STUCK: Revisiting the Conversation with Dr. Todd Ferguson
Earlier this year, Ministry Forum hosted a timely and impactful gathering: Are You Stuck? — an immersive and small group event at Crieff Hills Retreat Centre with Dr. Todd Ferguson, sociologist, pastor, and co-author of Stuck: Why Clergy Are Alienated from Their Calling, Congregation, and Career. For many who attended, it was a clarifying, even healing experience. One that named the unspoken tensions ministry leaders have carried in silence for far too long.
Today we’re sharing with you a part of that experience through our Podcast feed.
Todd’s work is deeply rooted in listening to clergy who have found themselves saying, “I still feel called… but this isn’t working.” Drawing from interviews with over 40 pastors across North America, Stuck is goes beyond the symptoms and fall out of burnout and instead focused on systems. Todd discusses church systems, vocational expectations, and institutional norms and how these things collectively have failed to keep pace with the realities of 21st-century ministry.
In this episode, Todd explores:
Why pastors feel alienated even when they still feel called
How structural pressures—not lack of faith—drive ministry dissatisfaction
What it means to recover authenticity and joy in a changing church landscape
The idea of “traditioned innovation” as a way forward, not just for clergy, but for congregations and denominations too
If you’ve read the book, this episode will deepen your understanding. If you haven’t, it’s a compelling invitation to start. Whether you’re a long-time leader or relatively new to ministry, we hope you’ll find language here for what you’ve sensed but perhaps couldn’t quite name.
Listen to the episode now
Stuck: Why Clergy Are Alienated from Their Calling, Congregation, and Career ... and What to Do about It
Stuck is a guide for understanding how and why a traditional approach to ministry does not align with the modern realities facing pastors, congregations, and seminaries. More than simply describing findings from their firsthand research, however, Todd W. Ferguson and Josh Packard offer a new understanding of why professional ministry can be so alienating today.
Stuck shifts the dominant narrative around calling, vocation, and ministry away from a focus on individual traits and characteristics of pastors and congregational leaders and toward a more structural understanding of the social forces that impact modern ministry. The authors focus on the nature of calling; the need for modern, flexible congregational supports; and a different approach to training professional clergy.
Stuck lets pastors who feel stuck know that they're not alone, they're not crazy, and it's not their fault. It helps congregations be more supportive of their clergy. And it participates in the conversation for reshaping seminary training and professional development.
About Todd W. Ferguson, Ph.D.
Director of Social Sciences Quantitative Methods Program
Assistant Teaching Professor of Sociology
Rice University
Todd W. Ferguson is a sociologist of religion who specializes in studying congregations and pastors. In his 2022 book STUCK, he analyzed interviews of clergy who no longer wanted to lead their congregations. He and his co-author discovered that it wasn’t psychological burnout or a loss of faith for these pastors. It was the structure of the profession that led to their alienation from their career and calling. These leaders felt that the congregation was no longer the place where they could follow their calling. They wanted out but felt stuck in the ministry.
Todd serves as the Director of the Social Sciences Quantitative Methods Program and an Assistant Teaching Professor of Sociology at Rice University. He leads the undergraduate social statistics curriculum and loves training students to use large amounts of data to make discoveries about our social world.
Todd earned his Ph.D. in Sociology at Baylor University and an M.Div. at Duke Divinity School. Before becoming a sociologist, he was a pastor for a congregation in Houston, Texas.
Todd is married to Emma, a veterinarian, and they have two beautiful children. They live in Houston, Texas.
To find out more about Todd Ferguson, visit his personal website https://www.twferguson.com/
Education
Ph.D. in Sociology (Baylor University)
M.A. in Sociology (Baylor University)
M.Div. (Duke University)