Pastoral Care

Drawing on psychological, theological, and cultural studies on suffering, Carrie Doehring encourages counselors to view their ministry through trifocal lenses and include approaches that are premodern (apprehending God through religious rituals), modern (consulting rational and empirical sources), and postmodern (acknowledging the contextual nature of knowledge). Utilizing strategies from all three perspectives, Doehring describes the basic ingredients of a caregiving relationship, shows how to use the caregiver's life experience as a source of authority, and demonstrates how to develop the skill of listening and establish the actual relationship. She then explains the steps of psychological assessment, systemic assessment, and theological reflection, and finally she delineates the basic steps for plans of care: attending to the careseeker's safety, building trust, mourning losses, and reconnecting with the ordinariness of life.

The essentials of pastoral care involve the pastor's distinctive task of caring for those who are estranged--the lost sheep. Taken from the biblical image of the shepherd, the pastor by virtue of his or her professional calling cultivates wise judgment in order to hear the hurting and offer guidance, reconciliation, healing, sustaining presence, and empowerment to those in need. This book will outline the quintessential elements pastors need to wisely minister in today's context by discussing four major kinds of lostness: grief, illness, abuse, and family challenges. The purpose of the Abingdon Essential Guides is to fulfill the need for brief, substantive, yet highly accessible introductions to the core disciples in biblical, theological, and religious studies. Drawing on the best in current scholarship, written with the need of students foremost in mind, addressed to learners in a number of contexts, Essential Guides will be the first choice of those who wish to acquaint themselves or their students with the broad scope of issues, perspectives, and subject matters within biblical and religious studies.

Explore a new way of pastoral care that enables caregivers to develop relationships and provide meaningful pastoral care to the children and youth they encounter! The Pastoral Care of Children focuses on the need for pastoral caregivers, clergy and chaplains to develop relationships with youths and gives you suggestions to overcome the anxiety associated with caring for an acutely ill child through unique, playful, and child-centered approaches. Many pastoral caregivers have high anxiety when children are ill or hurt, are unsure how to have a substantive conversation with a nine-year old, or their fears of what could be said keep them from hearing what children have to say. The effective approaches in The Pastoral Care of Children are illustrated to assist you with serving the spiritual needs of children. You will explore actual pastoral care experiences that will help you gain confidence in handling situations such as a teenager's desire to be baptized out of fear of death when neither he nor his parents believe in Christ. Intelligent and heartfelt, this valuable book gives you a complete theological exploration of ministering to children who may ask you “Why me?”, “Why do people have to die?” and “What happens to children if they die before they are baptized?” The Pastoral Care of Children helps you answer these questions with meaningful responses that are genuine and grounded with yourself, and reflect the parents’beliefs. Some of the help you will discover in The Pastoral Care of Children includes: understanding the similarities and differences of caring for children in comparison to adults, such as different vocabularies but similar emotions, and realizing that children are very perceptive using play as a tool, for example referring to a puppet's experience in reference to the child to eliminate the child's self-consciousness and help him or her open up confronting pastoral issues in acute care settings, such as fear, guilty feelings, and anger, from parents, family and the child helping children recover from mental health issues such as depression, eating disorders, and identity and self-esteem issues by using cognitive therapy conducting prayer and rituals with children such as baptism, naming ceremonies, anointings, and funerals to assist the child and family through this spiritual rite of passage Complete with child and family focused approaches for dealing with the questions surrounding death, The Pastoral Care of Children also provides you with several cited scriptures, and a list of questions you may be asked by a child who is facing death. You will learn from actual circumstances pastoral caregivers have encountered and discover how to approach topics, and answer questions on God and death. The Pastoral Care of Children, an extremely resourceful book that will assist you in overcoming anxiety and help you deliver thoughtful and uplifting pastoral care to children and youth.

A distinguished historian, academic and occasional evangelist I know was hushed by his stunned wife after he said to a friend he was visiting in the hospital, "I hope you don't die." A sentiment delivered sincerely but oh-so-awkwardly. Expressing care to someone in need--whether within the community of faith or beyond--may seem the most natural thing in the world. For some, it is; for others, it's less so. All can improve. Learn to reach out with God's love and care for others as outlined in this practical book. Farabaugh offers a systemic path for pastoral care using the gifts of the laity in the church. "At a district Council on Ministries' meeting, our conversation focused on the realization that most of the clergy had no assistance in the area of pastoral care and felt overwhelmed by their many, sometimes conflicting, responsibilities," writes Farabaugh. "Most of the churches did not train anyone in caring ministries. Today it is time for clergy and laity to partner in caring for one another." Unique to this course is the ongoing training and accountability meetings outlined for those in this invaluable ministry. During the monthly meetings, participants report on what they have learned and also study aspects of caring for situations and conditions of life, such as illness, suffering, grief and loss. Leader's Guide: Leading in Lay Pastoral Care

This book is an edited volume of works that have predominated over the past several decades in contemporary pastoral theology. Through the writings of nineteen leading voices in the history of pastoral care, Dykstra shows how each contributor developed a metaphor for understanding pastoral care. Such metaphors include the solicitous shepherd, the wounded healer, the intimate stranger, the midwife, and other tangible images. Through these works, the reader gains a sense of the varied identities of pastoral care professionals, their struggles for recognition in this often controversial field, and insight into the history of the disciple. Includes readings by: Anton T. Boisen, Alastair V. Campbell, Donald Capps, James E. Dittes, Robert C. Dykstra, Heije Faber, Charles V. Gerkin, Brita L. Gill-Austern, Karen R. Hanson, Seward Hiltner, Margaret Zipse Kornfeld, Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Jeanne Stevenson Moessner, Henri J. M. Nouwen, Gaylord Noyce, Paul W. Pruyser, Edward P. Wimberly.

The Old English Pastoral Care, a ninth-century translation from Latin of Pope Gregory the Great's guide for aspiring bishops that advises on what sort of spiritual guidance bishops should provide, was aimed at revitalizing the English Church. This new edition and translation into modern English is the first to appear in a century and a half.

Ritual can resonate to human need, and to this end there is much the ritualist can learn from the psychological insights into human development and personality familiar to those in the field of pastoral care.