John Edgerton, CPSP President, announces that the CPSP Governing Council will meet November 4-5, 2010 in Raleigh, NC at the Hilton Raleigh-Durham Airport at Research Triangle Park. The meeting will convene at 7:00 PM on the 4th. It will re-convene 8:30 AM on the 5th and conclude at 12:00 Noon. Meals will be provided by CPSP.

Participants are to directly contact the hotel and make their own arrangements. Be sure, however, you request the CPSP room rate. There is a free shuttle service provided by the hotel that makes frequent runs to and from the hotel and airport.

The Governing Council has significant work before it as it provides leadership for CPSP's mission and its future directions. All Chapters are encouraged by John Edgerton to send their Chapter Convener or representative from the Chapter. He further reminds Chapters that it is important to establish, when needed, financial resources to help insure Chapter representation at meetings of the Governing Council.

The National Clinical Training Seminar (NCTS) is right around the corner.

The NCTS will meet October 11 and 12th, 2010. IMPORTANT: The event will be held in a new venue: Stella Maris Retreat Center located at 981 Ocean Avenue, Elberon, NJ 07740.

Our theme for the upcoming fall NCTS is: “On the Varieties of Courage: Anton Boisen, Daniel Berrigan, Frank Serpico and The Pursuit of Liberty and Happiness.

The featured presenter Joseph M. Kramp, PhD candidate Drew University will use Heinz Kohut’s theory as a framework for his presentation. Most of his presentation will focus on Anton Boisen's autobiography.

Important Downloads:

NCTS SCHEDULE

NCTS REGISTRATION FORM

http://www.waterspirit.org/directions.html

This is going to be an exciting seminar. Plan to attend. Registrar now!. Registrations forms are available on this site!

Francine Hernandez,
NCTS, Coordinator
francine.angel5@gmail.com

Last week I visited Fort Hood in Texas to provide a consultation to the Family Life section of the Army’s chaplaincy corp. I was invited by Dave Scheider and Lance Sneath. Lance is on partial medical leave due to his debilitating Gulf War syndrome, one of 125,000 victims of flawed anti-radiation medicine. Dave is directing the training program for the time being.

The Family Life chaplains have an excellent facility, soon to be expanded. There are multiple counseling rooms with state of the art electronics that enable clinical supervisors to monitor the work of their trainees.

One of the remarkable aspects of Army chaplaincy is that they are currently much more advanced than the civilian sector in the matter of training their chaplains to work clinically with troubled families. The Army has integrated psychology and religion in a way that the civilian sector should emulate.

The clinical training program at Fort Hood, the largest military base in the country, the home of two divisions, is overall very impressive. Chaplains who go through the clinical training program simultaneously earn an M.S. degree in counseling awarded by Texas A&M University. This program is one of the most promising programs I have visited both in terms of the seriousness of the clinical supervision and teaching, and the quality of the trainees, as well as the infrastructure support.

On my visit I also consulted with the Lake Belton Chapter, which is made up largely of military chaplains based at Fort Hood. Some of their certified chaplains are currently and temporarily stationed in overseas bases and communicate with the Chapter by phone and skype for the time being.

I also made a visit to Utah and found a considerable amount of energy and enthusiasm for the expanding clinical training programs there. I was consultant to the clinical program at the Veterans Administration program in Salt Lake City. Chaplain Mark Allison supervises the program there.

The population in Utah is majority Latter Day Saints(LDS), or Mormons. I found the religious environment to be quite ecumenical. It seems clear to me that the LDS enthusiastically promote an ecumenical spirit. The trainee population was a mixture of Buddhists, Indian shamans, and a variety of Christian groups, Roman Catholic and Protestant. The program was multi-racial and multi-ethnic.

As well as consulting the program, I attended and spoke at the graduation ceremonies of Mark’s most recent training group. It was a gathering of more than one hundred persons along with the media from television and the Salt Lake City newspaper, Deseret News. The hospital administrator also spoke.

While in Utah I also conferred with several Chapter conveners and reviewed the rapid expansion of CPSP work in Utah. Five years ago we no CPSP activity in the state. Now there are five functioning Chapters and discussion of new Chapters to be formed.

While in Utah I also met with Roger Keller and Michael Benedict who are conducting a training program in Provo supervised by Foy Richie. Foy has been the person who originally brought CPSP work to Utah and the fruits of his work are quite impressive.

See below the Deseret News photo of Arnold Thomas, a blind Indian shaman who during the graduation ceremony treated me to a native ritual, chanting and purifying me magpie tail feathers and fumigating me with the Indians’ mountain tobacco smoke. I’ve felt better ever since. (The Pastoral Report’s editor is incorrect in reporting that the shaman was chanting ‘off with his head.’)

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Contact Raymond Lawrence, General Secretary: Click here.

The Deseret News published an article on 7/29/2010 featuring the Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) graduation service held at the George E. Wahlen Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Salt Lake City, UT.

Eighteen trainees graduated from the VA's accredited College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy's CPE training program directed by CPSP Diplomate, Mark Allison.

One of the CPE graduates, Chaplain Jody Smith was quoted:

It is an amazing journey," Smith said. "It will bring you both closer to God as well as help you develop awareness of what our veterans have done for us, and the journey our patients go through, and recognizing that spirituality is an inherent component of that healing equation.

Raymond Lawrence, CPSP General Secretary, was in attendance and is featured in a photo where he received an American Indian blessing during the Chaplain Graduation Ceremony at the VA Medical Center.

The complete article can be read by clicking here.

Perry Miller, Editor

A 77-year-old black male Baptist patient, for example, underwent assumed routine surgery, had an unexpected stroke, and was dying. His shocked sisters and nephew expressed considerable anger at a family meeting: “He just came in for this surgery,” one said. “He was all-right when he got here. Now look at him. He’s dying! He may be just a patient to you, but he's our brother and uncle.”

