This was started by an (Episcopal?) priest as a list of what not to do, then continued by various others.
Leading A Parish In Assisted-Parish-Suicide1. Move as far away from and have as little to do with your troublesome relatives as possible.
2. If the above is not possible, maintain as over-close and over-involved relationship with your troublesome relatives as possible. Try to adopt the position of family “expert” and “savior.” Especially assume personal responsibility for the chronic problems of the most intractable members of your family.
3. If you don’t have enough troublesome family members to keep you busy see if you can’t adopt some troubled people who need your help. Look for people no one has been able to help before.
4. Don’t let anyone tell you that the character of your relationships with the other families in your life will affect the character of your leadership in the parish family.
5. Believe that your own habitual patterns of relating to others and the habitual relational patterns of your parishioners will be completely changed for the positive by the right theology or religious experience without any further attention, work or discipline.
6. Believe that God prefers to work by extra-ordinary rather than ordinary means and that you are going to be the miraculous exception to the prevailing reality principle.
7. Firmly believe that a combination of persuasion, reason and exhortations to try harder to do better will change any situation for the better.
8. Firmly believe that the apparent lack of success of the above is due to this strategy not being tried hard enough or long enough.
9. Choose as a parish to lead a parish with a notorious reputation for confounding the best efforts of experts to help it.
10. Do not allow yourself to be convinced that there is anything worthwhile that can be learned from examining the congregation’s history.
11. Be convinced that most of the congregation’s troubles can be blamed on the diocese and nurture the congregation’s animosity toward the diocese.
12. Be convinced that none of your predecessors were spiritual enough or knew what they were doing.
13. Be convinced that none of the previous lay leaders were spiritual enough or knew what they were doing.
14. Be convinced that the only hope is a “completely new paradigm” for ministry.
15. Be convinced that preaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments and building up the body of Christ in worship, fellowship and service are only the beginning of real parish life and that much more needs to be done in order to have a church worthy of the name.
16. Make sure that personality over principle is the operating norm of all aspects of parish life.
17. Emphasize caring and sensitivity over discipline and standards in all aspects of parish life.
18. See if you can make your spouse and children angry, resentful and resigned by your constant overwork and obsession with the parish.
19. Lavish trouble-makers with attention and let the most spiritually and emotionally mature members of the parish take care of themselves.
20. Have no interests or life outside your role in the parish.
21. Be someone who keeps secrets and swears other to secrecy.
22. Spend as much time as possible reading about highly successful mega-churches in contexts completely different from your own.
23. Become convinced that all that is lacking is the right mix of music or cell groups or whatever technique or concept you nominate for the position of messiah.
24. Become relentless in your rigid and desperate attempt to institute whatever technique or concept you nominate for the position of messiah.
25. Read more books on leadership and congregational development.
26. Constantly urge the key leaders in the parish to “catch up” with what you know about leadership and congregational development. .
27. Communicate by either resigned stoicism or simmering anger your profound disappointment in the congregation’s lack of responsiveness.
28. Carefully follow the controversies in the larger church and spend several hours each day obsessing about things you cannot control.
29. Put people you know to be difficult in leadership position for “pastoral” reasons.
30. Take everything as personally as possible and as seriously as possible.
31. Keep your distance from your colleagues and superiors.
32. Go to as many leadership and congregational development seminars as possible and try to introduce at least one “completely new paradigm for ministry” every year.
33. Secretively nurse your guilt over your lack of success and do not talk to anyone about it except your exasperated spouse and children.
34. Leave after three or five years at most, to find a more spiritual and responsive congregation.
35. Don’t leave after three to five years; instead, stay so long that no one can remember a time without you.
36. Because of the above, convince yourself that you are the most loyal and dedicated parish priest ever, and the parish couldn’t possibly function without you.
37. Because of the above, exempt yourself from any oversight, because, after all, “you’ve earned it!”
38. Pick a member of the parish, usually a newer, younger member, to be your “New Best Friend” ™ every couple of months.
39. Refer to them often in sermons. Take them into your confidence. Tell them secrets about other members of the congregation, whether they want to hear them or not.
40. Give your “New Best Friend” ™ lots of responsibility, so they feel involved in the parish.
41. When your “New Best Friend” ™ has accomplished what you want him or her to do, promptly find a “Newer Best Friend” ™. Kick “New Best Friend” to the curb, and repeat the process with “Newer Best Friend.”
