BOB ABERNETHY, correspondent: If you have ever wondered what it is like to be the pastor of a church, there’s a book out about that. It’s This Odd and Wondrous Calling, by two seasoned United Church of Christ ministers who are well aware of ministry as it really is—the joys, the problems, and the things that can drive pastors crazy.

At the Wellesley Congregational Church in Wellesley, Massachusetts, outside Boston, the senior minister is the Reverend Martin Copenhaver.

REV. MARTIN COPENHAVER (preaching from pulpit): We worry about so many things, so Jesus says what we all long to hear: Do not be anxious. Do not worry.

ABERNETHY: At the First Congregational Church of Glen Ellyn, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, the Reverend Lillian Daniel is senior minister.

REV. LILLIAN DANIEL (to congregation): Let us greet one another with a sign of God’s peace. Peace be with you.

ABERNETHY: Recently, Lillian and Martin were together in Glen Ellyn. They talked with us about the church and its challenges.

DANIEL: This is what drives me so crazy about the “spiritual but not religious” people who see God in the sunset. You know, anybody can see God in the sunset. But what is remarkable is that you can see God in the committee meeting with other people who you disagree with, and that’s to me the miracle.

COPENHAVER: God can actually be found inside the church among flawed, quirky, broken people who are somehow bound together, and try to even see God in one another.

ABERNETHY: Ministry is constant, they said, never 9 to 5, and preaching is just part of it. They insisted ministry is often fun, and Lillian spoke of what she called the weird interplay of the sacred and the earthy.

DANIEL: The time right before you are leading worship, and so you’ve got a sermon that you are trying to memorize, and you are trying to be prayerful and lead hundreds of people in worship, and you walk in the sanctuary, and somebody says, “Lillian, we’re out of toilet paper in the men’s room.”

ABERNETHY: Lillian has been a pastor for 19 years. She has seen a lot of life. She once played bass guitar in a punk rock band, and she still sits in occasionally. Lillian has campaigned for social justice and is married to a union organizer. They have two teenage children. Recently, she went to Guatemala on a mission trip to build houses. Her father was a foreign correspondent. She has lived in seven countries.

DANIEL: It makes me feel angry when people think that the ministry is somehow removed from the real world, as though we have never heard swear words before. You know, we’ve heard some of the grittiest stuff you can hear. We’ve visited people in prisons. We’ve heard from folks when their lives are really at a low point. You’re eating with people, and you are talking with people, and you hear some of the worst things that people have done, and they are just sharing real life with you.

ABERNETHY: Lillian loves preaching and preparing for it.

DANIEL: We get to immerse ourselves in scripture and really study this stuff. And then we distill that and share it with the congregation. To me, that is such a privilege.

ABERNETHY: But in today’s world, Lillian says, the church’s message can sometimes seem unwelcome.

DANIEL: I think we live in a society of rampant narcissism, and the church rubs like sandpaper against that. You are selling a message that a lot of people just don’t want to hear in this sort of “it’s-all-about-me” culture.

ABERNETHY: Churches such as Lillian’s try to live the concern for others that they teach. This was a gourmet eight-course dinner and auction to raise money to send forty young people on a week-long work project this coming summer to help build a soup kitchen for the poor. The ample menu suggested a problem for many ministers—obesity.

DANIEL: Food is the socially respectable addiction of the church.

COPENHAVER: Ministers are always being plied with food. It’s one of the things if you pay a call on somebody they have a coffee cake.

ABERNETHY: Martin is the son and grandson of ministers, comfortable with many styles of worship.

COPENHAVER (speaking to congregation): This is our sabbath, our day of rest, a word that means literally a day for quieting the heart.

ABERNETHY: Martin puts a high priority on encouraging young people to consider becoming ministers and on training young ministers on the job. So does Lillian.

DANIEL: I remember I was an intern in divinity school at my first church, and the minister, my supervisor, turned to me in the meeting and said, “Lillian, would you like to open us with prayer?” And I said, “No, I wouldn’t like to.” You know, I thought he was just asking if I wanted to, and later he said that’s not an option, and I said, well, I don’t know how to do it, and he said nobody knows how to do it. You just have to do it.

COPENHAVER: The way to learn how to pray is to pray.

ABERNETHY: Sometimes, even the most experienced ministers face situations that test them, such as one that faced Martin when he taught a Sunday school class of very smart fourth graders—ten year olds.

Sunday school class: What came before God?

