Transitions: New Job, Same Vocation

This past spring, I initiated a risky but necessary conversation with the leadership at Bishop Noll. After two years of building what started as dreams on a Google Doc into a sturdy reality, the growth I had instigated had exceeded my ability to sustain it responsibly. I could no longer be the sole animator of Campus Ministry, and I needed my school to respond to that. (For a fuller background on how this all unfolded, scroll to the bottom of this post or read this post's postscript/epilogue for more.)

I had instigated the overhaul of a system of retreats from one-day "reflection days" to pastorally and catechetically informed retreats, including student leadership and adult involvement on all retreats, overnights for all non-freshmen, and the implementation of Kairos, done in collaboration with my chaplain. I had created a Service & Ministry Team, which though its profile of concrete work never stacked up to more than the Christmas gift drive and one planned-from-scratch prayer service, became a strong family and attractive community for students. I expanded Mass ministries to involve more altar servers and readers, created a rotation of gift-bearers, instituted student ushers, and trained 30 new EM's to, along with our excellent choir and director, make Mass a heavily student-driven ministry. I created and led an overnight immersion, which took place seven times, around Chicago for students to do service-learning on the go. Etc. Etc.

You'll notice a lot of "I." Yes, I tend to be arrogant, and my choices of words too excessively reflect that. (I have that double layered arrogance where I'm arrogant underneath, and to cover it, I then become terrible at receiving gratitude and thus thicken my own arrogance.) Yes, I fail to more fully recognize the true origins of ministerial movement in grace and the Holy Spirit.

One of the other issues at hand was that I was on my own in my job.

While my chaplain was a great advocate and partner, he was part-time, only around to teach a bit in afternoons, say a monthly Mass, and make some room for occasional meetings. Besides that, I was on my own to recruit, plan, recruit, train, and recruit. I found some great partners in some very supportive teachers, but beyond a handful of deeply committed people and a few supporting cast members, I had built up a landscape, thanks to the hunger and response of students, that exceeded what I could do alone. And the administration's hands-off approach was simultaneously liberating and frustrating.

I initiated a dialogue about all this with my administrators, and they were both slow to respond and ultimately unable to enact any changes. Sensing this from the outset, I looked for other opportunities at Catholic schools and ultimately matched up with a good one. Though I could have buckled down to buy in for another year at Bishop Noll, I decided that my impending marriage coupled with the knowledge that I didn't want to work in and commute to Hammond forever made it a good time to transition.

I knew what I needed to tell my bosses, and I knew they would understand. I knew what I needed to tell my students, and I knew they would be frantic.

I wrote up a post to my work social media accounts and prepared to face the music in the cafeteria. I made it as far as the hallway leading to the lunchroom when I was swamped by a dozen of my more active students. Through these little conversation gaggles and wanderings about the lunchroom and hallways, I tried my darndest to humbly receive their guffaw, anger, and disappointment. Then, I tried to say that I was just taking a job closer to home with more reasonable commitments and that it wasn't about leaving them or letting Campus Ministry fall away.

I wrote them a letter, and asked everyone to spread it around, ultimately leaving copies taped to my office door as my farewell note. I wanted to give myself the same advice that I had already given the seniors before I knew I was leaving: leaving only hurts if you leave behind what you found. And I needed them to know: "I am not Campus Ministry. YOU are Campus Ministry."

And so I did commencement, a couple grad parties, a farewell dinner at BW's with some kids, and traded some emails to keep in touch with graduating seniors, and off I went. I left behind copies of my Google Drive and saved files and met with my successor, and I rode off into the sunset (well, the drive back was mostly north, so kind of but not literally).

And so I turned my attention to my new job at St. Benedict Preparatory School and Parish. Here's a few things about "The Block" that I could only repeatedly describe as unusual and intriguing:

• We are one of three high schools in the Archdiocese of Chicago that is connected to a parish.
• We are the ONLY school in the archdiocese that is a PreK-12 school.
• We have three principals for the three segments of our school and a fourth administrator who oversees all of them/it/us. Oh, and we all work for the Pastor, too.
• I am the Campus Minister for the Secondary School (6-12), though our all-school Masses and Campus Ministry include younger kids and Prayer Buddies.
• Confirmation takes place across the school and parish, and I will spearhead sacramental prep within the 8th grade theology course.
• Our parish Director of Youth Ministry will share an office with me and is contracted to work in both parish and school.
• etc. etc.!

