The Cost of Developing a Minister

This house is the equivalent of the money spent on
my ordination process.

I just mailed my first batch of Commissioning Documents to the Registrar. “That will be $32.06,” the clerk behind the registrar said. I didn’t blink an eye; it was after all an overnight delivery. Yet as I clicked through the DEBT card purchase, it reminded me yet again that there is a very high monetary cost for creating a minister.

I believe that it is a conservative estimate that at the end of my ordination approximately $325,000 will have been spent to turn me into a minister. Between tuition for schools, interest paid on student loans, airfare to and from seminary, and many other $30.00 dollar incidental costs all add up quickly.

I have been lucky to have a great deal of financial assistance. Scholarships have accounted for most of that aid, but others came from my community, from airline mileage donated from cousins, books that have wandered their way into my library, and Starbucks cards that show up with letters of encouragement. In the end my parents and I will have underwritten only a quarter of that cost.

As I wrestle my way through this process, I try to remember that I am able to enter the ring because of my privileged place. I am someone who has been able to carve three years out of her life to attend a prestigious seminary. I am someone who has the ability to take the extra two days for her commissioning paperwork instead of saving herself the $15.00 for groceries for that week. I am someone who knows how to find scholarship money if and when I need it.

I could not imagine what this process would be like if I did not have this financial cushion.