Very early this morning I received a break-up note from our church’s youth pastor.
On Facebook.
Now, don’t get me wrong. It was a very thoughtful, well-done sort of thing the upshot of which is that he has prayerfully taken another job back in Texas. He’s from Texas and his family is still there.
I guess I’m just a bit stymied about it being on Facebook of all things. I still think of Facebook as a place where people throw sheep at me and I race my cute toy monkey against other cute toys of other people. I suppose what I’m trying to say is that despite all their attempts to be relevant I still think of Facebook as kind of a childish entity. To me it doesn’t seem to be the place I’d expect to get a grown-up job resignation notice from a pastor.
It’s not that he was wrong to do it–I don’t mean that. It just feels weird to me; like eating McDonalds instead of chicken at a charity dinner or saying the Pledge of Allegiance at a Pampered Chef party.
I thought Facebook was a place to go stalk ex-girlfriends, er, I mean, find old friends.
That is kind of weird…
Personally I think it’s kind of unprofessional…I guess I’m a little old-fashioned, though.
I think a resignation by any kind of pastor should be done in the church first…But that’s just me.
being youth pastor, i’d look at it a few ways. 1. facebook for me is one of my primary communication tools with the teenagers. that and txt. they do not email as i would hope. when i send out messages it goes in email newsletter (which is primarily read by the parents), facebook group email, myspace bulletin, txt to check their emails or facebook, then the paper newsletter. 2. i would opt to tell the kids myself, but lets say maybe i have already, but only 50% of the regular kids were there, the word is getting out and you would want some clear message to be out there for when they start calling each other, sorry txting. i actually got a live txt once when a yp was telling his kids he was leaving. not sure how i felt about that one, shock was one emotion.
it seems unconventional, but it is very much in line with the relationship a yp can have (they don’t have to be all wired with the kids) with the teenagers. facebook is as real to them as a church newsletter is to another parishoner.
If Facebook is one of the ways this particular youth pastor is using to stay connected to the kids, then I can see that putting up an announcement there would be a good idea. But I’d hope it was one of several ways he was reaching out to the kids and letting them know about his decision.
One thing that Facebook has going for it is that the kids can read what he actual said.
I think it is important to say that the youth pastor did have a called meeting with all the youth and parents where the official resignation was read to them the night before. I know that it did leave those out of the youth ministry loop a little confused because there was more than one person that commented on this to me. I don’t know if this helps.
Oh, and you’re right, it was weird, even to me who had already heard the announcement…