Cops and Pastors

daniel on Jan 24th 2009

I think we have a problem with cops and pastors. I don’t mean that cops are having problems with pastors and vice versa, but that we choose who should be a cop and who should be a pastor based on criteria that don’t really match up with their real-world performance.

For instance, if you ask cops what they spend most of their time doing, you’ll find out it’s paperwork and relational work. Very, very little policework involves things like running, jumping, wrestling, and bench pressing. Why then do we choose cops in very much the same way we choose soldiers? After all, the EMF/SWAT version of policework we see on television is in reality a very constricted, minor part of real policework. From what I understand, police spend a lot of their time resolving disputes. Do you really need to be able to wrestle a bear to resolve a dispute? (Keep in mind that, at least here in Canada, the cops are also the ones with the guns.) This is why I think women generally make better police officers than men; also, it’s a tragedy when policewomen try to bitch themselves up enough that they can run with the dudes. If anything, they can probably do their job better than the guys anyways.

The same thing applies with pastors. Where I come from, the most spiritual, well-mannered men are advised that they should go to seminary, where their heads are filled with facts, and the come back to a doctrinal examination after which they’re called to a church. Is it a co-incidence then that most of these pastors aren’t good at preaching or relating to people? After all, what is being a pastor about, really, if it’s not leading people to a closer walk with God? And what is leading if not teaching and inspiring?

We pick our cops as if they’re soldiers. We pick our pastors as if they’re professors. Is it just me, or is there something wrong there?

The solution is, of course, to widen the pool of potential cops and pastors. You can certainly have a SWAT team, and you can certainly have masters of theology, but must every potential recruit be a potential SWAT team member or master theologian? I don’t think so. It certainly doesn’t seem to be making those professions any better.

I think the police force could use fewer beefy adrenaline monkeys and more level-headed problem-solvers. I think the pastoral corps could use fewer theologically astute snooze-fests and few more dynamic individuals who have the ability to teach, the ability to inspire people and engage them in their faith, and if possible both.

Filed in main | 7 responses so far

7 Responses to “Cops and Pastors”

  1. # Justineon 24 Jan 2009 at 11:21 pm

    Funny: Recently I read Alan Hirsch’s The Forgotten Ways. You can google it, there’s a website and Hirsch’s blog and all kinds of handy links.
    He talks about Jesus movements/successful grassroots churchplanting churches…and mentions a couple times that the successful leaders of those movements most often have no formal leadership training at all, and definitely not seminary… And these successful grassroots churchplanting churches are more like the New Testament church (mroe real!?) than many of the Christendom-styled institutions we know today with the pastors we pick…

  2. # Chris Hubbson 25 Jan 2009 at 8:33 am

    Some good thoughts there, Dan. I’m with you for the most part. We definitely need more pastors who are are less professorial and more people-inclined and pulpit-astute. Some seminary training won’t hurt them, though. After all, we’d like to make sure that they’re dynamically leading and pastoring people into truth and away from error. (I’m sure you agree, just figured I ought to say it. :-))

  3. # links for 2009-01-25 - chrishubbs.comon 25 Jan 2009 at 10:30 pm

    [...] Elsewhere in Dreams » Blog Archive » Cops and Pastors (tags: cjh_comment) [...]

  4. # Keithon 26 Jan 2009 at 8:26 pm

    I’ve definitely thought that about pastors for a while. Seminary is a good thing, but from what little I’ve seen, it could sure stand to have some more real-world experience and a bit less fact-cramming.

    Never thought much about the police element, but, yeah, that makes a lot of sense, too.

  5. # Nickon 28 Jan 2009 at 8:40 pm

    About the cops, beefy, well they do have to somewhat regulary deal with people who don’t particularly being told what to do. Some strength is definatly a good idea. Brains actually have a large part in the current selection process for todays cops.

  6. # *danielon 29 Jan 2009 at 7:32 am

    @Nick About the second part of what you said, if that’s true, that’s a good thing for sure and I applaud it.

    The first part, though. Regularly have to deal with people who don’t particularly like being told what to do… how do you get from there to beefy? How do we go from law enforcement directly to physical force or the threat of physical force? That’s quite the assumption.

  7. # Nickon 10 Feb 2009 at 10:58 pm

    Its not an assumption. I’ve both seen it and been told about it. One of the common tasks of a beat cop is to take care of drunks and people who are high. Well, at least the ones on the street. The ones I’ve seen didn’t want the attention. The break up fights, which often means dragging people apart. There are many reasons. Again, not discrediting the need for conflict resolution via conversation. But it doesn’t always work that way.