Sympathetic staff persons tried to reassure the family that the medical treatment of the patient was thorough, that strokes after surgery, while uncommon, do occur, and that the patient may have had an unknown medical condition that contributed to the stroke. The intellectual, rational, and probably accurate explanations of what possibly happened did not console the family. What seemed to be helpful in shedding light on their feelings of shock and anger was my reflecting how they must feel in assuming their loved one was undergoing routine surgery, then suddenly seeing him dying from a stroke. The pastoral relationship I already had established with the sisters and nephew evidently contributed to whatever degree of being understood they felt at that family meeting. A primary challenge was to hear and understand and reflect their feelings—which may be more difficult if one’s own feelings are unduly pressuring one to convince a family of one’s best medical efforts.

Before ending the family meeting, the attending doctor, who valued and utilized the role of us chaplains, asked if I had any final words. My words were: “The daughters love their mother very much, and are very concerned that the treatment their mother receives is guided by her wishes.”

On another occasion, I had the privilege of observing a doctor talking with a husband about the importance of being guided by the wishes of his 65-year-old white wife, who only had a few months to live. The husband asked if it were more helpful to keep from his wife the amount of time she may have left, to make it easier for her—and for him. The doctor said, ”It is better for her to know how long she has to live. She can then complete what is important for her in the time she has. If she doesn’t know until near the end,” the doctor, continued, “what is important to her will be left undone, and her dying will be that much more difficult for her and for you. She may also feel that she has been deceived.” The doctor’s advice helped the husband to see more clearly what dying meant to his wife, and thus to deal more appropriately with his own feelings about her dying.

The empowerment of patients and their families is enhanced by their realization that they are being understood. Thus pastoral care is about understanding. Understanding where we chaplains are coming from in order for us to know where patients and their families are at.

Being understood is a universal human need. It enables growth and grieving, caring and community.
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Bill Alberts is a hospital chaplain at Boston Medical Center. Dr. Alberts is a nationally known writer and an occasional contributor to Counterpunch. In addition, he is convener of the New England Chapter of CPSP. He can be reached at william.alberts@bmc.org.

The ShoreUpdate.com published an article about the the Shore Health System's CPE clinical training program. David Berg, a CPSP Diplomate, directs the program at the Memorial Hospital at Easton, Dorchester General Hospital in Cambridge and Shore Regional Cancer Center in Easton. CPE Interns provide ministry as clinical chaplains in each of these clinical settings.

The program's training structure has been designed to enable busy community clergy and seminarians to participate while get continuing their parish and divinity school responsibilities.

To read the article, click here.

Perry Miller, Editor
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Frank had great difficulty communicating to me what he wanted to tell people. He had been tall and stocky, but was now extremely thin and weak, and his hair prematurely white. At times, during our conversation, his voice would grow faint and fade and his eyes would close.

“ One of the things I always feared was cancer,” Frank began. “When the doctor told me that a cat scan revealed I had pancreatic cancer in a very advanced stage and only had six months, plus or minus, to live, I was naturally scared. But there wasn’t anything I could do about it except determine my attitude.”

Frank’s attitude was one of the messages he wanted to share with people. “I could either roll over and die, and some people literally do that. Or I could acquiesce, go along with it, not do much of anything, give in. Or I could fight it, go down kicking. I was determined I wasn’t going to die just by giving up. No matter what the quality of life was toward the end,” he continued, “it was still more important than not having any life. The more you give in the less quality you have.”

Throughout my visit, Frank struggled against the adverse effects of the medicine he took to ease his pain. “There are days when it’s rough,” he said. “Two days ago I woke up and felt like I didn’t have any coping mechanisms whatsoever. There are certain unknowns.” Frank hesitated, groping for words. He welled up. “You don’t have much strength. You’re weaker. And you worry.” He stopped and broke down. I did not know what to say to comfort him. Trying to push aside my own uneasiness and hesitation, I reached out and held his hand. After a moment, he continued through sobs, “You worry about how much time you have left. And yet the one thing I try to balance that off with is that there’s no sense of worrying how much time you don’t have left. It’s more important,” he said, “to deal with what you do have left. You could become awfully morose and despairing.”

Frank regained his composure. “No matter how bad things work, there are still things that are good. And to not get stuck worrying that you may be at the end of your life. That you know is close. Probably not as close as you are feeling. It’s close.” He then said, “Do the best you can and the most that you can, because there will come a time when you won’t be able to do that.”

Frank wanted to tell people that the most important possession they have is life itself. “So often I hear a person say, ‘Life isn’t worth a dam.’ I would ask him what he would do if he went to a doctor this afternoon and was told, ‘Mr. Jones, you have two months to live.’ ‘How would you live it?’ I would tell him to think about everything he would like to do, and do as many of them within the possibilities of time and finances. I would tell him to keep living.” I responded, “That’s what you have been doing, Frank.”

Frank also wanted to share with people his understanding of faith. “My life takes its course from an understanding of God as Creator,” he said. “God does not cause cancer. Having cancer does not mean unfaithfulness. God,” he continued, “wants us to live not die. I think God wants us to reach our potential no matter what the circumstances are.” He then said, “I believe that God wants people to be able to forgive themselves for what they may feel guilty about rather than continue punishing themselves. I also think God would want people to walk humbly, love their neighbor, do justice.”

Frank himself gave flesh and blood meaning to the prophetic message of “preaching good news to the poor.” As Chairperson of Social Work for Area 2 of Fairfax County (Virginia) Public Schools, he helped to established a breakfast program for poor immigrant children in one school, which led other schools in the Area to adopt the program. Frank said, “A kid who comes to school with an empty stomach is not apt to pay attention and learn as well.” Frank was making an important point: a full stomach feeds a hungry mind.