I started work this week, and it was a bit sputtery at first - starting to furnish a newly created ministry office for us, starting to meet people (we have almost 200 people working at the school and parish!), connecting people's titles to how I will work with them, learning the trimester and daily schedules, and so on! I tried to keep myself on task as I lesson planned for 8th-grade theology and plugged my work into our school curriculum templates, but I had moments of struggle and low initiative.

I weathered the ups and downs with bathroom breaks, random encounters with new colleagues, and a couple good introductory meetings, and I ended up with a solid start on lesson plans. I realized that my struggles come back to something I learned while ministering in Ireland: I am not an office minister.

The days in Ireland that we spent mainly in the office, planning music, organizing copies, folders, and binders, or even just working independently were my least favorite days. I wanted to at least be making phone calls, if not going to make visits to schools or parishioners or even just to be in town. I preferred the times when I got out to St. Vincent de Paul Society meetings, choir rehearsal, or drinks at the pub with friends. And when it came to ministry, I wanted to be cantoring, handing out bulletins at the door, or working with our youth. I wanted my office work to be short, sweet, and expedient to set me up to have more time and to do better pastoral work out with people.

I worked through the silo-ed mentality at my old job to become a consummate self-starter in the mid-morning and mid-afternoon, and then to spend the beginning of the day, lunch periods, and the end of the day to see colleagues, roam the halls, and be a constant presence in the lunchroom. I pursued ubiquitousness with students, and to a lesser extent with colleagues too, and it paid off in my ministerial connections. It took time to feel out the routine, but it helped me efficient and driven in my organization and administration. Office-me enabled pastoral-me to do a better job!

So in the early going of a new job, gradually starting to meet colleagues and seeing a few students' faces, it has been hard to get started. But getting a strong sense of collaboration and team mentality, and awaiting my office buddy in ministry, I know the potential is strong to reach out and work together to do great ministry in this community.

As I take my first meetings and start to get a sense of how things are done and who does them, I am anxious over feeling out the right connections. However, I know the norm of collegiality will support me as I dig into everything. 

I love to take initiative and am blessed to be driven as I try to take ideas from creative dreams to concrete realities; at the same time, I have increasingly tried to be diligent in improving my ability to actively seek out colleagues, both socially and professionally/collaboratively, to do my work in tandem with others. My new workplace and ministry setting is beckoning me to commit even more strongly to that.

The other day, Katherine (my wife[!?]) was playing a song via a YouTube video, a man who had layered his own voice several times over itself to sing a complex song a capella. I was not a fan - partially because I'm a butthole, partially because I find what he did obnoxious. Why would one person feel the need to sing on their own? Not just solo, but manipulated to be accompanied by his own voice!? Does he not have friends he likes to sing with? Does he only like his own voice? Can he not blend with other voices? Is he really this vain? Maybe I was just jealous of his talent!

Either way, I found the metaphor powerful. I prefer the sound of a well-rounded, well-blended choir. Sopranos and tenors paired with altos and basses to fill out a full harmony. Maybe there's a conductor, but the voices complement and uphold one another better to my ear than any one person's layered voice ever could. I don't yet know what it will look like in this new school and community, but my gifts, my passions, and my ministerial attitude should work well in this atmosphere of collaboration.

Leaving an old job and the people I ministered with and to is hard, but I repeatedly have consoled myself in each transition that are always people to love, and be loved by, in a new community. There is a need for what I can bring and do at my new job, and there is much for me to learn from this unusual, unique community.

I hope and pray that God will keep me open, humble, and receptive. I believe my initiative and creativity will endure, and I hope I can negotiate the growing pains to connect what I can bring to the people of my new faith community.

__________

PS: Here is a timeline of how my considerations of switching jobs unfolded. It's lengthy and detailed, so dive into it at your own peril!

