Churches' Ministerial Counselling Service
Ministry can bring its own stresses, and ministers are not exempt from the other problems of everyday life arising from family and personal circumstances. It is not always appropriate to seek support from a colleague or a Regional Minister. In this instance, the Churches’ Ministerial Counselling Service (CMCS) can provide confidential independent help.
The CMCS provides professional counselling at a heavily subsidised cost. The service is accessed anonymously, with no records available to any regional association or Baptist Union staff concerning who uses the service. To preserve confidentiality, requests for counselling should therefore go directly to CMCS and not to a regional association or the Baptist Union.
Those eligible for support from the CMCS are: Accredited Ministers, Ministers-in-Training at a Baptist college, Recognised Local Ministers, Nationally Recognised Pastors, as well as adult members of their households. (Members of staff of a BUGB Specialist Team are similarly eligible, whether ministers or not.)
A fuller explanation of how CMCS operates and how help may be accessed can be found on the CMCS website.