Center for Pastoral Effectiveness of the Rockies

Maintaining Ministers in Ministry

The Center

Resources for Clergy

Resources for Churches

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The Center for Pastoral Effectiveness is a 501c3 non-profit organization.
For immediate information or feedback: Contact Bill Selby at integrity4u@comcast.net - or call 1-303-521-3850.
   
 

A Trusted Resource

by over 1400 Alumni

Since 1999 

First Things First!  
If you feel like you need support, personal and/or professional, now!!            Even if you didn't think of that until now....,
email integrity4u@comcast.net.
Let's eliminate the reactivity or self-sabotage now,
 BEFORE it happens!




Find out why over 1400 clergy and leaders have attended the Center and continue to describe the Center experience as
"the most valuable continuing education experience!"
The Center for Pastoral Effectiveness has been a vital resource for clergy since 1999, and its importance has only grown in today's climate.  Turn on the news at any hour and you will see it - anxiety is everywhere.  Communities are still processing the lingering effects of COVID-19.  political divisions are deep, often splitting not just parties but families.  Economic uncertainty, environmental concerns, global conflict, and complex cultural and spiritual conversations, 
all add to the weight people carry.

And where does that anxiety often land? At the door of the clergy leader.
You hear it.  You feel it.  And so do the people you serve.

This reality makes it absolutely essential for clergy leaders to reflect on how they engage with and manage this anxiety.  Without intention, that anxiety can become focused -even fixated- on you. There has never been a more critical time to be connected to a resource like 
the Center for Pastoral Effectiveness.

The Center offers a process designed to help you respond thoughtfully rather than react emotionally.  It provides a leadership framework that equips you to manage yourself while 
maintaining healthy relationships within both the church and your family.

EMOTIONAL ROLE OF  LEADERSHP
At its core, the Center exists to sustain ministers in ministry through the lens of Family Systems thinking.  This is not just another leadership model.  Pastoral leadership is unique.  While it includes responsibilities like administration, preaching, pastoral care, and facilitation, it also carries a deeper dimension. Fundamentally pastoral leadership is an emotional role. 
The Center speaks speaks directly to that reality.

Developed by a minister for ministers, this model understands the challenges you face and offers practical, grounded support.  It is a journey you won't regret designed to strengthen your capacity for leadership in the midst of complexity and pressure.

THE PROGRAM
*Consists of Six Three-Day retreats spread over an 18-20 month period
*Retreats are during the week 
*Schedule is sensitive to family, church, and denominational calendar
*Travel and Retreat can usually be completed in the three days
*Total Cost is $2400 with a flexible payment option spead over the six retreats

Contact the Center Mentor, Bill Selby, a integrity4u@comcast.net for more information.
 


Take a look at the retreat opportunities coming up.
 
Colorado Track l - Spring 2027 Bill Selby, Mentor   

Colorado Track ll - Spring 2027 Bill Selby, Mentor   

Colorado Track lll - Spring 2027 Bill Selby, Mentor

Track III 3M - Next Retreat, Jan 12-14, 2027
Bill Selby, Mentor



Do you want a Center near you?  
Then plan one! Just get 6-8 of your colleagues to join you and 
we will bring it to you.  Find out the discount to host.
Email integrity4u@comcast.net to find out more.


Clergy & Spouse Retreat

This is a very special retreat for clergy and their spouse.  It is an opportunity for both people to gain an understanding of how ministry is an emotional system of three families, their own, each of the families IN the church, and the family OF the church.  Couples can begin to appreciate how emotional enmeshment occurs and how the church gets triangulated into the familiy and can undermine both couple and children.  Developing both an understanding of the system as well as some emotional tools will be refreshing.  This is also a "retreat" at which couples can relax and reaffirm the relationship at a wonderful retreat setting which is "away" yet very "accessible."  Give your relationship and one another a gift by attending this retreat.  
This resource has a limited registration of only eight couples.

If you are interested, contact the Center to get on a list for our next retreat.
The Center at a Glance
"If ministry were that simple!"



When meeting with clergy in one of our current Centers for Pastoral Effectiveness, I was struck by just how complicated ministry is.  During my tenure the expectations for clergy has seemed to expand, financial pressures seem to have grown, the anxieties of people have seemed to have gotten more enmeshed in the system.  No longer does it seem that being "called to ministry" and wanting to be a "good and faithful servant" to our people is enough.

