Introduction To Academic Writing And Research

The Significance of Pastoral Practice for Mental Health

Discuss about the Introduction to Academic Writing and Research.

The world is continuously growing with advancement in technologies, employment and education and because of these, competition, frustration and passive aggression are taking place into the lives of the modern inhabitants. The practice of pastoral guidance in modern life is found essential for providing spiritual help to the suffering ones.[1] In this regard, it should be kept in mind that over years, spiritual help is proving most relevant for reducing stress, trauma and aggression. However, one of the biggest issues for conducting a fruitful pastoral practice in the current era is the inefficient skills of the pastoral practitioners. Furthermore, it is being assumed that the reason behind such issue is the lack of ability to think critically. The present essay has the purpose to make an in-depth discussion for determining whether critical thinking is a helpful aspect for improving the pastoral practices or not.

It is believed that in the modern era of technical and scientific development, people are succumbing into the circle of uncertainty. Increasing amount of competition and easy accessibility of wealth is making people more self-centric and aggressive. As part of the consequence, life has become more uncertain and people are losing faith in their lives. It is certainly proving that abundance of wealth and technical advancement in life is not proving helpful for maintaining the peace of mind. Except that, complex lifestyles also provoke the volume of uncertainty in modern life. It has been found that people are losing confidence and that is leading them to behave inappropriately in right situations.[2] On the other hand, the threat of being deceived by the policy makers and the business organizations are found to be another reason for leading an uncertain life. In this context, it is significant to note that as part of the fatal outcome of such uncertainties, people are tending to commit suicide and attempting to take ghastly decisions regarding their selves due to high per tension.       

In this respect, the significance of pastoral practice for decreasing mental pressure and anxieties is recognized to be worth notable. The phrase Pastoral practice is indicative of the spiritual practice or theological training that is fundamentally applied to bring an individual closer to the almighty. The practice is largely appraised for healing traumatic minds of individuals by motivating them with positive energy. Motivation and positive expression support human minds in facing any uncertainties or hostile environment from the outside world. Therefore, it can be said that the practice is significant for transforming a mind from being agonized to peaceful. Hence, it can be underpinned that pastoral practice is well applicable for reducing pressures and harmful tendencies to end life.

Issues Encountered in Pastoral Guidance

However, it should be kept in consideration that to become a pastoral leader, a person re   quires to have capabilities to understand and judge any critical situation.[3] Additionally, the person needs to have the potentiality to take right decision in an apt way to mitigate a particular critical scenario. Critical thinking is reviewed to be that power, which gives the ability to analyze and investigate a matter by going beyond the surface understanding.[4] The use of critical thinking is therefore related to form a right judgment. Thereafter it is understandable that prior to become an efficient pastoral leader, a person needs to become a efficient critical thinker.

It is however, unfortunate to note that in the era of twenty first century, the field of pastoral practice is encountering several issues regarding the pastoral leadership. The main pitfalls of the current practice of pastoral guidance is that most of the time the responsible counselors are found to have little knowledge about the rudimentary purpose of pastoral guidance. On the other hand, a pastoral leader is required to have a strong control over the learners or the suffering ones’ humanistic approach. Therefore, it can be understood that one of the increasing issues in pastoral thinking are the practitioners’ lack of ability to delve deeply into any particular situation. On the other hand, several times pastors themselves go through certain issues like unresolved family problems, personal conflicts and financial difficulties, which make them incompetent to read others characters. Such issues are acting as some stubborn constraints for the pastors to give their entire attention on a particular problem and thereafter failing to become a reflective thinker.

Moreover, a pastoral leader is required to possess spiritual maturity along with the capacity to make a trustworthy relationship.[5] Above all, a pastor should understand the density of a particular problem with clear insight to find out a convenient get way at the final stage. With the help of critical thinking, it is possible to understand a situation appropriately and thereafter to reach to an applicable solution. Though there is confusion, about how exactly this quality can help to become flexible with the suffering individuals and make a trustworthy relationship with them. Therefore, it has to be said that the significance of critical thinking is limited to the extent of observation and judgmental skills.

However, precisely, critical thinking is regarded as the way of analyzing a situation rationally and giving a reasoned judgment. According to the National council for Excellence in Critical Thinking, critical thinking is a disciplined as well as an intellectual process that conceptualizes, analyzes and evaluates any certain information based on reflection, observation and communication. On the other hand, key aspects of humanity include varied emotions, sensitivity, and faith. With the help of critical thinking, an individual becomes able to control their emotional fluctuations that restrain a person from having a rational and peaceful mind. Furthermore, if communication could be seen as a part of humanity in terms of human skills, it should be said that a systematic and critical thinking improvise the way of expressing own thoughts.[6] Most importantly, critical thinking acts like a way of promoting creativity, which again is considered being one of the chief aspects of humanity.[7]