COPENHAVER: Oh, man, that’s a good one.

Sunday school class: Where is heaven?

COPENHAVER: Heaven is where God is.

Sunday school class: How do we know God exists?

Sunday school class: If God is good, why did he also create bad?

COPENHAVER: That is the biggest puzzle.

ABERNETHY: At last, the closing prayer.

COPENHAVER (praying with children): So God, we thank you that we might continue to stretch our hearts and minds toward you, never being afraid to ask and always seeking to learn.

ABERNETHY: I asked both pastors how they had known they were being called to ministry.

COPENHAVER: A sense of being compelled: I cannot not do this.

DANIEL: You keep coming back to it over and over again. When you try to walk away it is impossible.

ABERNETHY: Both pastors say the satisfactions, for them, far exceed the problems.

COPENHAVER: We are invited in and given privileged access to people’s lives, and that is not always joyous in the happy sense, but it’s a great, deep, abiding joy to share in people’s lives in that way.

DANIEL: Most clergy would far prefer to do a funeral than a wedding. You feel that the work that you are doing is profoundly important, and you are there to say something that nobody else in the world can say.

COPENHAVER: We get a chance to be wise. Not that all ministers are wise, but we get a good crack at it, because we see people in a variety of circumstances. We meet at that intersection of a human and the divine. We live in community. Wisdom is always acted out in community.

(to congregation): Go in peace.

Ministry is a lot like parenting in that it can be really difficult at times, but it never feels not worth doing. It really is joyous work.

DANIEL: God calls you just as you are, and you don’t have to be this phony-baloney person. You’ve been called to be exactly as you are and in that to proclaim this Word that is bigger than yourself.

ABERNETHY: Lillian and Martin’s book is This Odd and Wondrous Calling.

TIM O’BRIEN, anchor: The issue of gay marriage is on the agenda as the US Episcopal Church holds its once-every-three-years General Convention in Anaheim, California.  For years, Episcopalians have been deeply divided over homosexuality.  One proposal being debated at this meeting would allow Episcopal churches to conduct same-sex weddings in the six states that have legalized gay marriage.  Currently, most mainline denominations do not officially allow same-sex weddings.  But the changing legal environment is adding new pressure.  Kim Lawton has our report.

KIM LAWTON: Boston’s historic Church of the Covenant has been an important place for Anne Crane and Sarah Perreault. The lesbian couple had their first date there in the late 1970s, and by the time Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage the two had been active members for more than 25 years, so a church wedding seemed the obvious choice.

SARAH PERREAULT: In particular we wanted to be married at our home church with our community and our family and friends.

LAWTON: But it was complicated. Church of the Covenant is dually aligned with two mainline denominations: the United Church of Christ and the Presbyterian Church (USA).  And while the UCC has no problem marrying same-sex couples, it’s against national Presbyterian policy.

ANNE CRANE: Well, it’s painful to know that the church that I’ve been a part of all my life does not recognize our relationship and our marriage as being a legitimate marriage.

LAWTON:  Church of the Covenant worked it out so that a retired UCC minister conducted the ceremony, and the Presbyterian side of the church officially stayed out of it.  Crane and Perreault say their wedding was beautiful and meaningful, but not quite everything they would have planned.

PERREAULT:  I felt badly because there were people that we would have liked to include in our ceremony who could not participate because they were ordained Presbyterian clergy. There was a real loss there.

Man at Protest:  “We are a couple…”

LAWTON:  For decades, mainline denominations have been wrestling over issues surrounding homosexuality: whether to ordain gay clergy and whether to recognize–and bless same-sex unions. Now that six states have legalized gay marriage, those battles are taking on a new urgency. Some church members are pushing the denominations to reassess their policies, while others are fighting to hold the line.

Mark Tooley is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, an advocacy group that supports conservative positions within mainline denominations.

MARK TOOLEY:  The church shouldn’t just go along with what the wider society demands of it. But the church is ideally supposed to be faithful to timeless teachings that have been presented to the church through its Scripture and through its traditions.

Minister:  “To have and to hold…”

LAWTON: Currently, while the Unitarians and the UCC conduct gay marriages, mainline Protestant denominations as a rule don’t officially allow it. Clergy who participate in same-sex weddings could face church trials and even risk being defrocked.

Minister:  “I hereby pronounce you husband and husband…”

TOOLEY:  Traditionalists within those churches will strive to help to ensure there is as much fidelity as possible, by the clergy to the official teachings.