Members of the smallest of churches are far more aware of what is "out there" than when I began in a small church in Indiana.  The feelings may be parochial but the attitude cosmopolitan.  Sunday's worship expectations of the young are influenced by high tech, high energy, and high life, while many of the people in our churches still struggle to change the flashing 12:00 on the  "VCR."  Just how can a minister meet all the needs while remaining true to the high calling of being spiritually and emotionally present in times of trauma or the celebrations of life?  Add to that the calling of clergy to "preach prophetically" which many times means bringing up very uncomfortable issues within the church as well as society.  That all adds up to a lot of anxious people in the pews and a lot of reactivity within the system.  So what do we do?

Well, it begins with YOU, the leader.  Are you the non-anxious presence in the system we call the church?

When someone is complaining about the latest hymn, another about "those people no longer in church," and still others wanting you to be more "spiritual" or "dynamic" to get "those young families we want" but with no changes to "their" worship, it is very difficult to be a non-anxious presence. 

But this is the purpose of the Center, to assist you to be more healthy as a leader, to grow in your awareness of what raises your anxiety level, and to be more prepared to deal with the anxieties of others while continuing to follow your vision as minister.

As you plan your  continuing education, I invite you to consider attending one of the new Centers that are announced above.  
Over 1400 Center Alumni agree that you will not regret the decision.


Clergy, you need to consider the Center when....
  You don't think you could ever find the time!
  You struggle to balance the needs of yourself, your personal life, including family and/or friends, with the needs of each family in and the
     family of the church.
  You have recently moved to a different appointment, especially a different size or type of appointment.
  You are in or around your first, tenth, twentieth, or thirtieth year of ministry.
  You feel excied about attending such a Center.
  You feel apprehensive about attending such a Center.
  You have recently experienced a major life-change, or trauma or move.

Review the rest of our website for more information regarding the Center for Clergy and Professional Coaching for Clergy along with our resources for  churches including some powerful seminars as well as personal consultations. 
                                                                                                                                                         Peace,  
                                                                                                                                                         Bill Selby
Put your name on a list, just email integrity4u@comcast.net.
Bill Selby, Center Mentor

Rev. Bill Selby, creator of the Center for Pastoral Effectiveness of the Rockies is the Center's Mentor. Bill's professional background includes engineering, higher education, and pastoral ministry. He has studied and used Family Systems theory since the 1970s. Ordained in 1974 in the South Indiana Conference of the United Methodist Church, he served a small country church and then a church in a county seat community. He became a member of the Rocky Mountain Conference (UMC) in 1983 and was appointed to 1st UMC in Casper, WY.

His last church assignment was a new church "re-start," St. Luke's UMC in Highlands Ranch, Colorado, in 1987.  It was there that he integrated most fully "Family Systems" into his ministry as he worked to grow a church that was dealing with heavy financial debt, economic downturns, and church families under tremendous stress.

In 1995, he left his first love, church pastoral ministry, with a vision to create an Extension Ministry of and for the church. This became known as Growth With Integrity Resources. The goal of this new ministry was to provide vital resources that clergy and churches need today - while keeping integrity in their ministry and mission. The Center for Pastoral Effectiveness of the Rockies is the cornerstone resource offered by Growth With Integrity Resources. Bill spent 4 years in intensive study and planning to develop the Center. After 3 successful years of leading Centers, The Center for Pastoral Effectiveness of the Rockies became a separate non-profit corporation with the goal of widening its scope to include clergy and religious leaders of all denominations throughout the western United States.  Since 1999, over 1400 clergy have become Center "believers" and alumni or are presently enrolled.  Center sites are or have been in Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Montana, Kansas, Nebraska, and Iowa with clergy from the United Methodist, Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, Episcopal, United Presbyterian, United Church of Christ, and American Baptist denominations.


The Center also expanded to provide a variety of resources for the local church and leadership found on this web site.


Bill comes from the small town, Orion, Illinois. He married the girl across the street, Sherilee in 1965.  They have created and acquired a unique "family" whom they cherish dearly.