Professions

The professionalization of work, one of the characteristics of modern society, is a matter about which Christians can profitably reflect. Sociologists speak of the professionalization of everyone (Wilensky, pp. 137-58) and everything from housecleaning to car repairs. But can everyone and everything be professionalized? The word professional is difficult to define. The idea has Christian roots, and Christians, both professional and nonprofessional, have reason not only to reflect on this occupational trend but to respond with appropriate Christian action. This article will explore the Christian roots of professions, the difficulty of defining professionalism in modern life, the dangers of professionalism and a Christian response.

Christian Roots

Prior to a.d. 500 the generic term profession (pro-fateri; to confess, own, acknowledge) was understood only in a religious sense. Both office bearers in the church and ordinary members profess their allegiance to Christ, to the gospel and to service in God’s kingdom. Though such “professions” were predated by the oath of Hippocrates and the claims of shamans to understand the mysteries of life and death, it is substantially true that “the mother of all the learned professions is the church” (Reader, p. 11). In the New Testament we read about professing godliness (1 Tim. 2:10) and professing the gospel (1 Tim. 6:12). A professional is therefore someone who makes a public declaration of service to God. In a special sense the medieval church used profession for the vow of poverty, chastity and obedience made by those entering the religious life, thus creating a religious professional elite. Reacting to this, Luther recovered the biblical universality of calling, insisting that all, and not just priests, nuns and monks, were called of God.

The modern world has secularized this idea of a holy calling from something with a divine source outside oneself to an occupation with a special status and special responsibilities. To be a professional is the opposite of an amateur. Instead of professing to serve God, the modern professional claims a unique role that brings him or her deep fulfillment. In answer to the question of what is professed, E. C. Hughes says, “They profess to know better than others the nature of certain matters, to know better than their clients what ails them or their affairs” (p. 1). George Bernard Shaw made one of his characters say that every profession is a conspiracy against the laity. It is vitally important to consider whether this is true.

Defining Professions and Professionalism

A broad outline of the traits of a profession include the following: (1) it is a full-time occupation (amateurs might do the same thing as an avocation); (2) it is viewed loosely as a calling, that is, an occupation that places behavioral and ethical demands on the person who engages in it; (3) it is based on special, often esoteric, knowledge that usually involves training of exceptional duration; (4) it is regulated by a credentialing process usually administered by a peer organization and thus excludes those not so trained; (5) it is dedicated to the service of the community and is not intrinsically self-serving; (6) it allows professionals considerable autonomy as they exercise their own judgment and authority. In practice this leads to an elitist occupation.

Wilbert E. Moore says, “The bond established by shared mysteries, exemplified in technical language and common styles of work and even common attire, bespeaks a consciousness of being set apart” (p. 9). Thus, in the modern world, not only doctors (who in England were long denied professional status because of the manual skills involved in surgery) and lawyers but engineers, accountants, the clergy and (increasingly) managers are accorded a professional status. Further, in a technological society tradespeople with esoteric skills in repairing computers, for example, have become professionalized.

The sixfold “trait” definition of a profession has been attacked by those who question the service role of professions and single out other distinguishing marks. One is wealth. While the original idea is that a professional does not work for pay but rather is paid to work, the high level of remuneration is now viewed commonly as a distinguishing mark and a motivating reason for entrance into a profession. Another mark is education; the professional is first and foremost an educated human being. To this Alfred North Whitehead said that “the term profession means an avocation whose activities are subjected to theoretical analysis, and are modified by theoretical conclusions derived from that analysis” (quoted in Hoitenga, p. 302). Since the 1960s, however, a third mark has been highlighted—power.

Professional help, it is claimed, leads to dependence on the part of clients and therefore disables rather than enables them (De Vries, p. 153). The emotional neutrality so widely promoted by professionals leads to less care than that given by those who simply love, that is, amateurs (those who work for love, as the original meaning implies). Ivan Illich calls for the abolition of occupational expertise not, as Adam Smith and Karl Marx do, because of its effect on the workers but because of what it does to the consumers (Freidson, p. 13). So added to the difficulty of defining what occupations may be called professions is this further confusion of whether professions and professionalization are good things.

