Incarnation and pastoral care

This essay is an examination of the usefulness of incarnation as a theological metaphor for pastoral care and counseling. Understanding the incarnation as both an event and as a paradigm of God's relationship to the world provides a theological perspective for examining four interrelated questions about identity and the helping relationship frequently asked by the pastoral care-giver. The incarnation metaphor finally frees us to care in the confidence that in God the Incarnating One, all things, including our care for the sick, are held together.Dr. Anderson is Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology and Counseling at Wartburg Theological Seminary, 333 Wartburg Place, Dubuque, Iowa 52001.     

Phenomenology and pastoral care

The author discusses phenomenology as a potential resource for pastoral care generally and then illustrates its implications in two specific areas of pastoral care. After a brief discussion of the development of phenomenology, he defines pastoral care and identifies its methodological problem. Phenomenology, it is argued, offers potentially helpful methods and interpretative categories in its attitude, its attempts at self-aware, ordered discernment, and its anthropology. It serves to militate against the temptation in pastoral care to understand human problems in terms of individual and social pathology, in the case of individuals, and to illumine the ways the community functions as a dimension of pastoral care.He is the author ofEcclesial Man.     

Story and promise in pastoral care

The writer describes the pastoral office and considers the difference his theological orientation makes in understanding its work. The gospel is described as narrative and as promise. As narrative it concerns a particular person, Jesus, and especially his passion and resurrection. Becoming Christian means allowing one's own story and that of one's communities to be shaped and reshaped by Jesus. As promise, the gospel comments on the final outcome of the human enterprise. Ministers are those to whom the community grants the burden of tending the life of the gospel in the church. Their temptation in pastoral care is to lose the specificity of the gospel in slogans that are temporary and partial, e.g., identifying health care with the liberation of the gospel. Pastoral care is described as sacramental and as eschatological.He is the author ofStory and Promise: A Brief Theology of the Gospel About Jesus.     

Transference and covenant in pastoral care

Transference raises issues in pastoral care which covenant addresses. Through transference one tames the terrors of life and death. Transference also provides a basis for healing in pastoral relationships. Transference must be managed so that it does not result in idolatry but rather points the helpee beyond attachment to the minister and toward dependence upon God. Covenant provides theological guidance for transcending transference. This covenant involves the pastor-helpee relationship, commitment to God as a third party, and accountability to the covenant community.This article was presented in an earlier version as the Spring Faculty Lecture at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary on March 1, 1979.     

A critical appraisal of Charles Gerkin's pastoral theology

This article reviews and criticizes the recent writing of Charles Gerkin (Living Human Document, 1984;Widening the Horizons, 1986). Gerkin is concerned to ground the practice of ministry in the Judeo-Christian Tradition in a world of pluralistic claims to meaning. He calls his approach a narrative hermeneutical perspective, and shows in case material how the stories of individuals and groups can be reinterpreted through the work of ministry. Poling examines Gerkin's work to see what views of human nature and God are operative here. The result is a dialogue about the nature of pastoral theology and its role in the church today.     

Jungian psychology and pastoral care

This article provides a review of the implications of analytic psychology for pastoral care and the caregiver. Four areas of Jung's thought are examined: (1) his mode of treatment, (2) the process of individuation, (3) his theory of personality types, and (4) his concept of synchronicity. We suggest that Jung's system of thought contains a rich reservoir of insight for the enrichment of pastoral care.     

Genetic science and pastoral care

Important advances in the field of genetic science have raised new and challenging pastoral issues. This article describes the nature of genetic screening and artificial fertilization and follows each with the relevant pastoral implications.     

Transcultural hospital pastoral care

Transcultural hospital pastoral care's subjects, the immigrant and the refugee, are described. Differences and similarities are noted. Three difficulties—culture shock, prejudice, and ethnocentrism—are followed by principles of transcultural hospital pastoral care, the significance of hospitalization, and a case history.The Rev. David G. Hawkins, B.A., S.T.M., D. Rel., R.S.W., St. George's Anglican Church in Vancouver, is a chaplain at Vancouver General Hospital.     

Social pedagogy and pastoral care in schools

In the context of this paper, social pedagogy concerns how a person trained in social pedagogy can take up the role of a trusted and caring adult to help, support and empower troubled and vulnerable pupils to meet the demands they face in their lives so that they are better able to lead fulfilling and satisfying lives and can, in their turn, contribute to the betterment of society. This paper describes the nature of social pedagogy, highlights its origins and practice in mainland Europe, considers some key developments within the current context in England and outlines its implications for pastoral care in schools. There has been a marked growth in social pedagogy as an aspect of professional practice amongst the pastoral care community in England. Its further development will depend on an increasing recognition that pastoral care needs to follow the pupil into the different social settings they inhabit.