Frank saw my writing down what he wanted to tell people as “one of the last ministries I could do. I would like to give people a message of hope,” he explained. “Don’t despair when you are confronted with a debilitating or life-threatening disease. You can go on. The sun comes up each day whether you can see it or not. We can be part of that sunrise. It gives us another opportunity to deal with obstacles.” He concluded, “Not all has ended. I hope that people will be able to find within themselves the ability to see there is a glowing light to tap into that could help them.”

A few weeks later when I called Frank to discuss the first draft of what I had written, his wife, Judy, answered the telephone with sad news. “Frank died this morning,” she said. During a subsequent telephone conversation, Judy talked about a trip Frank and she took three months earlier to the Red Woods in California and Crater Lake in Oregon. She stated, “Frank always had wanted to go to Crater Lake, as it is one of the most impressive sights you would want to see. TWA was offering $99 tickets to San Francisco and Los Angeles, so we went.” She then said, “We drove for eight days in California and Oregon. No matter how sick Frank was, he wound himself up to do that. They said he would be dead in six months,” she went on, “but he was traveling in California and sending post cards back home to people. He got a kick out of that.”

Rev. Franklin W. McGuire, MSW is his real name.

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Bill Alberts is a hospital chaplain at Boston Medical Center. Dr. Alberts is a nationally known writer and an occasional contributor to Counterpunch. In addition, he is convener of the New England Chapter of CPSP. He can be reached at william.alberts@bmc.org.

Francine Hernandez, NCTS Coordinator, announces that the fall 2010 gathering of the CPSP National Clinical Training Seminar will occur October 11 and 12th, 2010. IMPORTANT: The event will be held in a new venue: Stella Maris Retreat Center located at 981 Ocean Avenue, Elberon, NJ 07740.

The featured presenter will be Joseph M. Kramp, a doctoral candidate in psychology of religion at Drew University. He holds the M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary and has completed the Clinical Pastoral Education internship and residency at
BroMenn Hospital (Bloomington, IL) and Sequoia Hospital (Redwood City, CA). His dissertation topic is a psychological biography of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

As always, central to the mission of the NCTS is clinical case presentation and consultation within the context of psychodynamic small group process. All participants are to prepare and bring clinical cases for reflection and review.

Additional NCTS information, including the NCTS Registration Form will be will be posted on the PR in the near future.

Mark your calendar and make you plans to attend the NCTS this fall.

The Rev. Doctor John Edgerton, CPSP President, will be attending the Annual Meeting of the Association of Pastoral Supervisors and Educators (APSE) held in Nottingham, England on June 24, 2010. He will be representing CPSP and will bring greetings from our community.

The Reverend Robin Shohet will deliver the Keynote Address, Passionate & Spirited Supervision.

The APSE is a recently formed pastoral organization committed to the mission of advancing Clinical Pastoral Education in the UK. The history and story of the APSE seems reflective of CPSP's meager beginnings where only a handful gather to launch a movement.

We of the CPSP Community wish our friends and colleagues in the UK well as they gatherer to consider significant and practical issues in the field of clinical pastoral supervision.

Perry Miller, Editor

I sit with my mother now in the middle stage of Alzheimer’s. She too, is surrounded by what remains of her life: a silk flower arrangement to brighten up the room, a crucifix, a picture frame, a radio. Her bed is close to the ground to lessen the likelihood of a fall. Her closet, once filled with designer clothes and more than a hundred pairs of shoes is now two feet wide and filled with elastic waist pants and shirts that have become stained and beaten by the commercial laundry machines. Her shoe collection is now an array of slip-ons and Velcro strap shoes designed for ease and stability and definitely not for looks.

My mother’s disease has progressed rapidly over the last 18 months. She has gone from living in her own apartment, to assisted living and now a nursing home. She is relaying to me her boredom, depression and lack of meaning in her life. She struggles with word retrieval making it hard for her to communicate what she is thinking and feeling. Sometimes I can’t make sense of what she is saying. I sit quietly. She says to me “You’re not saying anything.” She’s right. I don’t know what to say. This is what brought me to Clinical Pastoral Education Training.

What started as a desire for skills, training, and knowledge turned into a unit of self-discovery, education, challenges and camaraderie peppered with moments of ultimate joy and appreciation to utter heart break. When I chose my site placement, a mother’s and children’s homeless shelter, I wanted something outside of my comfort zone to challenge me professionally, educationally and spiritually. Despite our obvious differences, our similarities as mothers created a space for trust and security which led to, not only moments of connection between us, but opened up a portal into my own struggles with transition and uncertainty, and magnified my frustration with injustice, inequality and bureaucracies. I learned about the world of domestic violence, sexual abuse and living in recovery. I recognized the effects of trauma in both the women and the children they were caring for. I was pushed to the limit of my emotions, and into the depths of my soul.

People in the photo: Back row, left to right: Ken Williams, Cesar Espineda, Charles Monaco, Andrew Harriott, Joan Alevras Front row, left to right: Elaine Barry, Lisa Mollusky, Maria Scaros-Mercado, Mary Barberio
Missing from the photo: Jodey Williams

My peers and supervisors have created a network of support, guidance and knowledge for me. I am proud of the work I have done, and the diversity of our group and our assignments. We covered a field of ministry from AIDS patients, the elderly, the sick, the homeless, the abused, to the wounded, the innocent victim and the invisible and forgotten.

As the mother of an autistic young adult child, I have had to fight for people to look beyond the diagnosis, the behaviors and the deficits to the person who lies beneath and who is loving and caring and shares the same frustrations and emotions as all “normal” beings. Boisen’s clarity of “the human living document” and the need to attend to the spiritual needs of everyone reminds me of the struggles I have witnessed in the world of the disabled to be understood, loved and cared for.