LAWTON: In the United Methodist Church, 83-year-old Richard Harding has a long history of activism for gay rights. He helped found Reconciling Retired Clergy, a network of retired pastors willing to perform gay marriages.

REV. RICHARD HARDING: There’s not a whole lot that they can do to we retired clergy, and there’s a whole lot that they can do to active clergy that they can’t do to us. And that’s why we’re stepping in.

LAWTON: Harding says he believes what he’s doing is the right thing, so he’s willing to risk any repercussions.

HARDING: We could be defrocked. I would be now sitting here as Mr. Harding instead of Reverend Harding. And in Massachusetts, a lay person can go for a day to the state house and get permission to officiate at a marriage. So I’d still be able to do it, only I just wouldn’t be a pastor anymore.

LAWTON: At Church of the Covenant, interim minister Jennifer Wegter-McNelly is an ordained Presbyterian pastor. She says her congregation has been put in a difficult position of trying to maintain support for gay members while still respecting the national denomination.

REV. JENNIFER WEGTER-MCNELLY: We have a long history and we’re very active, and so I think there is a lot of really thoughtful hard conversation about how do we be prophetic and remain faithful and connected to the churches that are our larger community?

LAWTON: So far, they’ve been able to do that by keeping same-sex weddings solely under the jurisdiction of the UCC part of their church. Other congregations don’t have that option. Episcopal clergy also can’t conduct gay marriages. In an effort to be even-handed, many Massachusetts Episcopal churches aren’t doing any weddings, gay or straight. Instead, Reverend Pam Werntz at Boston’s Emmanuel Episcopal Church says they provide a blessing for couples who are married by the state.

REV. PAM WERNTZ:  That could happen separately, it could happen at the courthouse and then a couple comes here for the ceremony, or it can happen in the same ceremony where a Justice of the Peace presides over the first part of the service and the priest presides over the blessing and often a Eucharist celebration.

LAWTON: The compromise may have helped circumvent some of the denominational difficulties, but Werntz says it was still painful for many members.

WERNTZ:  There were people that left the church in feeling a lot of sorrow and betrayal that the Episcopal Church couldn’t move as fast as I think it needed to move when same-sex marriage was legalized.

LAWTON: UCC minister Reine Abele, who does perform gay weddings, say churches need to be better at addressing social concerns.

REV. REINE ABELE: Churches generally are not the leading edge of cultural change in our society. They are often not the engine but the caboose.

LAWTON: But despite the new activism, mainline clergy continue to be conflicted over the issue, and those who support gay marriages still appear to be in the minority.

LAWTON: According to a recent survey by Public Religion Research, mainline clergy are generally more supportive of gay rights than Americans as a whole. But that doesn’t hold true when it comes to same-sex marriage. Only a third of mainline clergy support gay marriage. That number is just about the same for Americans overall.

TOOLEY: Often people in wider society are very surprised to learn that the mainline churches don’t already accept same sex marriage, because typically these churches, at least for the last 50, 60 years or more have been on the liberal side of social issues. But they have hung back on the marriage issue.

LAWTON: For many, it’s an issue of basic theology.

TOOLEY: Typically for Jews and Christians, marriage is a metaphor for faithfulness between God and his people and once you begin to redefine what marriage is you ultimately start to redefine who God is and that obviously and understandably is difficult for Christians and Jews.

LAWTON: In the Presbyterian Church (USA), Reverend Mary Holder Naegeli is among those urging the denomination to maintain its stand.

REV. MARY HOLDER NAEGELI: Homosexual practice is not God’s design for humanity. Not being God’s design for humanity, having these clear prohibitions in the Scripture make homosexual practice a sin. Homosexual marriage makes permanent a situation that God wants to redeem.

LAWTON: But others advocate a different interpretation of the Bible.

WEGTER-MCNELLY: Our call to be inclusive of all people comes from scripture.  It comes from faithfulness to God, it comes from understanding that all people are made in the image of God and it’s essential to support people in their relationships, to bless them and support them and nurture them.

LAWTON: For Wegter-McNelly, the issue also comes down to her pastoral responsibilities to the people in her pews.

WEGTER-MCNELLY:  Here gay marriage isn’t an abstract issue. It’s not a political issue.  It’s very much an issue of the people of the congregation being in community together. To tell people that this community that is the compass for your life is not going to bless and support you in your intimate relationship is kind of an impossibility.

