Chaplain Mark LaRocca-Pitts on "agape" care, part two

Agape Care: A Pastoral and Spiritual Care Continuum

Pastoral care and spiritual care are neither identical nor opposed, but are both expressions of a continuum of care defined as defined in my previous article as agape care. Chaplains and local faith leaders provide the full continuum of agape care, but with different emphases due to their different settings.

Pastoral care developed within the socially contracted context of a religious or faith community wherein the “pastor” or faith leader is the community’s designated leader who oversees the faith and welfare of the community and wherein the community submits to or acknowledges the leader’s overseeing. The “faith” they share is a mutually received and agreed upon system of beliefs, actions, and values. The faith leader’s care for his or her community is worked out within a relationship between the person’s unique needs, on the one hand, and the established norms of the faith community, as represented by the pastor, on the other.

If and when the individual’s needs and/or beliefs, actions, and values are at odds with the faith tradition, the faith leader’s response is either to lean in favor of the traditional norms at the expense of the person, to encourage the person to reconcile with the traditional norms, or to re-interpret those norms so as to include the person. Regardless of the specifics, “pastoral” care occurs within the dynamic of the aforementioned process.

Spirituality refers to an individual’s quest for meaning, purpose, and a sense of place and connectedness in the context of relationships with self, others, nature and possibly a Higher Other. Spiritual care supports the patient in this quest apart from the imposition or referencing of norms from the chaplain’s faith system, whereas pastoral care also supports the patient in this quest, but in the light of authoritative norms that the pastor and the patient hold in common.

The agape care continuum within the context of a faith community shifts from pastoral care toward spiritual care to the degree the faith leader allows the individual’s spiritual quest to take precedence over the norms of their shared faith tradition. An individual’s spiritual quest may never venture outside or contrary to the norms of his or faith tradition, but if it does and the pastor supports this venture, then the care shifts toward spiritual care. Thus, for the local pastor or faith leader the agape care continuum emphasizes pastoral care with spiritual care as a component or subset of that care.

Chaplains are not bound by the same social contract as local pastors or community faith leaders. Though the chaplain is accountable to a faith community within which the chaplain is a leader, the norms of the chaplain’s faith tradition do not automatically apply to patients. If patients invite the chaplain, whether explicitly or implicitly, to utilize his or her own faith norms in their care, then the chaplain becomes a faith leader or “pastor” for these patients and the agape care continuum shifts toward pastoral care. If the chaplain journeys with the patient as the patient negotiates and realizes their own journey without reference to or projection from the chaplain’s own norms, then the agape care shifts toward spiritual care. In the provision of agape care in the context of a secular institution, the chaplain first offers spiritual care to all and then pastoral care to those who invite it. Thus, for the chaplain the agape care continuum emphasizes spiritual care with pastoral care as a component or subset of that care.

Both the chaplain and the local faith leader are called to provide the full continuum of agape care to all for whom they care. Whether this agape care manifests as spiritual care or pastoral care, or a mixture of both, depends on the context and the needs of the patient or parishioner. For the chaplain, the patient primarily determines if the care is to be spiritual care or pastoral care, whereas for the local faith leader, the faith leader primarily determines if the care is to be pastoral care or spiritual care. However, as an agape care practitioner, when in doubt as to your context and which care you provide, simply love the one you are with.

[1] I want to thank the virtual community of chaplains at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pastoralcare/ who provided valuable feedback when I raised this question on the list for discussion. If you are a chaplain and are interested in joining this list, send a request to pastoralcare-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Do you have thoughts about advocacy you’d like to share with your colleagues? Send an e-mail to info@PlainViews.org.