Watching my children maneuver through the confusing and sometimes tumultuous world of adolescence, and into young adulthood has opened me up to the world of uncertainties, fears and rites of passage. It has opened me up to understanding how important it is to have a spiritual companion and guide for that journey. Companioning my husband through unemployment, my son through a serious injury and my mother through the aging process has afforded me the opportunity to understand the struggles of life and the importance of faith and spiritual guidance.

Over the months of my first CPE unit, I have analyzed my relationship with my family and friends, my health, my mortality and the meaning of my life. I have not only looked at my clients’ views of the divine, grace, and providence, but I have wrestled with my own understanding of these and how they affect my life and my ministry.

I began my CPE journey looking for a tool to gain skills in dealing with some of life’s big issues. I didn’t think of myself as a chaplain, and didn’t think I would continue on past my first unit. I ended my first unit not only proud of the work that I had done, but proud of all chaplains and the work that they are doing. In the beginning, people would ask me why I was doing this and what the difference was between chaplaincy and “regular” ministry. I didn’t really know and surely couldn’t explain it. It has been a gift to discover the challenges and treasures of chaplaincy. As I came to understand the process and results of being an effective chaplain, it unveiled to me a world of joy and pain, pride and shame, success and failure and unending circumstances, possibilities and relationships. I am honored to call myself a chaplain and to work with amazing individuals within this community of the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy (CPSP).

I sit across from my mother who is now in a wheelchair. There are no more conversations, and very few words or recognition. I still don’t say much, and much of our time is spent in silence. But the difference now is that the silence is not a result of my being uncomfortable, but of my understanding.
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Lisa Mollusky is an ordained interfaith minister from One Spirit Interfaith Seminary/One Spirit Learning Alliance in New York City. To contact Lisa Mollusky, click here.

The CPE Training Program was the first unit offered in this institution by Elaine Barry (SIT) and Cesar Espineda (TS).

We invite persons interested in offering such a workshop to write a summary with name and subject of workshop to Al Henager, 2011 CPSP Plenary Workshop Coordinator. Please be sure to put Plenary Workshop in the subject area when sending Al Henager your email.

Thank you!

Barbara A. McGuire
CPSP Registrar

CPSP Delegation members, Annari Griesel, John deVelder, and Rabbi Dr. Einat Ramon, who helped initiate CPE in Israel

More than five years ago, the Executive Director of the National Association of Jewish Chaplains, Cecille Asekoff had a dream of starting CPE in Israel. Rabbi Zahara Davidowitz has fulfilled that dream by supervising CPE for the past four summers through the Schechter Seminary in Jerusalem. Zahara is a Diplomate of CPSP in the New York/New Jersey Chapter.

Since Zahara began the first CPE programs in 2006 interest in CPE and professional chaplaincy is growing in Israel. This May, the NAJC invited a delegation of about fifteen ACPE and CPSP leaders to attend the Fourth National Conference on spiritual care in Jerusalem. There were about 140 Israelis from 20 organizations all doing creative things in spiritual care. Our CPSP delegation included Rev. Dr. Annari Griesel, Rabbi David Glicksman, and Rev. Dr. John deVelder. The plan was for leaders of both organizations to consult with leaders in Israel about Standards and ways of developing CPE programs that fit the Israeli context.

John deVelder with Devorah Corn of Tishkofet (Life's Door) one of 20 organizations at the Conference, Cecille Asekof, Executive Director of NAJC and Teresa Snorton, Executive Director of ACPE

Many of the ACPE delegation are members of the ACPE Board. They saw the effect of four years of CPSP work and they remarked that cooperating with CPSP made sense. Some said that we should do more projects together. Out of these cordial and enthusiastic conversations about the exciting things happening in Israel several ACPE leaders offered to speak up in the ACPE Board to work toward mutual understanding and cooperation. What an outcome of a trip to Israel that ACPE and CPSP might begin a peace process.

John deVelder explaining the Chapter model of CPSP to spiritual care Leaders in Israel

We in the CPSP delegation are hopeful that both organizations will enter into a process to develop ways of dealing with conflicts and find more ways to work together in the important work of Clinical Pastoral Education not only in Israel but also in the USA and all over the world.

Contact John DeVelder and Annar Griesel

John Edgerton, CPSP President

Twenty years ago, at a place called Phoebe Needles’ Conference Center in Calloway, Virginia a small group of people gathered to define the type of community they wanted in the pastoral care movement. While they were at Phoebe Needles’ Conference Center they began to put together the ingredients of an alternative pastoral care community whereby the members of that community would see themselves as spiritual pilgrims seeking a collegial and professional relationship with each other. They thought this community first and last would be theological. They imagined that this community would deal with such things as accreditation, certification, and ethics complaints through what they were to call “chapters”. The chapters were made up of small groups of people that would share life together, but would also challenge each other. This new organization, as they envisioned it, would be for the purposes of recovering soul. It would value personal authority and creativity. It would live by grace. And it would value persons more than institutions. After the people at this particular meeting spelled out these ingredients they were put in the format which would become known as the CPSP Covenant that was written by Raymond Lawrence.

Now whether consciously or unconsciously when this group of people decided to form an alternative community they aligned themselves with the prophetic tradition arising out of such sections of the Old Testament as Jeremiah and Second Isaiah. Walter Brueggeman said in his book, Hopeful Imagination, “The central task of ministry is the formation of a community with an alternative liberated imagination that has the courage and freedom to act on a different vision and a different perception of reality”.

Twenty years ago when the original founders of CPSP put their vision of a new pastoral care community in to words through the CPSP Covenant. An alternative community with a liberated imagination was formed. We may not have known that, but that is what we were doing. It is certainly what has transpired. We defined ourselves. We were not defined by someone else and we left ourselves free to act on a different vision and a different perception of reality. We were not captives to any Babylonian interpretation of what reality is and therefore we were able to set up a community that would travel light, be liberated and have the capacity for creative imagination.