The Winding Road

discerning the next transition around many twists and turns, 2015

·      Mid-year 2014-15: Fr. Kevin, our chaplain and my colleague at Bishop Noll, and I discerned different ideas to incorporate into the Mission and Ministry / Catholic Identity proposal for the Capital Campaign Master Plan. In addition to dreaming of a Chapel and a Mission and Ministry Suite (chapel – office – meeting/conference room all adjoining), we wondered about staff. We tossed around the idea of a Director of Mission and Ministry, perhaps Kevin, and a Ministry Associate – an administration team member as well as a full-time minister. Kevin seemed interested in such a potential job, and we went from there.

·      Late Winter/Early Spring 2015: Kevin began discussions with his provincial and company on his future, and it became clear that while he would not continue at his parish, he also could not extend his presence at Noll. The community needed him dedicated to one of the institutions they sponsor and sustain. I jointly decided that I could not continue as the sole staff member, and that whether or not Kevin left, I would need some sort of assistance in retreat direction and a bit of help in the day-to-day. I didn’t want to continue with equal or less staff and equal or greater work, especially 19 nights away on overnight retreats and immersions.

·      March 2015: Kevin is confirmed in a new position as a Special Assistant to the President at Calumet College; in addition to leaving his parish ministry completely, Kevin would no longer be involved as a teacher or retreat director at Noll. I created an exhaustive job description of all the things I was doing to demonstrate the breadth and depth of what Campus Ministry was becoming. As I worked through this list, I also created a three-column system of how these things could be handled with adjusted staffing: most of the direction and administration would remain with me, pieces of it would be delegated to a teacher with a reduced load and contracted responsibilities to Campus Ministry, and it’d involve a significantly scaled-back role for Kevin as Chaplain, basically just Masses and Reconciliation availability.

·      March 20: I requested a meeting with Kevin, the principal, president, and dean/de facto assistant principal to submit my exhaustive job description and proposal for three-part team.

o   Pessimistic about getting a timely, effective, decisive meeting, I began to scour job boards around Chicago. Resurrection High School in Chicago was the one reasonably nearby school had a Campus Ministry posting, so I inquired with the president, sending a resume and a note explaining my uncertain future at BNI.

·      March 24: We eventually agreed to meet on the 26^th, and the principal informed us that it would last “a minimum of an hour, probably more.”

·      March 26: Our principal called in sick for the day, but our dean informed us that he would host and run the meeting. I shared my thoughts and talked through my presentations at the meeting as we had it. The meeting turned into a trouble-shooting and kind of tangential dream session. Nothing concrete was decided, and no timeline was given. I requested that some sort of information be given to me by mid-April after we returned from our Spring Break. I followed up with the principal with a summary email and attached the presentation handouts I composed, offering to meet after he returned to school.

·      March 27: The president of Res. replies to my email, inviting me to Resurrection for an interview with her.

·      March 30: I arrange for an interview for April 15 in the morning. I file for a personal day.

·      April 14: Having heard nothing back from anyone since the meeting, I checked in for an update with all four of them. The principal replied back, “Still working on it.”

·      April 15: I have my interview with the president at Resurrection. We talk very comfortably for about an hour. I feel pretty good about how I present myself, confident that she was interested and receptive to what I offered. I thanked her by email and obtained a copy of the job description. The whole process felt pretty good, and I walked away thinking that it was an attractive job at a stable, fairly strong school, even if not profoundly fired up yet.

·      April 28: The president at Res. informs me that I am one of the final three candidates and invites me back for a final interview. Meg tells me to come back on May 12 at 9:15am.

·      April 29-May 11: Continuing to look for positions and finding little, I continue sending out resumes and cover letters with introductory emails. Recipients include Mt. Carmel principal, St. Xavier University Director of Campus Ministry, Christ the King administrators, Trinity administrators, Marist administrators, Cristo Rey administrators, LaSalle dean, St. Ignatius Director of Formation and Ministry, Josephinum administrators, St. Benedict Campus Minister, DePaul College Prep president, Notre Dame administrators, Loyola University Chicago Director of Campus Ministry, and Regina Dominican administrators as well as reaching out to Chicago Campus Ministry colleagues from a networking events and even applying to a religious publication position. One interesting element was that the Campus Minister at St. Benedict turned out to be a Domer (’13)! Well I received various replies saying there were no open positions or that my resume/cover letter would be kept on file for openings, nothing materialized concretely from any of these.

