Christian Conciliation & a Solvent Business Model?

I received an email today from a fellow “recovering lawyer” who is interested in pursuing certification as a Certified Christian Conciliator with the Institute for Christian Conciliation, a division of Peacemaker Ministries. (This is the organization where I used to serve as a director.)

She asked some interesting questions and I thought that some of you might be interested as well, so here is a portion of our email exchange.

1. How well utilized is Christian conciliation? Is conciliation fairly well received by churches, in general? Also, about how many certified conciliators are out there right now?

The service is well-respected and growing, but not that well utilized by most denominations. However, a number of key denominations have put biblical peacemaking into their governance (church order, discipline, etc.) and into their contracts (employment, vendor, etc.), so I (prayerfully!) hope that the service will become more and more utilized in the future. (Especially since it is so clearly tied to evangelism and the ministry of the gospel to Believers!)

I do not know how many Certified Christian Conciliators there are right now. Since I no longer serve as the director of the Institute for Christian Conciliation, I am no longer privy to that information. Sorry.

2. How long might it take to recoup the costs of training; how much income I could expect in the first year or two; and do people really utilize – and pay for – this kind of service?

Oooooh – a popular question and one that I would encourage you to (of course) pray about. A lot.

I can tell you that I think most Certified Christian Conciliators and (I believe) the senior staff members of Peacemaker Ministries would give you the same advice: ‘Don’t give up your day job.’ That is, no, I do not believe that you can recoup the costs of training and expect a reasonable (i.e., ‘solvent business model’) income in the first year or two. In fact, I’d even go so far as to say, ‘No way.’

That being said, I would still urge you to take the training and begin to minister in this strategic, eternal, wonderful ministry! It is WELL worth it – and who knows? Depending on your denomination, church size & interest/commitment/involvement, business & ministry ties, relationships, etc., you may be able to recoup your costs and earn an income and I may simply be flat wrong. But I would urge you to not anticipate a steady income—especially not right away.

(Oh, and you can encourage your husband that, yes, people pay for these services all the time and many (excellent/experienced/gifted) conciliators earn their professional rates. For example, one of the ICC mentors is a hugely successful litigator who is regularly paid his $350/hr. rate for conciliation cases as well as his legal advocacy cases. Even I have earned a nice, professional rate on an arbitration this year—although I usually perform conciliation cases for much less.)

 3. I was also wondering if there was much cross over for you between your role as attorney and your role as conciliator. I got the sense that you have retired from practicing law, but I wondered if you ever had occasion to wear both the lawyer hat and the conciliator hat.

As you get to know Christian conciliation, you’ll learn more about the Standard of Conduct and Rules of Ethics and Procedure, etc. and I’m sure that this will all become self-evident to you … but no, you cannot serve as both a lawyer AND a Christian conciliator at the same time for the same client. This is because as lawyers, our responsibility is to advocate for our client, but as conciliators, our goal is to promote the glory of God, reconciled relationship, and just/mutually-agreeable solutions to material issues.

However, yes, lawyers practice law AND perform conciliation services at the same time—just on different cases with different clients. (And having a JD is an excellent resource for serving as an arbitrator—my personal favorite conciliation service. I tremble—but I love serving in the place of a judge.)

Thank you so much for your time and help.
My pleasure!
And joy to you & yours—

Your sister in Christ,
Tara B.

PS
If you haven’t already read it, I encourage you to read the following Law Review Article. It’s a keeper! 🙂