thoughts on pastoral care

[cellio]

I have this perception that there are three broad aspects to the job of a clergyperson. (If I've missed some, please say so.) The first is in the area of knowledge; in the case of a rabbi it's knowing our texts and the rabbinic process and applying halacha and so on. The second is all the performative aspects: leading worship, public speaking (giving sermons and lectures), conducting special events, and so on. The third is the collection of personal-interaction skills that I lump into "pastoral care": comforting those who are troubled, guiding spiritual seekers, visiting the sick, working with congregants with special issues, and so on.

I consider the first two to be tractable -- not easy, of course, but I understand how to get there given suitable time and effort -- but I sometimes think I just don't grok the third. Sure, sometimes, but the path for turning "sometimes" into "most of the time" isn't clear, and I don't know what concrete endeavors lead to improvement here. People are hard.

This shabbat I found myself in two very different situations in this space, and in both cases I felt confident and didn't worry about being out of my league. That was a bit surprising.

The first one was the easier one (and if this were the only one I probably wouldn't be writing this post). Someone who's been thinking about converting to Judaism for at least a year, but has still felt some ties to Christianity, told me he's decided that Judaism is right but he's extremely hesitant to tell his parents and he wanted my advice. While the explicit question was about dealing with his family, I sensed an implicit question of "how do I know this is really the right choice?". I talked with him about family stuff and how my own family had surprised me with how accepting they were, and we talked about some logistics. But as I talked about my own family I wove in a few bits of how I had come to realize that this was the right path for me. I never said "you'll know because of X", because how can I know what will work for someone else?, but I gave him things to think about.

The second is one of the regular attendees and participants in our synagogue. She told me that a dear friend, a gentile, had died and she had gone to the funeral. She said she didn't participate in the liturgy, it not being hers, and that at one point during it she had said the mourner's kaddish quietly to herself. She wanted to know if this was ok.

"Ok" is such a loaded concept. Was she asking me for a halachic opinion? It seemed unlikely that she wanted me to talk to her about the preconditions for saying kaddish, and similarly, it seemed unlikely that she was asking whether one can say kaddish for a friend (rather than just specified relatives). And anyway, she was asking after the fact (b'diaved). Was she asking whether this was offensive to Christians? That seems unlikely, especially as she did it non-invasively. So I opted for the path of comfort and said something to the effect that it's traditional that we say kaddish among Jews, but mourning is primarily about bringing comfort to the mourner and this obviously brought her comfort. I then told her that when my grandfather died (while I was going through conversion), I attended the high-church Greek-Orthodox funeral and then we proceeded to the graveyard for the burial. I found a time where I wouldn't bother anyone else, stepped a few paces away from the service in progress, and said kaddish for him, reading from a copy I'd tucked into a pocket just in case it became relevant.

I don't know if I handled either of those the "right" way or the way my rabbi would have, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had apparently-useful instincts and enough perceptive ability to see and think about the underlying questions. And both people seemed to be glad that we'd talked, which is a good sign.

But people are still hard. :-)

Comments

[dagonell.livejournal.com]

According to Wikipedia, "Amen" is actually from the Torah and adopted by the Christians. "Amen, So Mote (May) It Be" is used in Freemasonry rituals. Neo-pagans chose to use the 'non-christian' portion to give the same meaning.

As someone who was raised strict Roman Catholic, is currently a "signed the book" U.U. and attends as many Pagan circles as possible, I'd have to say that if someone responded to "So mote it be" with "Amen" there wouldn't be a problem. The intent would be understood.

I'm currently in another discussion on another board over a similar topic. A woman who is an open pagan oftens does the sign of the cross when a fire-truck passes by. Her reasoning is that the firefighters may not understand her pagan gestures, but will understand the christian gesture and hence her intent even if they aren't christian themselves. It's a universal enough gesture that it gets her intent across, "I'm praying for you as you head towards danger" She said one time, she was still at the same place when the trucks came back and they stopped the truck to thank her.

[cellio]

According to Wikipedia, "Amen" is actually from the Torah and adopted by the Christians.

It's certainly from Jewish liturgy and adapted by Christians; I don't have a concordance handy to see where in our texts it comes from, but I'm sure it's in there somewhere. It's a verb meaning, basically, "may it be so" or "let it be". (It's actually an imperative form, I think.)

Thanks for the information about Freemasonry and neo-pagans.

Her reasoning is that the firefighters may not understand her pagan gestures, but will understand the christian gesture and hence her intent even if they aren't christian themselves.

That's an interesting idea, using the gestures of the dominant religion to communicate rather than to participate. It's a thoughtful gesture, and I'm glad she got positive feedback the one time.

I think if I were trying to accomplish that effect I would hold my hands in the usual "prayer posture" and bow my head.

amen

[chaos-wrangler.livejournal.com]

My concordance lists amen as appearing in torah (I didn't note the place(s)). The only grammatical info I can remember re amen is the opinion(?)* that it's related to emunah ("faith") and/or emet ("truth"). If it is a verb, it seems to match daber ("speak"), so perhaps the literal meaning would be "make true" or "believe (imperative)".

*I don't remember where I heard this so I can't say how reliable it is.