TUPELO, Miss. — Responses in new research from Resilient Pastor and reported through the Barna Group shows a highly-concerning loss of personal well-being on the part of pastors. The data reveal a significant decline in personal, spiritual, mental, and emotional well-being between 2015 and 2022. In those seven years, self-reported spiritual well-being dropped from 37% to 10%, the sense of mental health plummeted from 39% to 11%, and meaningful friendships, a measure of emotional soundness, decreased from 34% to 17%.

American Family Association (AFA, www.AFA.net) Executive Vice President Ed Vitagliano said pastors are a special target of Satan’s, and church members must step up with more spiritual, mental, and emotional sustenance aimed at caring for their pastors.

“Pastors are at the front lines of the spiritual warfare that is ravaging our nation, the church, marriages and families, and the lives of many individual Christians,” Vitagliano commented. “Moreover, as America continues to unravel, the intensity of that spiritual combat will only grow. It is no wonder recent polling suggests that the warfare is taking its toll on our religious leaders. Church members must commit themselves to prayer on behalf of their pastors and their families, and church leadership should do everything in their power to provide for their pastors’ temporal needs to remove that anxiety from the list of things threatening to crush them. The Church is critical to our nation’s wellbeing, and pastors are critical to the church.”

For over 40 years, AFA has operated within the mission to inform, equip, and activate individuals to strengthen the moral foundations of American culture and give aid to the church here and abroad in its task of fulfilling the Great Commission.  Founded in 1977, AFA has long been on the front lines of America’s culture war. Today, AFA is one of the largest and most effective pro-family organizations in the country, with nearly a million online supporters and approximately 110,000 subscribers to The Stand (formerly known as the AFA Journal), the ministry’s monthly magazine.  Find AFA Action Alerts here.  In addition, AFA owns and operates nearly 180 radio stations across the country under the American Family Radio banner. 

View the media page for AFA here. For more information on American Family Association, visit www.afa.net or follow AFA on Facebook or Twitter @AmericanFamAssc.       

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To interview an AFA spokesperson, contact [email protected], Beth Harrison, 610.584.1096, ext. 105, or Deborah Hamilton, ext. 102.  