In an amphictyony structure, not only do the tribes have authority independent of any central government or state, but in times of danger in the tribal coalition there would arise a judge who would call the clans together and repel the foes. Battle strength relied not on customary military organization, but on the rally of the clans. The judge was not a king and his authority rested on personal charisma that gave evidence that the spirit of Yahweh was functioning in his life.

By forming a new community twenty years ago, we disengaged from a dominant reality of how organizations ought to be organized and structured in the pastoral care movement. We went a different direction from Association of Clinical Pastoral Education (ACPE), Association of Professional Chaplains (APC), American Association of Pastoral Counselors (AAPC), and other organizations that organize themselves along the lines of governmental and corporate structures. We liberated ourselves to be creative and to go beyond the empire structures that permeate all institutions and thrive on power and control.

In the last twenty years we have been flirting with, although not fully embodying, being a transforming, co-creating organization true to the needs of humans to have a community full of grace, and promoting restoration of the soul as well a nurturing through our chapters our capacity for transformation. We hopefully have aligned ourselves with the two elements: hopeful imagination and amphictyony community organization that can undergird our unfolding for decades to come.

However at this point in our juncture, I think it is fair to say that we are still adolescent. If you go back to Erik Erikson and his writing on developmentalism you will notice that the adolescent period of development is defined by Erikson as a period of identity verses identity diffusion. For Erikson, we develop psycho-socially not just psycho-sexually. Now the primary struggle of an adolescent is that out of their anxiety to both develop an identity but be acceptable to their peers, they can often have a too psycho-social definition of themselves rather than have the strength for differentiation. I want to suggest to you that’s the primary challenge we are facing in CPSP.

I think this challenge will show up in our internal struggles with each other on whether or not to become an organization that we think will be respected by others if we get recognition in such external governmental forms as the Department of Education or some other agency such as the State Licensure Boards; and through these agencies we think we will be validated as respectable rather than being true to the original vision of what we might be as an organization. We are living in a time where some of our membership may be saying let’s return to Egypt. It’s easier to live under the Pharaoh or it is easier to live under a Babylonian definition of reality rather than leaving ourselves free to have different visions and different perceptions of reality. Walter Wink in his work Engaging the Powers reminds us that most definitions of reality start with a concept of reality that says someone has to be at the top and have power/control. This creates a domination society rather than a partnership society. Usually it has been women or people of color who have been at the bottom and it has been persons who were white euro-male who’ve been at the top. Hopefully CPSP will never go in that direction, but hopefully we will never go in the direction of there has to be a hierarchal structure where centralized power has control over others through highly structured standards and regulations that determine what the membership can do and who they should be.

Also that kind of power usually shows itself in forms of taxation and certainly other organizations have chosen not to travel light, but often to accumulate millions of dollars and they often want to demonstrate their power, as humans have done historically, in terms of ownership of property. So CPSP will have its challenges in the future to not move in that direction.

A second perception of reality beyond the primary one is that all organizations must have authority and centralized power that must be held by a few. In return, these "few" must be able to have control over the membership. This is a concept of reality that says that out of that control and power we as an organization will function at our best.

Both these primary concepts of reality are forms of what I am going to call in this particular presentation, “the Babylonian captivity of our minds”. “The hardest battle isn’t with Mr. Charlie. It’s what Mr. Charlie has done to your mind”. Now if we are to continue to be a community with an alternative liberative imagination we will have to steer away from all definitions of reality and definitions of what we should be that would be predetermined by other organizations. We need to continue to struggle as adolescent needs to struggle with defining ourselves and continuing to form our identity. As a twenty year old we’re still in the midst of forming our identity. I hope we won’t give up that struggle and I hope in our frustration with defining ourselves and differentiating ourselves from others we will not give up the challenge to be true to the original vision of the founders of CPSP which is found in our covenant. There needs to be one organization that doesn’t use therapy and supervision as a way to adjust to a morbid society. (Hillman)

As we celebrate the twentieth anniversary of CPSP I would ask us to reflect on our unfolding and our development and realize that we have done better than anybody predicted we would do. We continue to grow at a very rapid rate. Some people would want to interpret this in a demeaning fashion. They might say we are growing rapidly because we are lax in regards to certification and accreditation. But I would say that another way to interpret that is that we are an organization that is attractive to many people because our yoke is easy and our burden is light and I hope that still remains true in years ahead.

Paul Tillich in his work on religion says that, institutionalized religion restricts and limits, rather than liberates the human spirit. He comments on the fact that the way religion accomplishes becoming a yoke rather than a source for transformation is through doctrine, dogma, and morals which are shaped and formed in a way to undercut the vitality of religion and in essence take the energy out of the animating principal of life. Tillich believed that if we were to be a part of the new creation and be transformative that we were going to have to move beyond the yoke like tendencies of all institutions.

Thomas Berry reminds us all institutions failed the human community in our era. CPSP is a pastoral care organization trying to move beyond the yoke of standards, outcomes, measurements, and other forms of institutionalization that live by law not grace and where the organization is more important than the people in it. Instead, we are striving to be a community that lives out of a theology of grace and has a structure that is flexible to allow for co-creations and transformation. What A dream!

What I am suggesting is that we live in a treacherous moment in our history. It is treacherous in the sense that we may be tempted to prematurely cease the struggle of what it takes for us to become an organization that is true to our own interpretation of reality and our own creativity and imagination. One of the ways we can do that is to put a yoke around our organizational life through such ingredients, as goals, standards, measurements and to do it in a kind of way that has a rigidity to it that does not leave us open for imagination, creativity, and flexibility. There is no doubt that soul is connected closely to the creative, the imaginative, and the instinctual. If soul is to unleash its potential it must live within a structure that leaves these elements free; one of the major reasons we have thrived is we have lean flexible and flexibility is a key ingredient in aging.

