Second, and related, there has been increased attention given to the more public, ecumenical, and even transforming nature of the Christian faith and thus of pastoral theology. In North America, David Tracy has been among the more influential proponents of this view. Third, given the expanded place for the laity in Catholic thinking, no longer is pastoral theology solely the purview of the priesthood. Laypersons too are called to identify and utilize their own gifts for ministry and to contribute to pastoral theology’s reflection and action (Duffy, 1983). Fourth, given its focus on praxis, pastoral theology has enlarged the role of human scientific knowledge and resources in the theological enterprise. Appealing to methods of correlation and various hermeneutical relationships as well as the methods of various critical theories, pastoral theology has become truly interdisciplinary, though typically a final appeal is made to how pastoral theology’s findings may be shaped by the perspectives and teachings of Catholic tradition. Here, too, David Tracy has been among the more influential voices, as have Thomas H. Groome, Dennis P. McCann, and Matthew Lamb in North America, and Johannes A. van der Ven in Europe and South Africa.
Though there has been a rapprochement between Protestant and Catholic understandings of pastoral (practical) theology, with respect to pastoral theology in the more narrow sense (pastoral care) at least two Catholic emphases remain. These are the communal context of both thinking about and offering pastoral care, meaning the larger ecclesial community remains the locus of care, as opposed to a more “professionalized” setting like a counseling center. Second, care is still closely tied to the rituals and liturgies of Catholic life and worship (Duggan, 1994).
2
What Makes Care Pastoral?
Introduction
Pastoral theology has attracted me for nearly two decades. Several of its qualities inform this attraction. One quality has to do with pastoral theologians themselves. I find them to be smart, creative, interesting, wise, and fun. They also tend to take intellectual and professional risks in ways that set them apart. As a result, they intrigue me and garner my admiration and affection.
Another attractive quality relates to pastoral theology’s identity as a field. As Robert C. Dykstra has noted, pastoral theology “typically refuses to behave, especially in terms of conclusively defining itself” (Dykstra, 2005, 5). In other words, pastoral theology and pastoral theologians maintain complex, variable, and often multiple identities. Pastoral theologians also tend to live and work contentedly with a measure of ambiguity, iconoclasm, countercultural appreciation, and even rebellion, all of which I think we need more of in theological education, not to mention the church. For all of these reasons, I find pastoral theology attractive.
I am also attracted to pastoral theology because, at its best, it works mainly with two broad fields of inquiry and practice that I find particularly significant and compelling—namely, the fields of theology and psychology. Of course, pastoral theologians draw from these fields in a variety of ways. Their work involves appealing to multiple forms of theological and psychological knowledge and practical wisdom—that is, appealing to various schools of thought within these wide-ranging disciplines, in both “systematic” and “ad hoc” manners. Pastoral theologians routinely engage other resources relating to the human condition as well, drawing especially from the range of human and social sciences. Making use of multiple approaches allows for intellectual diversity in pastoral theological work. Pastoral theology not only welcomes panoplies of focal subjects, but it remains less wed to prescriptive methods than some other academic fields. Indeed, when engaging in pastoral theological thinking, writing, and practice, one may drink plentifully from deep wells of knowledge and wisdom that attend to some of life’s most profound, pressing, and perplexing concerns; but one may extract from these wells using different types of “pumps” and “containers” appropriate for particular contexts, distinct needs, and available resources. For all of these reasons, pastoral theologians enjoy a measure of freedom uncommon in the academy.
When describing an encounter he had with a colleague who works in another academic discipline, Dykstra writes eloquently of the freedom that pastoral theologians enjoy precisely because pastoral theology “refuses to behave.” After sharing details about his current research with a friend, this friend remarked, “You know, it’s not fair; you pastoral theologians can study whatever you damn well please” (Dykstra, 2001, 48). Reflecting on this encounter, Dykstra writes, “His spontaneous comment . . . served to reinforce my conviction that, at some point long before or during their professional training, ministers and theologians typically learn to hesitate to pursue their own particular passions or to remain interested in what interests them” (48). This perspective helps me clarify further my own attraction to pastoral theology. My attraction follows from encounters with pastoral theology’s complex and multiple identities, but also from encounters with pastoral theologians who enjoy the freedom to remain interested in what interests them, and to study what they damn well please.
In my work as a pastoral theologian, I draw from my own complex and multiple identities. I make use of what might be called my “two selves.” One is my unconventional (and sometimes iconoclastic) self, perhaps most clearly reflected in my work in the psychology of religion and with psychodynamic psychologies (Cole, 1999, 2000, 2003, 2005a, 2005b, 2009b, 2010a, 2010b; Dykstra, Cole, and Capps, 2007). In this type of work, I enjoy swimming against prevailing tides (theologically and otherwise), stretching boundaries, challenging hegemony, and thinking outside of the proverbial “box.” The freedom to engage in this kind of work and, as important, the freedom to learn from those doing similar work, spawned, and later furthered, my interest in pastoral theology. These freedoms have also sustained my desire to make working in pastoral theology my primary vocation.
I think here especially of the shaping influences of scholars such as Donald Capps (1993a, 1995, 1997, 2002, 2008), Robert C. Dykstra (1997; 1999, 2001, 2005, 2007 [with Cole and Capps], 2009), James E. Dittes (1967, 1973, 1996, 1999a, 1999b) Bonnie Miller-McLemore (1988, 2003, 2006), John McDargh (1983, 1992), and more recently, Jaco Hamman (2007, 2009) and Nathan Carlin (2005, 2006, 2009a, 2009b, 2009c). Although their interests and perspectives vary, their collective penchant for working with ambiguity, iconoclasm, and unconventional ideas, their ability to draw from wide-ranging intellectual resources, and their faithful rebellion and “misbehaving” continues to buoy not only my intellectual life but my religious life as well. In a variety of ways, these thinkers (and some others like them) have helped me find new meaning and joy, not only in my work but also in my faith. Truth be told, these thinkers and others like them have helped restore faith qualities that had been compromised prior to my encounters with pastoral theologians. People who “misbehave” sometimes inspire us. They help us make more sense of who we are, what we do, and what truly matters to us, even when we may not always join in their misbehaving or misbehave differently.
Another part of me, my other self, is more conventional and temperate. It has also been nurtured and sustained at the wells of pastoral theology. I have in mind here especially the part of me that believes in the uniqueness and sacredness of the individual person, qualities that derive from having been created by God and called to serve God and other persons by virtue of God’s love. Jesus’ rhetorical question to his disciples, “If a shepherd has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray?” (Matt 18:12), points to this sacredness of individual lives. I also have in mind the importance that I attribute to ministers and congregations for attending to personal concerns and needs, so that these unique, called, and loved individuals (with God’s grace) may thrive. The same pastoral theologians I mentioned previously have fostered growth in my more conventional self, too; but some others have as well—scholars like Deborah van Deusen Hunsinger (2006), Carol Schnabel Schweitzer (2008, 2009), Daniel S. Schipani (2003), Gaylord B. Noyce (1982, 1989), Ralph Underwood (1993), and Margaret Kornfeld (2000)—all of whom have been known to “misbehave” as well, but whose work