42. Guard your feelings and family life obsessively. If you’re feeling trapped or scared, tell no one in the parish. Convince yourself you’re “sparing the parish.”
43. Completely erase from your mind that by doing No. 42, you’re actually sending the message that Christians shouldn’t turn to one another for mutual help and support.
44. Instead, express your natural frustration as a result of employing No. 42 as a simmering anger toward your parish. Nurse feelings of loneliness and convince yourself it’s because you’re so damn brilliant no one can “understand” you.
45. As a result of your boredom, frustration, or personal demons, surreptitiously seek solace and comfort not in the staples of the Catholic Life, but in extraparochial ventures like chaplaincies, community development groups, and nonprofits.
46. Jealously hide these from members of your parish, telling them only that you’re broadening the church’s mission and they’ll eventually accrue to the benefit of the parish.
47. At the same time, however, insist that while these extraparochial activities are supposed to somehow broaden the church’s mission, they are not subject to vestry advice, counsel and oversight.
48. Tell different people different things about these activities. If people start to get unnerved by the lack of consistent information, start to play people off against one another.
49. Commingle your finances with that of the parish as much as, and whenever, possible.
50. Convince yourself, a la No. 42, that you’re sacrificing yourself for the parish.
51. Exhibit a veiled hostility/offensive paternalism toward women.
52. Convince yourself you’re really fighting against women’s ordination and upholding orthodoxy.
53. Make sure the only time you praise a woman is when she’s pregnant.
54. Use offensive terms for this, such as that a couple is “doing their Christian duty” or “being fruitful.”
55. Ignore the fact that the brightest women in your congregation want nothing to do with you. Convince yourself it’s because they’re “uppity.”
56. At least seven times a day, make sure you remind yourself that no one is doing as much as you for the Church. You’re right behind Christ, carrying a cross big enough to rival His!
57. Convince your parishioners that you are the most loyal and dedicated parish priest ever, and the parish couldn’t possibly function without you (cf. No. 36).
58. Out-source the parish's work to parishioners only when absolutely necessary and insist that it is your responsibility. Your hard work and dedication will go a long way to accomplishing No. 57.
59. Organize the parish government around "lay-leaders" thoroughly schooled in the philosophy of No.57. This will greatly facilitate future manipulation, while engendering laxity, irresponsibility, and indifference amongst the so-called leaders.
60. Do everything in your power to see that your indifferent, impotent parochial leadership is similarly reflected in the ecclesiastical hierarcy. An anarchical diocese exercising little oversight or authority over your parish is the best possible situation. If your bishop is a criminal and/or a freemason, the task will be that much easier.
61. As the fruits of the above start to come home to roost, don’t take refuge in the staples of the Catholic Life like confession, prayer, communion, and counsel from your brother priests and trusted lay leaders.
62. Instead, go to a Large Group Awareness Seminar. Become hooked. Tell yourself only these people can understand you.
63. As you become more distant and weird, and parish leaders begin to put the pieces together, fall back on your politicking skills.
64. Rally your parish council - the one you’ve stacked with sycophants who won’t question you, see No. 37 - and tell them your ministry is “under attack.”
65. Turn to the parish members whom you’ve groomed to be more loyal to you personally than to the faith or the church. Turn them against those who are questioning your behavior. Tell yourself you’re protecting the parish from an insurrection.
66. If your displays of righteous anger and appeals to your years of “sacrifice” don’t quell the questions, switch to pathos.
67. Offer your resignation as tearfully as possible, explaining that you “just can’t operate in this hostile environment.”
68. When the cries of “no, no, don’t resign” are heard, inwardly smile - you’re almost home free.
69. Patiently wait, alternating between these tactics, until the brighter members of the congregation get sick of your games and simply leave.
70. Praise your loyal rump congregation, telling them how happy you are to pastor this “parish family.” Make no reference at all to how things just convulsed. Ignore the fact that many people left. Pretend they are “unpersons,” just like in 1984.
71. Wash, rinse, repeat!
72. Delve anew into parish life, having experienced catharsis from the drama.
73. In a few years, repeat the process.
74. Don’t ever allow yourself to think YOU might have something to do with why the parish membership is dysfunctional. Instead, view their dysfunction as your mission!
75. Whatever you do, don’t forget that for this parish, you are God.
ad infinitum