LAWTON: But supporters of traditional marriage say pastors also have a responsibility to their faith and to the wider church.

HOLDER NAEGELI: Why would I, a representative of God, help people make permanent with a vow, I take marriage vows very seriously, but with a vow to make permanent then, seal something that God wouldn’t agree with?

LAWTON: As they celebrate their fifth wedding anniversary, Anne Crane and Sarah Perreault are glad their church wedding worked out.

CRANE: It’s a liberating feeling, and it’s enabled me and us to just, to live our lives honestly and openly, and many people don’t have that opportunity and have to continue living a lie. And that’s the sad thing.

Minister: Those whom God has joined together, let no one put asunder.  Amen.

LAWTON: But given the conflicts within the mainline churches, the situation is not likely to change any time soon.

I’m Kim Lawton in Boston.

BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: In Washington, speculation is running high about where Obama and his family will attend church after they move into the White House. Earlier this year, Obama cut ties with his longtime Chicago congregation, Trinity United Church of Christ, because of its controversial former pastor Jeremiah Wright. Kim Lawton takes a look at some of the Washington churches Obama may want to consider.

KIM LAWTON: If the Obamas want to go with an establishment mainline congregation, they may want to consider National Presbyterian Church. It’s regularly attended by cabinet officials, members of Congress, and Supreme Court justices. Congregational archives claim that most presidents since James Madison have visited the church at least one time. National Pres, as it’s called, has about 2,500 members, and note to Obama daughters Sasha and Malia: there’s an active children’s program with about 400 kids.

National Pres has a special Chapel of the Presidents, dedicated to Dwight D. Eisenhower. Ike was the last president to make this his church home. He was actually baptized here while he was president.

National Pres may say that most presidents have visited, but St. John’s Episcopal makes the claim that every president since Madison has come here at least once.

St. John’s Episcopal Church has a great location. If you’re at the White House, all you have to do is walk across Lafayette Park and you are here. No excuses for being late.

The church was founded in 1815 specifically to offer presidents a place to worship. The historic national landmark is now undergoing its first major renovation in more than a hundred years. The sanctuary was literally gutted, and everything is being refurbished and upgraded, from the floors to the electrical systems.

Rector Luis Leon says St. John’s has a lot to offer a president. In addition to the location, he says the congregation is used to all the Secret Service and its elaborate security measures, and there’s even a special presidential pew.

Reverend LUIS LEON (Rector, St. John’s Episcopal Church): And right about here is where Pew 54, which is called the President’s Pew, will be once we finish the renovations to the church.

LAWTON: It’s the spot first selected by President Madison.

Rev. LEON: He didn’t want the front pew, which would be the most prominent pew. He wanted one that was in the middle of the church so that he would be treated as every other parishioner would be treated here at St. John’s Church, and that’s a standard that we’ve tried to maintain over the years.

LAWTON: So what if a president doesn’t want to sit in that pew?

Rev. Luis Leon

Rev. LEON: He could sit where ever he wants to sit.

LAWTON: Leon says the church tries to meet the spiritual needs of a congregation made up of people from all over the metropolitan area, from the powerful to the homeless.

Rev. LEON: And everybody checks their political partisan membership at the door, and we get along very well because of that.

LAWTON: And after the controversy generated by the fiery sermons of Jeremiah Wright, Obama may be relieved to learn that Leon has a very different preaching style.

Rev. LEON: The one thing we’ve grown accustomed and we are very careful about because we never know who’s in the congregation is that we try not to scold anybody.

LAWTON: Franklin Delano Roosevelt and several presidents after him held pre-inaugural prayer services at St. John’s. Leon says they’ll be ready should Obama chose to do so as well.

Rev. LEON: Our contractors have assured us that the renovations will be completed by the first part of January.

LAWTON: If Obama wants to be part of one of the most historic churches in the African-American tradition, he may want to consider Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church, also known as the National Cathedral of African Methodism. The AME was founded in 1816 by a former slave, Richard Allen, and it’s America’s first independent black denomination. Metropolitan has a long history of social activism. It was a stop on the Underground Railroad, and Frederick Douglass preached from the pulpit here. Today it continues to be a center of progressive religious causes.

We know Obama likes good church music, so he may want to base his decision on that. If so, there’s the Southern Baptist Church Praise and Worship Center, which, by the way, is not affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Earlier this year, Southern Church won the Verizon Wireless competition for the best small church choir in the DC region. Co-pastors Charles and Eleanor Doom say they strive for the kind of church music that touches everyone. It’s all part of the church’s exuberant worship style.

