Fidelia's Sisters: An online publication by, for, and about young clergy women, published by The Young Clergy Women Project.

It seems strange to me now, when I think back on my seminary training, how I can recall no emphasis placed on theological friendship.  Yes, I remember encouragement to join the ministerial association or a lectionary study group in my ministry setting.  In ten-plus years of ordained life, I’ve enjoyed close professional relationships with other clergy.  But the truth of having one individual to reciprocate my fears, my challenges, and my successes in this “odd and wondrous” calling seems simultaneously essential and miraculous.  How do other pastors function without such a dear friend in Christ?

Like all deeply-held relationships, the one I have with my best friend is not without conflict.  The strong personalities we each possess, which drew us together years ago, can cause friction in our friendship.  I cringe when I think of the thoughtless ways I’ve interrupted her speech or urged her too forcefully to “hurry up” as we engage in Olympic-caliber shopping trips.  She cringes, she tells me, when she realizes she is comporting herself like some sort of advice-giving older sister. She is many years my senior, it must be said, but we were ordained at roughly the same time.  Our relationship is one rooted and grounded in Christ; she forgives me my foibles with grace and speed.  The fidelity I’ve experienced in our union heightens my faithfulness in my marriage, and encourages my life as a mother, daughter, pastor and neighbor.

Culturally, it seems that women are not encouraged to maintain deep bonds of affection with other women.  As a young clergy woman serving in a setting where gender is still a much-remarked upon issue, I cannot imagine maintaining my vocation without the support of my friend and all the dear colleagues I know through the Young Clergy Women Project.  I know two women in their early twenties; one is a first-year seminarian and the other is beginning an internship with a parachurch organization.  Both women are gifted, intelligent, and faithful and hold creative minds.  They both have a true zeal for the Gospel message.  My advice to these women and others like them – find a friend.  Find a friend who shares your vocation and lean on each other for love and support.  Pray for one another.  Pray with one another.  Help each other.  Find a friend.

One of the vows I took when ordained as a minister in my denomination says this: “Will you be a friend among your colleagues in ministry, working with them, subject to the ordering of God’s Word and Spirit?”  At the time I eagerly assented to these words with the requisite “I will”, I had no idea just how essential this vow would become in my life.  This work we have, work blessed and ordained by our Savior, Jesus Christ, can chew you up and spit you out.  You need others to help you; you can’t go it alone.

Early in our friendship, my friend and I went on retreat together at a desert monastery.  Late one evening, we ventured out to some tennis courts located on the grounds.  We lay back on the concrete courts and looked up at the stars twinkling above the desert night.  I don’t remember what we talked about as the heat from the ground soaked up into our skin.  I just remember that we were there.  Together.

Alex Hendrickson is a founding member of the Young Clergy Women Project.  She is a solo pastor of a Presbyterian congregation in the stunning Pocono mountains but will always be a child of the desert.  She lives with her husband and three children in eastern Pennsylvania.