The Importance of Critical Thinking for Pastoral Practitioners

On the other hand, critical thinking helps to acquire self-reflection by reviewing any particular condition deeply. Therefore, with a thorough understanding about any distinct emotion, a person can identify the best possible solutions to handle them. In this regard the three embedded stages of critical thinking, which is known as the multi-layered structure, could be considered. The first layer of critical thinking helps to identify the alternative premises of affairs, whereas the second layer creates possibilities for evaluation by critical questioning. The final layer is the judgment process that makes decision regarding the reliable aspect of a cognitive faculty. The final layer is therefore responsible for creating trust. For instance, in time of counseling an individual, a counselor has to first understand the person’s characteristic features through the first and second layer of critical thinking. Thereafter, it is essential to analyze their problem not just by listening to them but also by perceiving views going beyond the apparent scenario. That is how the first two layers of critical understanding and thinking process help a person to have a concise understanding along with bright reflection on a particular matter.[8] Nevertheless, it should not be disregarded that to acquire critical thinking a person needs to have a certain amount of maturity.[9] Therefore, to improvise pastoral practice first it is necessary to have that level of maturity, which helps through which one understands the significance of critical thinking.

Instead of all these, the primary responsibility of a pastoral leader should not neglected, which says that the responsible counselor should evaluate every act of the troubled person with utmost priority. It is because, several times problems are hidden inside an individual’s behavioral disorder rather than inside the particular situation they are facing.[10] That is why in the practice of giving spiritual guidance, it is important to have the skill to analyze the behaviors of others to acquire a proper solution. As discussed above about the three layers of critical thinking, establish a proper decision or solution is the third layer of critical understanding. Hence, it is understandable that to evaluate behavioral aspects along with to have a clear reflection, a person initially requires the ability to think in a critical way.[11]   

Thus, it can be deduced that when a person riches the level of understanding a particular act or situation by every possible dimension of it, the individual can recognize a probable way to handle that particular act.[12] In that case, it should be taken into consideration that most of the time a pastoral guide fails to give relevant solution because of their tendency to follow the orthodox and age-old ideas. A counselor is supposed to propose ideas or solutions based on different situations, which will not be some random ideas acquired from bookish knowledge. However, critical thinking may not be the last option to acquire creative ideas as proper education and in-depth knowledge in several aspects of the environment and society are also required to procure creative ideas.[13]

Hence, after considering the above discussion, it can be perceived that a pastoral leader could not accomplish his/her role as a counselor if the person lacks the ability to think critically.[14] On the other hand, despite agreeing with the fact that critical thinking acts as a potential aspect to improve the practice of giving pastoral guidance, it has to be said that the entire facet of critical thinking rests on the aspect of maturity. That is why; a pastoral guide can only acquire the capability to think critically only if the individual feels the requirement to have it.

References

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Doehring, Carrie. The practice of pastoral care: A postmodern approach. Presbyterian Publishing Corp, 2014.

Fearon, H. Dana and Gordon S Mikoski. Straining At The Oars. 1st ed. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 2013.

Graham, Elaine L. Transforming practice: Pastoral theology in an age of uncertainty. Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2002.

Halx, M.D.; Reybold, L.E.,Dubicki, Eleonora. “Faculty perceptions of students’ information literacy skills competencies.” Journal of Information Literacy (2005) 7.2: 97-125.A pedagogy of force: faculty perspectives of critical thinking capacity in undergraduate students. Journal of General Education, 54(4): 293-315. Retrieved October 8, 2016 from Wilson Select Plus database.

Hatcher, Donald L. “Reflections On Critical Thinking”. Inquiry: Critical Thinking Across the Disciplines 28, no. 2 (2013): 4-24.

King, Patricia M., and Karen Strohm Kitchener. Developing Reflective Judgment: Understanding and Promoting Intellectual Growth and Critical Thinking in Adolescents and Adults. Jossey-Bass Higher and Adult Education Series and Jossey-Bass Social and Behavioral Science Series. Jossey-Bass, 350 Sansome Street, San Francisco, CA 94104-1310, 1994.

Kuhn, Deanna. “A Role For Reasoning In A Dialogic Approach To Critical Thinking”. Topoi (2016).

LaMothe, Ryan. “Broken And Empty: Pastoral Leadership As Embodying Radical Courage, Humility, Compassion, And Hope”. Pastoral Psychology 61, no. 4 (2012): 451-466.

Paul, Richard, and Linda Elder. Critical thinking: Tools for taking charge of your professional and personal life. Pearson Education, 2013.

Richardson, Ronald W. Creating a Healthier Church: Family Systems Theory, Leadership and Congregational Life by Augsburg Fortress, 1996.

Shiraev, Eric B., and David Levy. Cross-cultural psychology: Critical thinking and contemporary applications. Routledge, 2015.

Waddell, Charles. “Looking at church teachings and pastoral practices.” In Compass, vol. 49, no. 3, p. 3. Compass, 2015

Watkins, Megan. Discipline And Learn. 1st ed. Dordrecht: Springer, 2012.