Pastoral Work [antikvár]

Foreword The request for this book has come from various pastors. After I sent out my work on The Funeral, parish ministers began writing to ask me for something of the sort about pastoral work today. Similar appeals have come at ministerial conferences. Clergymen everywhere seem to be perplexed about things pastoral. They would agree with the late Dean William Adams Brown. One of his last books included a discussion of theological education. In the light of current surveys he declared that our chief weakness has lain in pastoral theology.^ Evidently our teaching has been theoretical and hortatory, not practical and helpful. Instead of dealing with cases, methods, and ideals, we have often presented " practical theology " im-practically. Such a weakness may have been due to the difficulty of the undertaking. The time allotted has been little. The medical student normally has devoted to clinical work the last two years in school, with an additional internship at a hospital. His brother in the seminary has been exposed to things practical in a few minor courses. The instruction has often consisted of theoretical lectures, venerable enough to be retired on a pension. The clinical training, if any, may have been given at a home for the feeble-minded. What a queer preparation for pastoral work! Such conditions, however, are being remedied. " What we need, apparently, is some technical literature, specializing on the details of the minister's life, and the everyday demands of his office." ^ Thus Dr. Lloyd C. Douglas wrote while he served as a parish minister. More recently such volumes have been coming forth. Still there seems to be a demand for something more. The resulting aim here is practical. The method calls for the use of cases from life. The theories also have grown out of experience. Every proposal has come