Earlier today at the PCA’s 38th General Assembly, Gary Campbell presented the report of PCA Retirement & Benefits, Inc. (RBI). RBI administers and provides retirement, disability, and life insurance protection for pastors, missionaries, and employees of PCA churches and agencies.

“Relief ministry is the heart of RBI,” said Campbell, the president of RBI, expressing concern over the readiness of many teaching elders to face retirement. “We see the potential for a train wreck, and we want to be prepared,” he said. While complete data is unavailable, RBI estimates that more than 60 percent of the PCA’s current teaching elders will reach the age of 65 in the next 15 years. Many of them are financially unprepared for retirement.

RBI relief director Robert T. Clarke wants to face this impending crisis head on. RBI’s Ministerial Relief Fund helps provide financial support for pastors’ families in need. Sometimes this involves simply filling in the cracks, be it helping pastors without a call, or those who are disabled, but frequently the support helps aging pastors and their families who were not fully prepared for retirement. “It’s the widows who bear the brunt of it,” Clarke said. “Statistics show that 82 percent of wives outlive their husbands. We have widows now who, without our help, would have an income of only $500 a month.”

Currently, the Ministerial Relief Fund is funded almost entirely through the PCA Christmas Offering. Based on what the Relief Fund traditionally receives from the Christmas offering annually, there will not be enough to meet the anticipated need for retirement relief in the coming decade. Both Campbell and Clarke remain hopeful that there is still adequate time to plan ahead. But before a long-range plan can be designed, accurate data must be gathered. To this end, RBI has recommended that the 38th General Assembly approve “Ministerial Relief’s Retirement Readiness Research Project and encourage pastors and churches to participate in the survey associated with the project.“

Financial Tools for Servants of the Church

Campbell’s overarching desire is to help servants of the church achieve financial security. While relief is available to those in need, RBI’s primary focus is helping pastors adequately prepare for the future so that they’re in a position to meet their own needs. “RBI is the only agency in the PCA with responsibility for delivering a retirement plan to our pastors … to protect PCA families from catastrophic loss,” Campbell said.

RBI recently launched a new website (www.pcarbi.org) to help pastors better plan for retirement. “It’s easy to use, whether it’s news, information about how your funds are doing, or financial calculators to help you plan—the new website presents information in a more friendly environment,” said Campbell.

The website also plays a significant role in helping people utilize RBI’s Defined Contribution Plan. “The problem with using [the Defined Contribution Plan] is education, because the money is yours,” Campbell said, noting that the website allows individuals to research, select, and easily keep up with their own accounts.

RBI recently made some noteworthy adjustments to its Target Retirement and Core Funds, providing better options to investors. “Today, the best retirement plans reflect a more customized approach,” Campbell said. “We’ve removed some of the multi-purpose contribution funds so that people can have more control.”

“The Balanced Fund was an approach used a decade or more ago that was designed as sort of a one-stop shop,” Campbell explained. “It was 60 percent stocks and 40 percent bonds. And that might work for a certain phase of your life. But if you turn 70 and you’re still at 60 percent stocks and 40 percent bonds, that may be way more risk than you should have.”

RBI also raised the percentage of Treasury Inflation Protected Securities—U.S. Treasury securities that protect the investor against inflation—in its portfolios. “It applies primarily to those people who are nearing retirement or after retirement,” Campbell said. “They’re a much better vehicle to use in terms of an inflation hedge in the short run than something like gold or commodities.” 

Campbell reports that 2009-2010 was a much better year for retirement plan performance than the previous year, pointing out that market value has recovered almost entirely to where it was prior to the October 2008 crash. Projections for the future are largely dependent on the coming period of deleverage, as major economies begin to face defaults on the massive debt they incurred in order to avert the economic meltdown.

For more information on RBI, visit www.pcarbi.org.