Dr. Ursula Pfäfflin on Intercultural perspectives of pastoral care and counselling

Treasure in Earthen Vessels: Facing Fragility and Destruction

This will be final advocacy article on chaplaincy throughout the world. We have tried to offer as many different voices of pastoral care as we were able. Clearly these articles have represented only a segment of the world of pastoral care and counseling. It is hoped that these articles have given PlainViews readers a glimpse of what their counterparts are doing in other parts of our world.

When I attended that European Network of Health Care Chaplains meeting in Lisbon in 2006, I had the opportunity to meet with Ursula Riedel-Pfäfflin, who was then president of the International Council for Pastoral Care and Counseling (ICPCC). Their focus has been upon learning the transcultural issues that people across the globe face. In the US we are fortunate not to have encountered the multiple kinds of distress inherent in warfare within the boundaries of our own country. Much of the world has experienced this terrible distress. The recent Russian invasion of Georgia highlights for me issues that are being addressed by the ICPCC, namely how International Pastoral Care and Counseling services can assist victims of such distress. My sense is that their work is on the cutting edge of what chaplains may need to learn in the future to support and understand people who have survived such conflicts. In that light, we offer to you parts of the introduction to a new book, written by Dr. Pfäefflin, which we believe offers an overview of the work of the ICPCC and what is ahead for them.
Chaplain George Burn

Theory and practice of pastoral care and counselling have changed impressively during past decades – similar to those of other disciplines. We recognize more consciously differences and diversity connected to the context of the systems involved and their respective historical development. At the same time, those who offer counselling and care also acknowledge themes relevant and meaningful for all women and men, for elderly and younger persons, around the world like: basics of life, survival, safety, shelter, trust, education, health, free development of abilities and beliefs, chance to work and compensation for work, also socially related work, within community and global development. These aspects are important for each person, all families and societies. In the discussion of changes in climate and their consequences we realize that by the destruction of life foundations, not only individual species or humans are threatened, but all living beings. Therefore, also in care and counselling, systemic and intercultural thinking becomes more relevant which sees events and historical developments in their connectedness and in their diversity.

In its constitution and vision, the ICPCC has addressed the awareness of global development and formulated the mission to promote the reflective practice of pastoral care and counselling, to enable practitioners of PCC to be resources for one another and allow for mutual, interdisciplinary exchange, to address social-political problems and to support and advocate for the unique and essential dimension of spirituality in the teaching and training.

The eighth World congress of ICPCC from August 7 – 14, 2007, addressed these challenges at a place and space which is located in the middle of Europe as witness of fragility and destruction by humans and their organisations in the time of National Socialism. At the same time, the history of this place also commemorates the resistance against fascism, and today there are empowered alternative ways of co-existence and co-operation evolving between people from diverse cultural and political backgrounds. In Kryzowa, in the region between Poland, Czech Republic, and Germany, more than two hundred practitioners, trainers, and teacher of pastoral psychology and care and counselling from all continents talked about actual problems in their professional areas and presented evaluations, models, and visions.

A more intense professional cooperation was created in the Pre-congress of the delegates of ICPCC in Dresden. More than fifty representatives of the national associations of care and counselling exchanged their experiences and experimented with models and methods of empowerment.

These closing words from the eighth World Congress, by the US-American theologian Kathleen Greider, are one expression of the sources of strength and thoughtful vision that move us to do the work that we do.

“When we are caregivers and when we are in need of care…. Every day is a new opportunity to receive the treasure of sacred light. Every day is a new opportunity to rely not only on these earthen vessels we inhabit, but also on a gift that is more than us. Every day is a new opportunity to stop acting like we are the treasure itself, or ought to be the treasure itself. Every day is a new opportunity to be the clay pots we are created to be – fragile, porous, prone to mold, expecting only of ourselves that we bear in some modest way the kind of hope and vision and love and justice that points beyond our limited energies, days, and wisdom to that which is eternal and ultimately reliable.”

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