United Methodist pastors in North Carolina are more obese than their neighbors like them, an “alarming” reflection of their isolation and job stress, according to a Duke University study.<\/p>\n
It’s the latest in a series of troubling studies on the state of clergy health, and that has experts saying that some ministers are working themselves to death — perhaps even seeing that as part of the job description.<\/p>\n
The most recent survey says it is the first in which researchers have directly compared a set of clergy with their immediate neighbors for rates of various health conditions, and the results aren’t good.<\/p>\n
The obesity rate is nearly 40 percent for white United Methodist clergy aged 35 to 64, according to a survey of 1,726 ministers. That’s 10 percent higher than comparable North Carolina residents (white, in the same age group, with jobs and health insurance.)<\/p>\n