Advantages

After considering the question of whether professions are necessary, Eliot Freidson makes a case for expertise, credentials and the institutionalizing of professional standards. There is simply not enough time in life to learn every form of expertise. Professions are based on a division of labor, so fundamental to a developed society. Such a division expresses a functional difference and not necessarily a difference in value and worth. Further, since ideas and skills cannot be advanced without becoming institutionalized, some form of credentialing is needed to protect society’s members from the disaster of ill-informed choices (Freidson, pp. 22-23).

Still, the dangers of professionalization are all too apparent. Professional life can corrupt the soul of the very Christians who take up the challenge of serving God’s redeeming purpose in the world, not just in the church.

Dangers

The autonomy of professional life, based as it is on advanced knowledge, all too easily leads to smug self-reliance, pride of place and position. Among God’s covenant people even a king must “not consider himself better than his brothers” (Deut. 17:20) nor “accumulate large amounts of silver and gold” (Deut. 17:17).

The structure of professional life rewards success and all too easily leads to a meritocracy in which service gives way to a psychology of entitlement. Success blinds professionals to the reality that grace is Christ’s gift to the broken, the needy, the blind and the wretched. Human achievement gets scant mention in the Bible. Scripture offers a theology of response to God’s achievements rather than to human expertise, of wisdom rather than success, of service rather than power. Without love, excellence all too easily becomes an idol. Technique may be safely learned only when one has determined in the heart that love is the most essential thing.

Because of the sacrifices they have undertaken in their long educational preparation, professionals all too often come to believe they deserve a special status and higher income (Hatch, p. 97). Frequently professionals find their identity in their work and measure their worth by what they do, rather than by who (or more important, whose) they are.

We require a deeper analysis of what is wrong with the professions. Christians diagnosing the problems of the world usually concentrate on hunger, poverty and war. But systemic evil is more complex and comprehensive. The principalities and powers (Ephes. 6:12-13) that Christians daily battle range from fallen social structures to the demonic. The very structure of professionalism in our society reflects not only the fallen human nature of those who have polluted the original vision of people professing Christ in their work, but systemic disorder. The result is that the very institutions established to serve others now serve themselves. Christians take their places in the world with hope but not easily. The hope involves living as a Christian amateur even while serving within a profession. This is especially difficult for those who are called to the professional ministry.

Christian Amateurs

The term professional Christian makes no theological sense at all. At heart Christians are amateurs who serve for the love of God, the love of serving and the love of those they serve. Three things militate against the professionalization of Christian service: one cannot be a Christian for a living; one cannot be a part-time follower of Christ; one cannot base one’s discipleship on peer review. Professional ministry itself is an oxymoron. Ministry is service to God and others marked by faith, hope and love. No one can be a specialist with God, though four basic models of ministry in history offer patterns of presumed specialization: (1) the sacramental model based on credentialing through ordination, (2) the cloistered religious model of monasticism, (3) the learned pastor model that has arisen since the Renaissance and (4) the organizational model of contemporary management culture. Each model offers a criterion for excellence and elitism. But it is questionable whether pastoral, missionary or parachurch service should be regarded as a professional career to be pursued for life (see Financial Support).

The professionalization of ministry may have some benefits (Noyce, pp. 975-76), but it normally contributes to the tragic and unscriptural dualism of laity and clergy, unless of course we return to the original meaning of professional as one who professes faith, hope, love and justice. At the heart of Christian leadership is the idea of giving away everything one has in order to equip all the saints for the work of ministry (Ephes. 4:11-12; see Equipping). Further, Christian ministry is never a one-way delivery system undertaken by highly trained experts but a mutual enrichment and empowerment (Romans 1:12). The recovery of a true amateur motivation is essential to the recovery of integrity in Christian ministry. But this is not the only way Christians may respond to the crisis of professionalism.

