Hi, friends, David Kandman here. I'm taking over Carrie's studio just for a couple of minutes before

today's podcast to give you a quick glimpse into what we're seeing here at Barna. So, thanks for

joining the podcast and we'll get to the show in just a minute. We want to talk about what we're

learning in the state of the church research. Actually, we'll be looking today at the state of today's

church leaders, specifically pastors and their

self-reported vocational stability. Do they want to stay in the jobs that they're in?

So for several years, we've been tracking how many pastors have seriously considered quitting

full-time ministry. That question became especially urgent during the pandemic as the

cumulative pressures of recent years had mounted

all the things that we endured as leaders, especially in 2020 and 2021. In fact, by 2022,

we saw the highest levels that we had ever recorded 42% of pastors in March of 2022 and 41% in

September of 22,

said they had seriously considered leaving full-time ministry.

And so we've been seeing some really interesting trends related to that.

That number has been declining.

That is good news.

It went to 33% in 2023 to 31% in 2024.

And I'm very happy to report that it is down to 24% in December of 2024.

So pastors are telling us that they're doing better. Now listen, that is still too high a number. One in every four pastors tell us that they are still considering leaving full-time ministry. And this new data still

could look at the positive here and say that this suggests that we're in a moment of opportunity

where intentional support, healthy expectations, and shared responsibility could help sustain

pastors for the long haul. And again, a lot to celebrate. We're actually in the midst

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