Page 29 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 8

Christian Psychology as a Challenge

more passionate understanding of God. God is ‘spiritual care’ has replaced ‘pastoral care’ as the
a God with a heart full of passion; God as pure descriptive work of hospital chaplains. At stake
passion, the God of pure suffering (die Passion is the question what is meant by the ancient
pura, das reine Leiden) (Feuerbach 1904:127). tradition of cura animarum and ‘Seelsorge’ (the
care or cure of souls).

The implication of Feuerbach’s view on the es- Despite many variations within different cul-
sence of Christianity is that ‘soul care’ should tural contexts, one can say that the aim of the
essentially become ‘life care’. The very special care or cure of souls is to respond to human
field of the discipline of soul care should thus pain with compassion and to human guilt with
be the existential realm of life and engagements forgiveness and grace (Anderson 2001:33). Ca-
with the existential reality of tragedy and suffe- regiving is about comfort (parakalein): to con-
ring. sole human souls by means of the biblical text,
prayers and sacrament.

In Greek tragedy, the human hubris (the illusi- A very famous formulation is the following de-
on that self-confidence and pride can cope on finition by William Clebsch and Charles Jaekle
its own with the demands of life) is frequently (1964:4): “The ministry of the cure of souls, or
exposed to disaster through the combination pastoral care, consists of helping acts, done by
of a personal failing and circumstances with representative Christian persons, directed to-
which humankind cannot deal or cope. Within ward the healing, guiding, sustaining, and re-
paradox and ambivalence tragedy is about the conciling of troubled persons whose troubles
conflict of pity and fear (Aristotle). Meditation arise in the context of ultimate meanings and
on loss, death and suffering inevitably leads to concerns.” In a nutshell, pastoral care is the
the puzzle of fate and tragedy with the burning attempt to link our human struggle to come
question: How is it possible to help the human to terms with the human quest for hope and
soul to cope in a meaningful way with loss, meaning in suffering.
dying and death? While he was on holiday in Switzerland, Molt-
mann read Ernst Bloch’s Principle of Hope and
As mortal human beings, we cannot escape was fascinated. “I wondered why theology had
transience. Caregivers should therefore become let hope, its very own theme, slip through its
agents of hope if they want to do what Socra- fingers” (Moltmann 2002 90). According to
tes had in mind: To be a healer of the ‚soul‘ (ia- Moltmann, hope is the core-driving factor in
tros tés psuchés) (in Oden 1983:187). In order the connection spirituality, future and life.
to penetrate the mysterious inner realm of our Very surprisingly, the question regarding the
being human and detect the meaning of ‘spiri- validity and credibility of pastoral caregiving
tual healing’, we need to reflect on the interplay has been posed quite recently in a European
between ‘soul’ and the existential realm of our publication. In her book Seelsorge, Doris Nauer
being human; on our quest for dignity, acknow- (2010:70) puts the question of the reliability of
ledgement, meaning and hope. What then is soul care (Glaubwürdige Seelsorge) anew on the
meant by ‘soul care’ within the connection ‘God’ academic agenda of theological education, as
and ‘human soul’ (Christian anthropology)? well as on the calendar of communities of faith.
A credible, reliable and sustainable understan-
Back to the ABC of cura animarum 1 ding of pastoral caregiving is possible only with
In Word and World, Herbert Anderson (2001:32) the emphasis on quality (Nauer 2010:105-109)
poses the question: Whatever happened to and the understanding of the Christian traditi-
pastoral care and to the tradition of soul care on of wisdom and faith.
(Seelsorge)? According to Anderson (2001:32), The challenge is quite clear: in order to convin-
this question has gained new significance as ce a secularised society of the place of cura ani-
marum (cure and care of human souls) within
1 “Early church practice of pastoral care was called cura the field of caregiving and healing, the church
animarum, the cure of anima which was the Latin for
the Hebrew nephesh and the Greek psyche” (Anderson should revisit its theological paradigms and
2001:33). their connection to God-images as shaped by
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