Read Carol Howard Merritt’s Aug. 13, 2010, post on the Call & Response blog on reasons for burnout. Merritt is a Presbyterian pastor in Washington, D.C.

Read a Jan. 28, 2011, column at EthicsDaily.com about the importance of rest for everyone, but particularly for ministers.

Read a Dec. 26, 2011, Huffington Post column by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach about a lack of gratitude among congregants and how that affects clergy job satisfaction.

Bernard Richardson is an ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. He teaches pastoral care and counseling at Howard University School of Divinity, where he also is dean of the Andrew Rankin Memorial Chapel.

Read a Jan. 21, 2012, Florida Times-Union report that blames the problem of clergy burnout on unrealistic expectations.

James Kenneth Echols was president of the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago until May 18, 2011. He edited I Have a Dream: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Future of Multicultural America (Augsburg, 2004), and he is an expert on the subjects of African-Americans in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Monte Sahlin is vice president for creative ministries with the Seventh-day Adventist Church, in which blacks make up 31 percent of members and which has 750 multiethnic congregations in which no ethnic group is more than 51 percent.

Read a Feb. 8, 2012, story from The Christian Post that says pastor burnout results from “idol-chasing” and neglecting the Gospel.

Read a March 15, 2012, account on the Ahead of the Trend blog about new research on “clergy killers” — conflict-filled congregations that are nearly impossible to lead.