Recovering True Professionalism

One contribution the church can make is the humanization of professional education. John Stuart Mill once said,

Men are men before they are lawyers, or physicians, or merchants, or manufacturers. . . . What professional men should carry away with them from the University, is not professional knowledge, but that which should direct the use of other professional knowledge, and bring the light of general culture to illuminate the technicalities of a special pursuit. (quoted in Hoitenga, p. 303)

Having lost the Christian (and therefore humanizing, though not humanist) foundation, the modern university has become a multiversity. Christians have the prophetic task of proclaiming a worldview for professional life that is fully integrated and includes moral education, the development of character and personal mentoring, all facets of professional education that preceded the present technical career preparation. The professional must be a person, a whole person.

Traditional professions were rooted in a special brotherhood of people who regarded their service as a special calling and therefore were worthy of trust by clients, patients and parishioners. The order of priority has been reversed in modern life. Professionals are expected to provide excellence in service as measured by standards, thus resulting in trust. The shift from interpersonal trust based on personal integrity to technical competence guaranteed by credentials is signaled by the widespread use of advertising to identify professional services and assure confidence in their use. Even if it were desirable, it is unrealistic to attempt to turn the clock back and eliminate the need for professional standards. Nevertheless, developing persons of integrity remains the greatest challenge in professional education and life. The Christian faith, with its emphasis on maturity as the master educational concept (Ephes. 4:13), is eminently relevant.

One of the hallmarks of professional life is excellence. The Christian serving in professional life in a so-called secular career will strive for the best. But excellence is not the goal or even the measure of Christian service, whether in church leadership or business management. Love is that goal: “If I . . . surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor. 13:3). Emotional neutrality and professional impassivity will lead to a lower quality of care than that given in love. Love empowers and serves even when there is no immediate financial reward or even the reward of visible results. Indeed, the results of our lives are not seen in this life. So the Christian professional, who is simultaneously an amateur, lives by faith, hope and love. In doing so, Christians can recover the original meaning of professionals as people who profess a holy calling.

» See also: Calling

» See also: Career

» See also: Integrity

» See also: Organization

» See also: Power

» See also: Service

» See also: Trades

» See also: Work

References and Resources

J. W. Carroll, “The Professional Model of Ministry—Is It Worth Saving?” Theological Education (Spring 1985) 7-48; A. M. Carr-Saunders and P. M. Wilson, The Professions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1933); R. G. De Vries, “Christian Responsibility in Professional Society: A Reply to Hoitenga,” Christian Scholar’s Review 13, no. 2 (1984) 151-57; E. Freidson, “Are Professions Necessary?” in The Authority of Experts, ed. T. L. Haskell (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984) 1-14; N. O. Hatch, “The Perils of Being a Professional,” Christianity Today 35, no. 13 (1991) 96-97; D. J. Hoitenga, “Christianity and the Professions,” Christian Scholars Review 10, no. 4 (1981) 296-309; E. C. Hughes, “Professions,” in The Professions in America, ed. K. S. Lynn (Boston: Beacon Press, 1965); I. Illich, “Useful Unemployment and Its Professional Enemies,” in Toward a Theology of Needs (New York: Bantam New Age Books, 1980); D. B. Kraybill and P. P. Good, eds., Perils of Professionalism (Scottdale, Penn.: Herald, 1982); W. E. Moore, The Professions: Roles and Rules (New York: Russell Sage, 1970); G. Noyce, “The Pastor Is (Also) a Professional,” Christian Century 105, no. 21 (1988) 975-76; W. J. Reader, Professional Men: The Rise of the Professional Classes in Nineteenth Century England (New York: Basic Books, 1966); H. L. Wilensky, “The Professionalization of Everyone?” American Journal of Sociology 70, no. 2 (1964/1965) 137-58.

—R. Paul Stevens