Ben! This is so good (though I read as an outsider, somewhat). You have me thinking about what difference it makes whether the person you are accompanying is already immersed in scripture, or is at least familiar with a given passage. It strikes me that this makes a lot of difference. I feel that in my own life, while there have been those lightning-bolt moments with a less-familiar passage of scripture, it's more often the repeated immersion in a familiar & repeated passage (e.g. a psalm) that becomes what I cling to, & this which communicates to me the unfailing presence of God. I wonder what this looks like in terms of pastoral care.
(Also: I wish I had known you when I had to take a hospital-led pastoral care course as a lay worker. Surreal experience of being led by the loveliest, most caring & earnest people, teaching perfectly helpful things, none of which I actively disagreed with, & yet there was something kind of goofy about the entire enterprise that was a bit hard to express. Anyway, it was probably good for me.)
Thank you! And yes, I think that's very much right that the question of people's immersion in Scripture very much matters as to how you can use the Bible pastorally. This shouldn't surprise us, either -- it is of course an ordinary feature of texts that re-reading enables deeper forms of engagement with them, and all the more with Scripture. And this raises the question of what this looks like in a moment with, in a lot of cases, pretty minimal Biblical literacy...
And oh goodness, the next time we're together we'll have to trade stories about this sort of training experience! "Surreal experience of being led by the loveliest, most caring & earnest people, teaching perfectly helpful things, none of which I actively disagreed with, & yet there was something kind of goofy about the entire enterprise" sums it up exactly right.
Perhaps mainline Protestantism would benefit from a fresh look at the Anabaptist approach to Scripture. There's an assumption in that tradition that Scripture is divinely inspired, at minimum, and that the average person is perfectly capable, in a community context which, of course, includes pastors, to make sense of it and gain inspiration and guidance from it. What that inspiration and guidance looks like will evolve over time as our individual and collective capacity to respond evolves. With this sort of mindset, pastoral care can operate within a context that avoids both the magisterium and the downplaying of Scripture's centrality to the faith.
Dear Ben, I follow you on Twitter for quite some time now, and I'm finally in the process to confirm myself as an official member of the Anglican Episcopal Church of Brazil. Draw Near With Faith is your official substack for texts on history of the church, intellectual history and theology right? I recently created this account on Substack. My best regards.
Yes! TEC began going off the rails when preaching was replaced with graduate seminars in the Bible as Literature genre. We need pastoral care rooted in real biblical knowledge and authentic sacramental practices. Less, “Let’s point out the discrepancies and tear faith down” and more “How do we understand the discrepancies to be real but in a way that nevertheless builds faith up.”
The Bible is more complex than it seems and in my experience it is the Living Word of God. This is an interesting article and I know I will be thinking more about this in the coming weeks. It reminds me of the Isaiah 55:11 -
Good observations. I want to learn more about the Zurich reformation. I read a good biography of Zwingli last year by Stephen Eccher, and though I disagree with Zwingli on many things, his concern for his congregants is unquestionable and there are definitely positive aspects to his thought worth exploring.
Ben! This is so good (though I read as an outsider, somewhat). You have me thinking about what difference it makes whether the person you are accompanying is already immersed in scripture, or is at least familiar with a given passage. It strikes me that this makes a lot of difference. I feel that in my own life, while there have been those lightning-bolt moments with a less-familiar passage of scripture, it's more often the repeated immersion in a familiar & repeated passage (e.g. a psalm) that becomes what I cling to, & this which communicates to me the unfailing presence of God. I wonder what this looks like in terms of pastoral care.
(Also: I wish I had known you when I had to take a hospital-led pastoral care course as a lay worker. Surreal experience of being led by the loveliest, most caring & earnest people, teaching perfectly helpful things, none of which I actively disagreed with, & yet there was something kind of goofy about the entire enterprise that was a bit hard to express. Anyway, it was probably good for me.)
Thank you! And yes, I think that's very much right that the question of people's immersion in Scripture very much matters as to how you can use the Bible pastorally. This shouldn't surprise us, either -- it is of course an ordinary feature of texts that re-reading enables deeper forms of engagement with them, and all the more with Scripture. And this raises the question of what this looks like in a moment with, in a lot of cases, pretty minimal Biblical literacy...
And oh goodness, the next time we're together we'll have to trade stories about this sort of training experience! "Surreal experience of being led by the loveliest, most caring & earnest people, teaching perfectly helpful things, none of which I actively disagreed with, & yet there was something kind of goofy about the entire enterprise" sums it up exactly right.
Perhaps mainline Protestantism would benefit from a fresh look at the Anabaptist approach to Scripture. There's an assumption in that tradition that Scripture is divinely inspired, at minimum, and that the average person is perfectly capable, in a community context which, of course, includes pastors, to make sense of it and gain inspiration and guidance from it. What that inspiration and guidance looks like will evolve over time as our individual and collective capacity to respond evolves. With this sort of mindset, pastoral care can operate within a context that avoids both the magisterium and the downplaying of Scripture's centrality to the faith.
Dear Ben, I follow you on Twitter for quite some time now, and I'm finally in the process to confirm myself as an official member of the Anglican Episcopal Church of Brazil. Draw Near With Faith is your official substack for texts on history of the church, intellectual history and theology right? I recently created this account on Substack. My best regards.
That's right, yes -- lovely to be connected with you on here, and congratulations on your upcoming confirmation! Best wishes.
Wonderful! Thank you so much.
Yes! TEC began going off the rails when preaching was replaced with graduate seminars in the Bible as Literature genre. We need pastoral care rooted in real biblical knowledge and authentic sacramental practices. Less, “Let’s point out the discrepancies and tear faith down” and more “How do we understand the discrepancies to be real but in a way that nevertheless builds faith up.”
The Bible is more complex than it seems and in my experience it is the Living Word of God. This is an interesting article and I know I will be thinking more about this in the coming weeks. It reminds me of the Isaiah 55:11 -
"so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose
and succeed in the thing for which I sent it."
Thanks for sharing your writing!
Good observations. I want to learn more about the Zurich reformation. I read a good biography of Zwingli last year by Stephen Eccher, and though I disagree with Zwingli on many things, his concern for his congregants is unquestionable and there are definitely positive aspects to his thought worth exploring.