Who am I? : bi-vocational ministers and pastoral identity

Abstract

“Who Am I? Bi-Vocational Ministers and Pastoral Identity” is a Hermeneutic Phenomenological study that examines the experience of bi-vocational ministers in the United Church of Canada as they navigate their vocational identity. Bi-vocational ministers who are navigating two vocations simultaneously were interviewed and the data obtained from these interviews was analyzed. Several themes emerged from the interviews: the bi-vocational ministers felt strongly called to be in bi-vocational ministry; they experienced the different threads of their identity, vocational and otherwise, as multiplicity; their experience of navigating this multiplicity can be understood through a framework that mirrors the intra-trinitarian relationship; bi-vocational ministers experience an urgency to develop good boundaries; and the bi-vocational ministers interviewed had developed a variety of concrete models or images through which they interpret their identity. There are many implications of this research for the church with an anticipated increase in the number of bi-vocational ministers.