Paragraph of Clarification:

When I suggest we stay clear of over standardization and attempting to measure that which cannot be measured I am proposing that it is enough to say, for instance, that what we are seeking to achieve in a unit of CPE or pastoral counseling training is growth in pastoral formation, pastoral competence, and pastoral reflection. I think these broad categories fit with training in both pastoral counseling and chaplains. When we move beyond these broad categories into specific goals and outcomes we are developing a yoke that will choke the learning process and predetermine the learning experience such that we regress from andragogical to pedagogical form of adult education. I hope CPSP will go in a different direction.

In an agrarian society, several thousand years ago up to the 1700’s, there were two types of yoke developed. The first yoke helped with planting but choked the animal if the plows went deep. However, innovation outdistanced expansion and second type of yoke was developed that did not choke the animal but rather tapped into his strength. I hope CPSP can develop this type of yoke. We can be a model for developing broad perimeters defining who we are and what we are about as pastoral counselors, clinical supervisors, and chaplains. Our perimeters do not need to limit our creativity or our imagination.

I have for almost thirty five years supervised an average of fifteen to twenty persons in pastoral care and counseling annually. The persons who grew the most were those who usually at some point after considerable clinical experience began to get a whole different vision of where they needed to grow personally and professionally than when they started their training. If they had been overly straight-jacketed (as they could be by standards that predetermine what they needed to learn) then they would have missed out on an opportunity for transformation. We need to not choke but tap into the strength of the client/learner in the counseling/supervisory experience in both CPE and counseling.

If we can possibly stay clear of putting a yoke around our own necks that chokes and continue to evolve in terms of our identity, then I think we are in a position to thrive. We must always avoid trying to put new wine in old wine skins. The structures and paradigms of corporate, governmental organizations simply do not unleash or restore the soul.

A lot of us are concerned when we hear stories of chapters not functioning or people not acting ethically. We have processes through our chapters to deal with these. I want to suggest to you that one of the most freeing things we can do as an organization is to be the pastoral care organization that doesn’t center on the weeds. In the thirteenth chapter of the gospel of Matthew, in the parable of the weeds and the tares where there is a field of mixed plantings there is the directive to let the weeds grow. In this parable when the field has been planted and the workers of the field go out and observe the field there are tares growing up with the wheat. The owner suggests not to worry about that. In other words go take a seat under the tobacco barn, enjoy the breezes, smoke a pipe, and have a good glass of wine. The suggestion is that one of the best things to do with the fact that the weeds are growing in the midst of the wheat is to let them grow together and at the end you can separate the weeds and the tares, but in the meantime to concentrate on the weeds is to loose your focus which needs to be on planting and letting the crop grow. I think this is a good parable of wisdom for CPSP. The last time we meet at Columbus, Frank Ciampa talked about the fear that permeates all pastoral care organizations concerning the issue of legal litigation. To live out of our fear is to focus on the weeds. Maybe the parable in Matthews 13 can be a guide to us all to focus less on controlling weeds and more on enjoying the crop. We’ve got a markable crop growing in CPSP.

Secondly, I think we need to not only not worry about the weeds, but we need to keep on planting. We have had phenomenal growth and we are an organization that’s important to a lot of people because we thrive in chapters. A lot of people want to judge our movement and make statements about us when they do not really know us, our chapters and what we mean to our membership. So I am suggesting that we suspend judgment on who we are.

In 1876, at the first centennial celebration of this country the Japanese government brought a plant to this event called kudzu. It was at that time considered an exotic plant. After the centennial many people purchased seedlings of kudzu and they grew them in their homes and they displayed them as a plant that has prestige. It was considered unique and rare. When the dust bowl hit in the 1930’s, the federal government saw kudzu as the plant that might replace cotton because it could thrive in almost any condition and grow at the rate of one to two feet per day. So kudzu, by the 1920’s and 1930’s became a plant that was the most promising crop of the future when soil erosion and the climate conditions were not right for such crops as cotton and tobacco. However, when kudzu was planted, it was not clear how to use it as it moved from an exotic plant to a plant that might potentially become the greatest crop this country had ever known. However once we moved through the dust bowl and got to the other side and the climate conditions were restored so that other crops could grow fruitfully kudzu began to be designated as a weed. It grew everywhere. It grew up telephone poles. It grew on railroad tracks. It grew across junk car yards. It covered almost everything in its path and people could not figure out ways to control it. Because we could not control this particular plant and it’s growth pattern, we tried to figure out ways where you could poison and destroy it. We judged it at that moment to be a plant that was useless, harmful, and destructive in terms of how it climbed trees, covered railroad tracks, power lines, telephone lines, and so on and so forth. Now, that might have been the final judgment on kudzu. However it wasn’t; and isn’t. I have got friends of mine, who for the last twenty years specialized in how to use kudzu as a source of food and nutrition. Their names are Edith and Henry and they discovered that kudzu is filled with nutrients and it can be grown almost anywhere in the world. They have several cookbooks on how to use kudzu in creative ways as a food source that might one day resolve world hunger.

What I am saying is that in CPSP, we need to suspend judgment and not accept premature interpretations of who we are. And like the great parable on sewing the seed, we need to keep sewing the seed of CPSP as a liberated, imaginative community that is formed in small tribes or clans; which are accountable to each other, support each other, and nurture each other in grace. We need to continue to support the idea and plant the seeds of the growth of a covenantal community that will not have a yoke around the neck of its membership, that chokes the membership’s creativity. And we need to continue to support this type of organization as literally a new vision of what we might be, what we can become, and how we can live together. We need to promote the values of lifelong education/training through consultation and process reflection for all that are in ministry and seek to care skillfully for others.