Reverend CHARLES DOOM (Co-pastor, Southern Baptist Church Praise and Worship Center): We just don’t sit. We are not quiet. We give our physical expressions. We do what the psalmist says. We make a joyful noise unto the Lord.

Reverend ELEANOR DOOM (Co-pastor, Southern Baptist Church Praise and Worship Center): We genuinely love God and appreciate what God has done for us.

LAWTON: There’s a closeness here — a feeling of family.

Rev. C. DOOM: We use these terms in the church “brother” and “sister.” Those are kindred terms — those are family terms. We are very oriented in terms of family. We believe that strong families make strong churches.

LAWTON: Pastor Doom often preaches a vigorous sermon.

Rev. C. DOOM: I try to preach something that will meet the needs of the people where they are.

LAWTON: Are they long sermons?

Rev. Charles Doom

Rev. C. DOOM: I’ve been guilty of that, yeah. I tell people I’m not a helicopter-type preacher. A helicopter goes straight up. I’m more like a 747. It takes me time to go down the runway, get clearance, and take off.

LAWTON: An added bonus: there are lots of church dinners, and Southern boasts that it has many great cooks.

Rev. C. DOOM: We have various services where food is involved. You know, church people love to eat, so we fellowship around food. Amen.

LAWTON: Obama may want to attend New York Avenue Presbyterian, the church of one of his presidential heroes, Abraham Lincoln.

Some presidents have based their church decision on denominational ties. Jimmy Carter chose First Baptist, where he sometimes taught Sunday school classes. The Clintons regularly attended Foundry United Methodist, the denomination Hillary grew up in.

Obama was a member of the United Christ of Christ for more than 20 years. There are eight UCC churches in Washington, including Plymouth UCC, which describes itself as a church striving to connect people to God, people to people, and people to great causes.

Then again, National City Christian Church might fit several qualifications. It’s part of a sister denomination to the UCC. It’s close to the White House. It’s historic, and it also has several presidential ties. Reverend Stephen Gentle is senior pastor.

Rev. Stephen Gentle

Reverend STEPHEN GENTLE (Senior Pastor, National City Christian Church): National City Christian Church is an exciting place to worship and to come and grow spiritually. It’s a multicultural, multiracial, bilingual congregation that seeks to be welcoming to all people.

LAWTON: Gentle says with his sermons he tries to engage both the heart and the mind.

(to Rev. Gentle): Do you preach a long sermon?

Rev. GENTLE: That’s a relative question. No. They could be longer.

LAWTON: National City Christian has a variety of musical styles, from a gospel choir to classical musicians who also perform at weekday noon concerts at the church.

Two presidents have made this their church home, James Garfield and Lyndon B. Johnson, and both are immortalized in stained glass windows in the sanctuary. Garfield was the only ordained minister to be U.S. president, and he was highly involved here until his assassination in 1881.

Rev. GENTLE: President Garfield, James Garfield, was not only an active participant in our congregation, but when he was in worship would often be asked to preside at the Lord’s Table, our Communion service, or sometimes even to preach.

LAWTON: LBJ and Lady Bird were also active here.

Rev. GENTLE: I’m told that often they would go down for coffee at our social time and would spend as much time as they would like, just greeting and visiting and taking photos with members of our church and other guests.

LAWTON: LBJ’s window has symbols that depict some of the highlights of his presidency: the establishment of Medicare; space advances at NASA; and, of course, racial reconciliation and the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. There’s a special presidential pew here, too, deemed by LBJ’s Secret Service team to be the safest place in the church. It’s right near an exit. The deacons always brought Communion here to the president first.

Rev. GENTLE: I’ve been told that the reason they wanted the president and his family to be served first is so that no one would tamper with the Communion, and they would be safe.

LAWTON: Gentle says while they have a special spot reserved for the president, they are flexible.

Rev. GENTLE: Of course, we would be delighted to find just the right pew for the Obama family should they ever like to worship here.

LAWTON: Whatever congregation the Obamas choose will have to make numerous accommodations, from security to the inevitable national scrutiny. But as one religious leader told us, the most important consideration for Obama will be finding a place that will nurture his soul.

I’m Kim Lawton in Washington.

ABERNETHY: We may not know yet where the Obamas will go to church, but we do know that the new president will attend a public prayer service at Washington’s National Cathedral on the morning after his inauguration.