afterwards. But it's really significant that we look well, what helps prevent burnout and how can we organizationally build that into our structure, in our culture that we are about building resilient people and monitoring how they're doing, so that we're not having to get to the end. A friend of mine once used to say it's much better to stop people falling off the cliff and pick up the pieces at the bottom. And that's where we are with burnout we're picking up the pieces at the bottom. How much better if we can stop people going over the cliff.

Valerie Ling:

Yes, I'm just gonna dial it back because for those listening who may not know, first of all what is member care and then what this master's course is, would you mind just unpacking that a little bit, please? Yeah.

Marion Knell:

So, as I say, we changed it to really well-being. I mean, if you talk within the NGO sector, they'll know I understand staff care. So member care is about the total well-being of people. Hr is about conforming to the right standards things. Member care is 24 seven. It's about the person as well as the work, and it encompasses whole life and all the families.

Marion Knell:

So this year there's an international conference on TCKs which is happening. So it's been around for quite a while, and so the member care MA was a response to getting some academic rigor and research done. So that's been around for about 10 years now. We have had graduates from Australia who are doing very well, deanna Richie, who did her studies on disability and mission, which was very good. So that's really what that's about and that obviously is also adapting all the time.

Marion Knell:

So we don't necessarily have everything the same as we had, say, 10 years ago, because we're trying to respond to a changing situation. But out of that, because of the dissertations like you and your dissertation, we're actually getting some solid research and direction in which to look for. What are the areas? So we've had dissertations on reentry, which was one on resilience, out of which a book came. So a multitude of areas that you can't do just as one person, but by having a master's program you actually get some return on that, right. So that can be done part-time, or most people do it part-time. It can now be done online.

Valerie Ling:

That's wonderful, and you were mentioning that it's one-part resilience and then there's one-part organizational as well. What would be some of the things that you see organizations can do to enhance member care, to take care of the wellbeing of staff?

Marion Knell:

I think, establishing what I would call job descriptions. What are your expectations? Some of the clashes and the stress are because the organization has this expectation of what you're going to do and you have this expectation. If they don't meet, then that's incredible. So clarification of role, I think, is a really important thing, Not being results-oriented in terms of what. Again, stating your expectations, having good appraisals and good accountability both ways, not just from the top down, but I'm a firm believer in 360, accountability and appraisals, good governance, ongoing support, a transparency that's there and, as I say, building in good practice in terms of time off, and that time off means time off. You don't say, well, it's a past as day off on Monday, but you can still contact him If it's a day off, it's a day off. I think putting those things can really help.

Valerie Ling:

What are some examples of governance?

Marion Knell:

Well, again, I don't know what has been happening in Australia recently, but the whole safeguarding issue is huge here because of failures, moral failures and, I think, safeguarding within what it's mandatory here. I expected it in Australia too, but that affects certainly the past as kids, which is important. How, again, you're talking about different denominations, aren't you? In a sense it's easier within the missions because you're talking about an organisation and so you can put in a set of rules or code, which is much easier than in a church situation where you've got different forms of governance. But I think that safeguarding that clear, good training, ongoing training too just because you've done three years at Bible school doesn't mean to say you don't need other training. And how do you identify people's training needs?

Marion Knell:

I think it was OMF that had a really good chart that you could before you went to the field. You would have things what do I want to develop in ministry-wise, spiritually-wise, family-wise, what am I going to do it by? And I think that could transfer easily into ministry One of the key areas that we want to identify what's needed and where can the training be found, and that will shift from year to year, but something that gives a minister a prompt to ask those questions I think is a good thing. And then just keeping obviously to charity law here, charity law is quite strict. So I'm chair of the Board of Welcome Churches, which is a network of we have over a thousand churches now working with refugees and we train them with them. But we have quite strict governance in what we can and can't do, how we do and don't spend our money and all that sort of thing.

Valerie Ling:

So I usually wrap up the podcast by asking three wrap up questions. If there was a problem, let's assume. Maybe let's target this at a family level. If we were a ministry family listening to our conversation today, what's one you would like them to walk away with, to think or to do?

Marion Knell:

I would like them to walk away being. I would want to say be free to be who you want to be and to do what God has called you to, because I think a lot of people are doing a lot of things and I'm not sure that God's actually asked them to do it in the first place. So a freedom to get out of this. If you're in a toxic box, break the lid of the box. So pretty.

Valerie Ling:

Wow. It is a commission to break the lid off of the toxic box. And if there was a church community listening to us and maybe I might ask you to slump this more towards thinking about the kids If there was a church community like a Bible study group or a group of elders listening in, what's one thing you'd like them to walk away with?

Marion Knell:

I would want them to walk in the shoes of the PK's chart of the PK. But imagine yourself as this eight year old and view what happens in the church and in this Bible group through their eyes what are they seeing or what are they hearing and treat them as a child. Know what I mean. We should all know what the various development stages of children are. But, you know, don't treat an eight year old as if they're a 16 year old, because they should know it. This is a Parson's kid. They should know all the verses, they should know all this. But treat them as understand. This is a child. Treat them as a child, as any other child, don't sing them out.

Valerie Ling:

And if there were, you know if there was a policymaker, or at a denominational level, or even at a college level, what's one thing you'd like them to think about in this? You know from our conversation.

Marion Knell:

Well, when you're well, when you're training or when you're employing someone in pastoral ministry, think about the whole family. Yes, this person is the job holder, but what they are about to undertake will affect the whole family. So think about that in terms of what your expectations are and your provision is in terms of, well, it can be provision of housing, but let's go down as simple as that, but take into account the needs of the whole family as you address this person and their move, their calling, whatever.

Valerie Ling:

Thank you so much, Marion, for spending this time with me all the way from the UK and for giving us your great wisdom. It's been wonderful.

Marion Knell:

Oh, thank you so much, Valerie, and look forward to seeing you again sometime maybe.

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