Talking about Listening and Caring: a Symposium on Pastoral Counseling

2007.7-9.9

"As the gap between the first and the second generations in migrant families [having moved from rural to urban areas] widens, the tensions between them increase. The number of suicides goes up, reflecting the conflicts and disputes in family. The number of drug addicts and alcoholics has increased rapidly in the last decade. There is an increasing need to reduce the stigma of mental diseases." This excerpt originates in Tian Feng, the magazine of the Protestant churches in China (June 2007, # 309), setting out the wider context of a symposium on pastoral counseling convened in Shanghai in March, 2007. The following article is a summary of the Tian Feng's report on the event, translated by Lucia Wah.

In modern church history, the role of pastoral care and counseling has expanded from the traditional biblical model of shepherding into a discipline utilising contemporary psychology. In the Chinese church, believers' psychological needs have been recognised, and training for pastoral counseling is being developed. In Mid-March 2007, Professor Al Dueck, psychologist at Fuller Theology Seminary, five pastors from California churches and more than twenty pastors, ministers, psychologists and pastoral counselors from Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Guangdong gathered in the CCC/TSPM headquarters in Shanghai to attend a symposium on pastoral counseling. The programme consisted of lectures, workshops with games, hands-on counseling techniques, and group discussions.

In his address, Professor Dueck introduced the participants to a pyramid-shaped model of pastoral counseling. This pyramid is built on God and the healing work of the Holy Spirit. The professional counselors form its top layers, while the congregation represents its base. Volunteer counselors occupy the space between the professional top and the congregation. Pastors are often busy carrying out their regular duties ranging from general congregational activities to marriage counseling and visits to the sick and elderly. Therefore, volunteers make up an extremely important layer in the structure of pastoral care because of their number and their involvement in fellow believers' lives.

Professor Dueck emphasised the importance of communication in Christian counseling – in particular listening – which is easily overlooked for more material help. Professor Yang Yuchuan, a guest speaker from China Youth University for Political Sciences (Beijing) at the symposium, led interactive sessions of games and group work to draw attention to the necessity of teamwork in pastoral care. People involved in pastoral care may get overburdened; therefore they need to draw upon professional counselors for help with serious psychological problems.

In group discussions, the participants were asked to define a good pastor using animals as symbols. The groups came up with the following characteristics which pastors should have: lion's power, sheep's gentleness, dove's sense of direction, eagle's wings, monkey's friendliness, pig's simplicity, water buffalo's yoke-bearing strength and wolf's societal skills.

In the symposium, the participants learned to 'listen, observe and touch with hands', as were titled Professor Al Dueck's handouts. The participants were shown basic principles of pastoral caring to analyze the church resources and establish a network of pastoral caregivers. In his closing speech, Rev. Bao Jiayuan, the Head of the CCC/TSPM Training Department, stated that this symposium was the beginning of professional pastoral care in China. The Chinese church will need to look for methods which can be applied well to the Chinese context.