·      May 12: I return to Resurrection for a final interview. Starting with the president, we discussed what she liked about my initial interview and overall application, and encouraged me to emphasis my leadership formation and immersion planning and execution. She also floated me a salary figure for an 11-month contract if I were to be selected; the amount was about 20% better than my current salary. After she guided me on a tour of the school, I proceeded to four more interviews, with faculty members who had daughters at the school, with teachers on the Catholic Identity committee, with a couple retired faculty, and with the principal and assistant principal. Each interview last about half an hour and involved similar questions and conversation. I felt confident and comfortable as I gave slightly different and honest answers in each round. I walked away confident in my responses and very impressed by the institutional consistency, coherence, and organization. I was more intrigued by the job but still felt like a bit of a wild card candidate as a male in a heavily female environment. I decided I wanted the job, but I remained ambivalent as to how likely it was that I’d get it.

·      May 13: The president at Res. informs me that I am one of the final two candidates and asks for references to follow up on the interviews. She says a decision is coming by the end of the month.

·      May 18-20: Following up on my earlier email to local Campus Ministers on May 18, the Campus Minister from Cristo Rey notified me on May 19 that she would be leaving Cristo Rey and vacating the Campus Ministry position there. I got very hopeful, excited that there may be potential to work in a Cristo Rey school. On May 20, trading text messages with her, I found out that the position would be filled by an internal candidate.

·      May 27: Out of the blue, as I wait for word from Resurrection, I received a missed call and a voicemail from a Chicago number while I was subbing at work. When we got to lunch, I listened to the voicemail in my room and read an accompanying email. It was from Erika Mickelburgh, the Head of Secondary School at St. Benedict in North Center of Chicago. She had gotten my resume from, the current Campus Minister who is a Domer. She wanted to interview me for a Campus Ministry and Theology position. I called back and explained that I expected to hear back about my status at Resurrection by Friday (May 29) and needed an expedited timeline. We agreed on a 4:15 interview for the next day.

·      May 28: I interviewed at St. Ben’s with Erika. It was a very comfortable, pleasant, genial conversation with minimal formality. We had a free-flowing discussion about the school, ministry, my background and experience, and tons of other stuff. She floated a salary figure to me based off a minimal scale, and when we agreed that I was only gunning for the Campus Ministry position, she explained that the compensation would be different as it connected to an 11-month contract. We needed to arrange an interview with the parish pastor, and we tentatively agreed to do that on Saturday to fit the expedited timeline.

·      May 29: Erika confirms I’ll interview with Fr. Jason, parish pastor, on Saturday afternoon at 2pm. Getting antsy about the news from Res, I follow-up with Sr. Donna to check on their progress. She responds around lunch time thanking me for my involvement but notifying me that they had chosen the other finalist for the position. Certainly disappointed but not especially surprised, I turned my thoughts back to Bishop Noll. Feeling optimistic about St. Ben’s but also wanting more specificity and finality with the open-ended, unupdated process at BNI, I followed up with my admins about my unanswered questions, requesting a meeting for Monday, June 1. I wanted firm answers on a written, signed agreement on my job description, salary, etc., and I wanted a decision on staffing for Campus Ministry.

·      May 30, 2pm: I head to St. Ben’s for my 2pm interview with Fr. Jason. Delayed trying to find my friend’s car, which I was borrowing, and driving through rain, I was a couple minutes late. Luckily, Fr. Jason didn’t notice, and his dog greeted me warmly. Fr. Jason sat me down at a table in his office, and with my resume and cover letter out, we began to talk about me. We had a “holy half hour,” as Fr. Jason called it before he went to celebrate a wedding. It was very comfortable and cordial, and my biggest takeaway was Fr. Jason’s thoughts on collaboration. He said everyone is charge there inherited the challenge of a PreK-12 school/parish combo, and rather than slog through it, they embraced it together. While he agreed with my sense of boundary-less, open communication and teamwork, he mentioned that people still have to recognize their job titles/descriptions and take ownership of their purview. Loved that this corrective was more needed than encouraging collaboration in the first place.

