Caring

Caring: Six Steps for Effective Pastoral Conversations is designed to help ministers and pastoral care givers solve one of their most significant problems. They are called upon to “fix” all manner of human problems, and this expectation often leaves them feeling overwhelmed, highly stressed, or woefully unprepared. Help is available! Author Denise Massey will teach readers how to coach people to access their own spiritual and personal resources, invoking both God’s help and the person’s own deep inner wisdom.

The six steps of the CARING process can transform ministry conversations from floundering and uncertain to powerful and effective. These steps of facilitating powerful problem-solving conversation are ones that the minister and the person receiving care take together. The acronym CARING will help the minister remember both the steps and the ultimate purpose of the conversation.

C Connect with God, self, and others.
A Attend to the journey and assess the need.
R Reach clarity about the realistic focus for this conversation.
I Inspire the development of a loving action plan.
N Navigate around obstacles to the plan.
G Generate commitment to a specific, loving action plan.

If you’re a minister, you’ve heard it all. People turn to you for help with every conceivable problem and expect you to help them “fix” it. You do your best, but you are more than open to learning new ways to coach and counsel. Denise Massey offers practical guidance for these pastoral conversations using the word “caring” as an acronym to make her six-step process easy to remember. This important resource helps pastoral caregivers coach people how to access their own spirituality, invoking both God’s help and the person’s own deep inner wisdom, creating an effective way for caregiver and care seeker to explore these six transformative steps together.