A Theology of Care
My theology of pastoral care focuses on transformation; that is, the change from a state of “brokenness” to a “healing” state of being. All humans from the day they are born are broken. Psychologist Abraham Maslow, for example, identifies physiological, psychological, and spiritual limitations humans need to address in order to survive. The ultimate human limitation is death. In the OT – because of humanity’s disobedience – God removes the choice of eternal life. According to Genesis 3:23-24, “So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.” As such, God makes death the end of life.
For humanity, this awareness or “shadow” of death brings about suffering. The suffering of Jesus Christ – depicted in Matthew 27 – portrays the dehumanization of Jesus associated with the Roman soldiers and prominent Jewish religious figures dividing up his few possessions (35), insulting him (37-40), and / or physically abusing him (30). If the body of Christ represents humanity, then people suffer from not being fully human. The imagery associated with an extremely frightened and diminutive woman, praying, begging God for her life within the vast cavity of a hospital’s pre-op facility magnified her helplessness, compromising her ability to be fully human. Christ crying out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34; Matt 27:46; Psalm 22:1) vividly underscores this imagery.
As such, transformation seems to require suffering. When performing pastoral care, patients possessing physical problems with predictable positive outcomes not only experience little suffering, they seldom require pastoral care. The specter of their death remains dormant and out of their awareness. These patients barely see me, looking past me for the last doctor or procedure prior to their discharge. Conversely, suffering patients, consciously or unconsciously, seem to search for transformation, seeking a shift from being broken to becoming healed. This search emanates from the inherent presence of a divine spark — discussed throughout this blog — found in humans and in all of God’s creation.
Because suffering extends beyond the physiological, it connected patients to me both emotionally and intellectually. In Acts 2, the Holy Spirit creates this connection mysteriously by uniting the disciples with those who spoke in different languages and enabling them to prophesy. Six of my conversations with patients stood out, for reasons that often was mysterious, based on something in the conversations that “struck me as unusual.” After the first few conversations, I began noticing the diversity of metaphors popping up in the conversations that resonated with my own emotional and psychological issues. One particular woman patient, for example, connected with me emotionally regarding the suffocating limitations of playing the role of “performer” and the transformation from the victimization associated with such a role to the freedom associated with writing poetry. As such, the Holy Spirit’s influence seems dynamic, bringing hurting souls together yet simultaneously providing valuable instruction (see John 14:26; 1 Cor 2:10-11) for both patients and chaplains.
Yet, transformation also requires death in a different sense than previously discussed. Death of the saliency of restrictive and toxic roles is necessary for human beings to begin to heal. Problematic interactions between family members often create maladaptive family systems. The growing conflict and disassociation between my parents, for example, forced me to adopt unhealthy personas. As a child, I adopted the role of “comedian” to dissipate any lurking tension in our home. A more problematic persona, for me, became the role of “standard bearer” for the family. A growing anxiety attached itself to this role as both my parents declared their despair and disdain for each other. To keep the family together, I felt I had to achieve. These and other personas coalesced into my role as “performer.” Through interaction with patients, this role cast me as “victim,” passive and responsive to my parents’ expectations, ambitions, and goals for my life.
Resurrection represents the culmination of transformation, the creation of life anew. In contrast to the brokenness of humans discussed earlier, Jesus declares himself to be the resurrection and the life (John 11:25). Where God once guarded eternal life, God (incarnate, a transformation as well) now makes eternal life available for humanity. God transforms as humanity transforms, by mutually interacting with each other.
Yet, resurrection does not completely erase the lessons of suffering. Responding to Thomas (John 20:25-28), Jesus shows his wounds from his crucifixion to Thomas, and has him touch them. The wounds of suffering were real for both patients and me, informing us in the transformative process. In providing pastoral care, for example, it becomes necessary to be cognizant of patient issues that may obstruct “being present” with patients. For me, for example, elderly women presenting as “motherly” – both positive and negative presentations – potentially “press my emotional buttons,” in response to the suffering I experienced interacting with my mother. If I am unaware of these issues, I potentially compromise my pastoral care with these patients. Moreover, these issues never completely leave.
In conclusion, my theology of care accentuates the role of transformation in achieving a shift from “brokenness” to “healing.” This shift does not occur in isolation but requires reciprocal interactions. Jesus Christ’s suffering, death, and ultimate resurrection provides a metaphorical understanding for presenting my theology. People of different faiths (e.g., Islam), however, would experience difficulties with Jesus Christ as a metaphor. For other faiths, different metaphors for transformation exist. For Islam, such a metaphor would be the “Day of Resurrection.” Muslims believe that God preordains the Day of Resurrection albeit unknown to humanity. The Qur’an describes the suffering preceding and occurring during the Day of Resurrection and emphasizes bodily resurrection; the Qur’an proposes that the gathering of humankind follows resurrection, culminating in their judgment by God. For Islam, then, the transformation is collective not individual.
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