Mental Health: Clergy Jobs Often Equal Stress

Here are a few highlights from the report:

Close to 50 percent of United Methodist clergy who answered a survey conducted by the United Methodist Board of Pension and Health Benefits said their jobs stressed them out.

Five percent suffer from depression, 26 percent report at least some functional difficulty from depressive symptoms and 47 percent experienced hostility in their congregations.

To show some perspective, for matched U.S. adults used as a benchmark, only three percent suffer from depression and 12 percent report difficulty working, taking care of things or getting along with others.

The survey also found United Methodist clergy have a higher percentage of physical conditions including obesity (40 percent), high cholesterol (51 percent), borderline high blood pressure (prehypertension) (11 percent), asthma (17 percent) and pre-diabetes (9 percent).