One of my concerns is that in this particular moment in our history, when there is a push by some for us to have what they consider recognition that makes us respectable through governmental agencies, is that we could sell our soul for a bowl of pottage like Esau did. That was Esau’s problem; sold his soul for a bowl of pottage.

I think we are at a place where as we grow large, people are going to say, we have to return to the traditional structures to function as an organization because we are now big and largeness implies certain realities. I want to challenge us to be the first organization ever, that will probably within the next few years reach over a thousand members, that remains true to the original vision of functioning primarily out of chapters and that it is in the chapters where we will do certification, accreditation, and deal with ethical complaints. It’s in chapters where we will both support, challenge, and hold each other accountable for being those persons that not only are about having our own souls restored, but restoring the souls of others. Majorie Suhocki said, “We clearly have our work cut out for us. But the spirit of God who wants creation to thrive is with us. The kingdom/queendom of God is among us and it is a kingodm not just of words but of power. The New Creation will be God’s work and our work. We are truly co-creators in the process of tranformation.”

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John Edgerton, President can be contacted at: jedgerton@wakemed.org

“Be Strong! Take Courage! All Ye Who Hope in the Lord” 1

– Comments Honoring the Rev. Dr. John Edwin Harris –

delivered in Columbus, OH, on 11 April 2010 at the Plenary of

the College of Pastoral Supervision & Psychotherapy

– on the 85th anniversary of the movement for a specifically clinical chaplaincy

– on the 75th anniversary of H[elen] Flanders Dunbar’s article:
“The Clinical Training of Theological Students”

– on the 60th anniversary of the final edition of Anton Theophilus Boisen’s hymnal:
Hymns of Hope and Courage 2

Robert Charles Powell, MD, PhD

Each year the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy presents “The Helen Flanders Dunbar (1902-1959) Award for Significant Contributions to the Field of Clinical Pastoral Training.” Many of those new to this world of clinical pastoral training, education, and transformation may not know who this mysterious Helen Flanders Dunbar was – so let me make several prefatory comments.

In a nutshell, she was the one who translated Anton Boisen’s thought-provoking ponderings about an intimate relationship between religion and medicine into a movement – a now world-wide movement – that has forever changed the definition of “chaplaincy” and of what constitutes “pastoral care,” “pastoral counseling,” and “pastoral psychotherapy”.

Dunbar was brilliant – and sincere.

To some extent just noting that she finished her first magnum opus in April 1927, graduated cum laude from seminary in May 1927, and finished her first year of medical school in June 1927 says it all.

Seventy-five years ago, in 1935, her second magnum opus was published
and she added a third doctorate to those bestowed in 1929 and 1930.

Seventy-five years ago, in 1935, having solidified during the previous decade the foundations of the clinical pastoral movement, she launched the psychosomatic movement – viewing these as broad parallel programs for “healing and wholeness”. 3

Dunbar was born in 1902. Four years earlier, her mother published a translation of a French novel – her only translation of a French novel – the easy-to-read story of a distinctive eighteen-year-old young woman, Colette. It is not hard to imagine that this romance lay somewhere around the Dunbar home and that Helen read it sometime during her pre-adolescent or adolescent years. In brief, the heroine is described quite positively as having “extreme individuality,” “extreme originality,” and “freshness” – as being “very unlike the rest of the world”. With Colette as the role model endorsed by her mother, perhaps it is no wonder that Helen Flanders Dunbar moved into the world establishing two enduring patient-centered movements for “healing and wholeness”. 4

Now let me focus on the situation at hand – the annual bestowing of the Helen Flanders Dunbar Award for Significant Contributions to Clinical Pastoral Training.

On this occasion last year – 2009 – we examined several heady questions: “How is wisdom lived? How is understanding grasped? How is knowledge gained?” Yes, “How is knowledge gained?” We will come back to that. “How is it that conviction, commitment, and covenant help foster life’s meaning?” Yes, “covenant”. We will come back to that, too. 5

The year before that – 2008 – our honoree’s words advised that “if the Spirit wants … [us] to do something … , the Spirit will not mind repeating the instructions.” That is, once the guidance “has been repeated so that it is clear,” and once we have “had time to check it out in the community of faith,” we “do not need to act impulsively” – we “only need to act obediently.” Yes, we are called upon “to act”. We will come back to that. 6

The year before that – 2007 – we considered “how to function as a knowledgeable professional AND retain one’s soul” – how to “start with engaged service, move toward active inquiry, move on to contemplation, and move still further toward guiding a future generation.” That is, how we might transcend any concern for
“the axioms of faith, the art of ministry, and the laws of the spirit” – to focus on what actually takes place – and needs to take place – in “the serious interaction of one human with another”. Yes, what “needs to take place”. We will come back to that. 7

The year before that – 2006 – we considered an amalgam of these concerns – “having strong feelings, taking bold action – without being self-righteous” – recognizing that we are “called to act in the face of uncertainty, knowing that we are inadequate – but probably the best available – knowing that we do not know the end of the story or even where it lies.” We considered while it might be “easier to fulfill the exact command – obsessively tithe of mint, anise, and cumin – the minutiae – to act as if we know with certainty what to do” –more likely we are called upon to accept that it is “harder to fulfill the inexact command – faithfully perform mitzvah – gut level acts of justice and mercy – to accept that we do not know for sure what to do – that we must act but in a world of unknown unknowns, with minimal reassurance that what we do is right.” 8

Anton Boisen rightfully is remembered for his faithful working out of his received “conviction that one must break ‘a hole in the wall’ – the wall ‘separating religion and medicine’.” Flanders Dunbar rightfully is remembered for her steady “commitment to removing that wall forever.” 9

Our honoree today wandered in a manner reminiscent of Boisen, and he established in a manner reminiscent of Dunbar.