·      May 30, 2:45pm: While I was driving home from the interview, I talked to Katherine for a few minutes before she started her internship shift at 3pm. As I hung up with her, my phone alerted me to a voicemail from a number not in my contacts, even though I hadn’t received a call. I listened to a short message from Erika asking me to call her back. I returned her call, and she asked how the conversation with Fr. Jason had gone. I told her I enjoyed it and liked Fr. Jason, and that he had called our chat a “holy half hour.” She told me Jason agreed with my thoughts, and Erika offered me the job as Campus Minister right then. She told me she would work on final compensation numbers and that I could learn the benefits package immediately through the archdiocesan website. She said she would have more information when she returned to the office on Monday morning. I was very excited and called Katherine to share the news.

·      May 31: While driving some last bits of Katherine’s stuff from her old place to our apartment for our move, Erika called again. I put her on speakerphone, and she confirmed a strong compensation offer. I ask Erika if she can organize a job description for me to look over everything in one place, and she promises to send one the next morning. On top of the job description and the excellent vibes from Fr. Jason and Erika, it felt like a very attractive opportunity, unusual and intriguing as it was.

·      June 1, early morning: I arrive to work to a reply only from our president, giving some windows of time to meet but no replies from our principal or dean. After morning prayer, I saw the principal and dean talking in the lobby as they often do. I approached them to ask if they saw my email or the president’s reply. Craig said he hadn’t, so I opened my email to share the timeframes with him. The principal said we could meet if I wanted, but he could tell me right then and there that a written agreement was no problem, “just a piece of paper” – a disappointing thing to hear having worked a full year with no written agreement – but that staff-wise he didn’t have an answer, as they were still waiting to hear back from a potential hire for the Theology teacher position. Their candidate of choice was actually a friend who I had spoken with our principal about as one of his references. My friend hadn’t returned any of their emails or call, though I knew he would decline in favor of his chosen offer from another school. The principal said he had a 9am meeting with Guidance, and uncertain on how long it’d take, didn’t want to promise anything. I asked him to update us after it was over. I emailed the group and shared that the principal would check-in after his meeting. Erika also sends me the job description, and everything checks out nicely.

·      June 1, later morning: The principal comes to get me around 10am to ask if I’m free to meet right now to meet. I head down to the president’s office. I explain to them that I had not planned on leaving, but given the indecision and lack of communication on things, I had begun looking for other opportunities and had another offer in hand. In addition to concerns over a written agreement and staffing, I shared that the compensation would be significantly better. After some discussion, the principal confirmed that compensation at BNI would only raise the small annual amount and that staffing considerations were still uncertain. The president asked for some time to see if anything could be decided, and I said I could definitely give 24 hours. I said I’d check in at day’s end to see if any progress was made or any updates could be given. I ask Erika if she can hang for 24 hours, which she happily agrees to, while saying she’ll be praying in the meantime that I accept.

·      June 1, end of school day: I drop by the president’s office, and he says he’ll check on the principal. The principal is on the phone, so we chat for a bit before the president checks again and sees the principal is now behind a closed door. I thank the president for trying and tell him I’ll follow up by email and then maybe again in the morning.

·      June 1, late afternoon: I receive one of the more cordial, warm emails from my principal I’ve ever gotten, starting with an apology for being busy on the phone when we visited. He explains that no significant salary adjustment is coming and that any growth in Campus Ministry staff is at least a year away, if not further. He asks that I let him know when I’ve decided and thanks me for what I’ve done for BNI and its Catholic identity.

·      June 1, evening: After trading texts with Kevin and Katherine and brief chats on the phone with Katherine and my brother, Tim, I call Erika to accept the job at St. Ben’s. Erika is pumped and gets the wheels turning on paperwork and an initial meeting with the Theology Chairwoman and outgoing Campus Minister.

·      June 2, morning: I see the principal and dean in the lobby after Morning Prayer and inform them that I am leaving. Craig thanks me again and affirms my having to do what I have to do. I offer to help write a job description, recruit candidates to succeed me, and sit in on the interviews. He asks me to write out a departure note and sign it, which I do and deliver to his mailbox and Paul’s mailbox.

·      June 2, lunch: I post a brief tweet on social media to announce my departure to the students and an emotional firestorm of screams, tears, guffah, and fun chats ensues. And so the transition began.