Caring Liturgies

Caregiving practices in churches often center around listening and giving counsel, making referrals, and creating support groups for specific needs. In Caring Liturgies, Susan Marie Smith proposes that Christian ritual is both a method and a means for helping people through liminal times of transition and uncertainty, even vulnerability and fear. This volume teaches readers to recognize the ritual needs of fellow Christians and thus create post-baptismal rites of passage and healing that might strengthen and support them in the fulfillment of their ministries. The book extends the usefulness of denominational "occasional services" books and other resources by suggesting ways to build a rite around a central symbolic action, pointing out issues of ritual honesty and ethics, and identifying skills and attributes necessary to preparing and leading a rite. Numerous narrative examples help to flesh out the principles and illustrate the key argument: that rituals are necessary means to enable human growth and maturity, both through times of suffering and times of transition, and that ritual-making leaders are central to the ongoing health of the church.

Prayers to guide your journey of raising kids in a complicated world. In an age of distraction and overwhelm, finding the words to meaningfully pray for our children--and for our journey as parents--can feel impossible. Written with warmth and welcome, To Light Their Way gives voice to your prayers when words won't come. Filled with more than 100 modern liturgies, this book guides you into an intentional conversation with God for your children and the world they live in. From everyday struggles like helping your child find friends or thrive in school to larger issues like praying for a brighter world rooted in peace and truth, these pleas and petitions act as a gentle guide, reminding us that while our words may fail, God never does. At the core of To Light Their Way is the deepest of prayers: that our children will experience the love of God so deeply that their lives will be an outpouring of love that lights up the world.

The fundamental intuition of this essay is that liturgical theology does not simply deal with Christian rituals, festivals and sacraments, but with the core of faith itself: God, world, the Christ event, tradition, Church, and redemption.

In a perfect world we might expect that all worshipers would be ready for a worship service of thorough praise and adoration. But that is not the case. Those who come for worship bring with them all the cares, anxieties, and stresses of life in this broken world. All are needy people. Some will find help for those needs in the pastor's office during a one-on-one conversation; some may find it in a pastoral call; but many will never experience either of those. The opportunity to minister to their needs will occur during that special time when all are gathered for worship. The sermon has received much attention as the avenue for help with their hurts, but what about the liturgy? This book takes a new and fresh look at the worship liturgy. It insists that the liturgy, regardless of denomination or style, is not merely preparatory to the main event--the sermon--but is rather the time in which the worshiper can be healthily cared for. The worshiper who comes before the face of God should be able to expect help, care, and healing. Blessed are the Pastors and worship planners who develop a sensitive concern for the care that worshipers come expecting.

EVERY MOMENT HOLY, Vol. 2: DEATH, GRIEF, & HOPE, is a book of liturgies for seasons of dying and grieving--liturgies such as "A Liturgy for the Scattering of Ashes" or "A Liturgy for the Loss of a Spouse" or "A Liturgy for the Wake of a National Tragedy" or "A Liturgy for the Weighing of Last-Stage Medical Options." These are ways of reminding us that our lives are shot through with sacred purpose and eternal hopes even when, especially when, suffering and pain threaten to overwhelm us. -over 100 liturgies for seasons of dying and grieving -beautiful leather-bound hardcover -over 20 illustrations by Ned Bustard -silk bookmark -gilded edges

Pastoral care has been traditionally understood as pastoral acts administered to individuals or small groups by an ordained or lay religious practitioner. As congregations in the twenty-first century begin to reclaim the missional nature of church, this view must be broadened to include care and concern for the needs of the larger community. A missional perspective of pastoral care embraces the notion that all of Gods peoplenot just trained professionalsare called to partner in the healing and redemption of the world. In Beyond Church Walls, Rick Rouse sets out to articulate precisely what such an approach to pastoral care looks likeand the substantial impact it can have on congregations and communities. A skilled teacher and pastor with deep experience in real communities, Rouse leads readers through the changing realities of the twenty-first century and to new ways for missional churches to succeed in offering pastoral care for the whole community.

Liturgies for Advent and Christmas, Lent and Easter, Transfiguration, Pentecost, Trinity Sunday, All Saints', St Columba's Day, Father's Day; on hunger, economic witness, peacemaking, the environment, pilgrimage, welcome, hospitality and friendship. Includes a blessing liturgy for a marriage or partnership, a wedding/partnership ceremony and resources for a memorial event.Full communion services and shorts acts of worship; liturgies for small groups and all-age gatherings; worship rooted in church life and the Iona Community's resident group on Iona, in social justice and pastoral work. So - as always with the Iona Community - worship which is contextual, with a strong justice and peace edge.Originally published as single digital downloads by Wild Goose, these are now all brought together for the first time in the second of at least two Big Books of resources and liturgies.Contributors include John Harvey, Nancy Cocks, Tom Gordon, Jan Sutch Pickard, Joy Mead, Chris Polhill, Ian M Fraser, Thom M Shuman, Alison Swinfen, Annie Heppenstall, Norman Shanks and others.God of the rhinoceros and the midge,God of the Large Hadron Collider and the iPhone,help us to sense your presence in and through all things. God whose grace is sufficient for all our needs,help us to be people of compassion, justice and peace.(Norman Shanks, from 'A liturgy for the Feast of the Transfiguration')

In a perfect world we might expect that all worshipers would be ready for a worship service of thorough praise and adoration. But that is not the case. Those who come for worship bring with them all the cares, anxieties, and stresses of life in this broken world. All are needy people. Some will find help for those needs in the pastor’s office during a one-on-one conversation; some may find it in a pastoral call; but many will never experience either of those. The opportunity to minister to their needs will occur during that special time when all are gathered for worship. The sermon has received much attention as the avenue for help with their hurts, but what about the liturgy? This book takes a new and fresh look at the worship liturgy. It insists that the liturgy, regardless of denomination or style, is not merely preparatory to the main event—the sermon—but is rather the time in which the worshiper can be healthily cared for. The worshiper who comes before the face of God should be able to expect help, care, and healing. Blessed are the Pastors and worship planners who develop a sensitive concern for the care that worshipers come expecting.