Boisen, Dunbar, our honoree – I doubt that they ever met. Oddly enough, they symbolically share a meaningful date. Boisen spoke of the “cutting loose from the beaten path” of our lives – the “starting forth into unknown territory”. Boisen’s three decades of wandering – living within over three dozen communities before settling down – began self-consciously at age 25, in 1902. Dunbar was born in 1902. Today’s honoree’s two decades of wandering – living within about a dozen communities before settling down – began self-consciously at age 25, in – 1966. You thought I was going to say “1902” – right? No, the connection here, odd as it may be, is that our honoree’s favorite “congregation” of sorts – a touchstone in his life – was first dubbed “The Volunteers” in – 1902. 10

The plenary’s focus this year is on the journey – literally “the pilgrim’s progress” – toward recovery of spirit and soul. Now, by “recovery of spirit and soul” I am not sure that we need to imply that either is something we had just last week and then somehow lost. Rather, I think we might consider that the situation is somewhat like that proposed by Plato – that we have been wandering about UN-whole, wandering about searching for a missing something – a missing something that we somehow know must exist and the recovery of which we sense might make us more whole. 11

I know that sounds vague, but I suspect it does come close to describing how today’s honoree wandered, slowly living within others’ wisdom, slowly grasping some measure of understanding, slowly gaining the requisite knowledge – to act, within a community of faith – to act, within a covenant of peers – to act, both on the level of here-and-now relationship and on the level of providing for future sufferers’ needs.

Today’s honoree wandered into the military, then wandered into the railroad world, then wandered into a Methodist college, then wandered into a Baptist college. This is sounding a bit like Boisen, isn’t it? 12

While Dunbar knew exactly what she wanted to do – attending medical school, graduate school, and seminary simultaneously, it was Boisen who wandered from foreign language teaching, to career forestry, to social activism, to battlefield chaplaincy, to psychiatric research, becoming what he himself called a “Presby-gationalist” along the way.

Today’s honoree, blessed with a beautiful voice, finally realized that he wanted to become a Minister of Music. For reasons not entirely clear, he ended up taking a unit of clinical pastoral experience with Chaplain Walter Jackson, in Louisville. As today’s honoree phrases it, “that one unit .. made me question my chosen path … .”

He took off a year from his pastoral duties in Sullivan, Indiana, to work with Chaplain Joe Boone Abbott, in Birmingham. He was hooked. Now his path was entirely clear. As today’s honoree tells it, “That year … was the start … , and I knew that CPE would be my destiny. I learned so much about myself that year … that I knew I wanted … the same for other men and women.”

He went back to his home congregation for a year – but only a year – before heading off to work for two years with Chaplain Ken Reed, in Indianapolis, and for six months with Chaplain John Galloway. From there he went to work for three years with Vern Kuehn in Richmond, Indiana, before becoming a player in Rush Jordan’s conglomerate of interlocking directorships at Dayton, Ohio.

That’s quite a collection of mentors: Abbott – a Baptist student of depression, Reed – a Methodist student of grief, Galloway – a Presbyterian student of “The Gospel According to Superman!” – and Kuehn – another outspoken Presbyterian. That was only the start.

To begin making this long story short, today’s honoree ended up in southwest Ohio, convinced of the value of pastoral care, counseling, and psychotherapy, but needing to invent an enduring conceptual structure for making competent services happen. He felt called upon to act – to create something from nothing – to do what he had to do – to create a new model for which there was no guarantee of success.

He brought together a diverse array of congregations – and non-congregations – into an entity called “The Covenant Society for Pastoral Counseling,” within which, through institutions’ payments of an annual contribution, each member gains access to pastoral care, counseling, and psychotherapy on a 24-hour, 7-days-a-week basis – at one-half of whatever would have been the member’s out-of-pocket cost. 13

Today’s honoree saw the problem and acted – on both a one-to-one and a systems basis. He made services available to a wide-spread patient population, made collegial support possible for isolated clinicians, and made a structure for nurturing the next generation of clinicians.

Eventually his became one of the largest programs in the country for the clinical training, education, and transformation of a new generation of pastors. Eventually he and his colleagues around Dayton decided that the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy’s comfort with individuality, originality, and freshness – with being “very unlike the rest of the world” – was attractive, and that becoming the “Miami Valley Chapter” of CPSP would best meet everyone’s needs.

Please congratulate the ninth recipient of The Helen Flanders Dunbar (1902-1959) Award for Significant Contributions to the Field of Clinical Pastoral Training, a proud son of Tennessee, a Tennessee “Volunteer,” a man of hope and courage, The Rev. Dr. John Edwin Harris.
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The fully endnoted version of Dr. Powell's, ""Be Strong! Take Courage! All Ye Who Hope in the Lord!" can be downloaded as a PDF socument. See below:

Download "Be Strong! Take Courage! All Ye Who Hope in the Lord!"

Robert Charles Powell, MD, PhD is the leading historian of the clinical pastoral movement. Many of his published writings are posted on the Pastoral Report. Readers can use the PR's search engine found on the left side-bar to locate his articles. As a practicing psychiatrist, his writings reflect his daily investment in his clinical practice of providing psychotherapy and care to his patients. Contact Dr. Powell by clicking here. Perry Miller, Editor

Francine Hernandez, National Clinical Training Seminar Coordinator, informed the PR that Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D will be the guest presenter for the NCTS held May 3-4, 2010 at the Carmel Retreat located in Mahwah, New Jersey. As the NCTS presenter, Dr. Alberts will explore the subject, The Humanology of Pastoral Care
Pastoral and Prophetic Dimensions. Below you can download a file containing several of his article. Participants are encouraged to read the articles as preparation for the NCTS.

In addition, one can download the file containing the NCTS Schedule.
FILES FOR DOWNLOAD:
Download file: William Albert's Articles

Download 2010 NCTS Spring Schedule file

-Perry Miler, Editor