Raymond J. Lawrence, General Secretary CPSP

REPORT TO PLENARY COLLEGE OF PASTORAL SUPERVISION AND PSYCHOTHERAPYLITTLE ROCK, ARKANSASMARCH 30, 2008

RAYMOND J. LAWRENCE, GENERAL SECRETARY

Introduction:

I report to you that our professional community is prospering. We are seeing steady growth. In numbers of certified members, we are now the third largest organization in our field in this hemisphere. We have problems too. Some of our Chapters need more attention than they are receiving. We need not be embarrassed about our failure to be a perfect community. But we need to be more assertive in approaching under functioning Chapters, because those with problems tend not to ask for consultation as we expect them to do. And we need to do more in the public relations arena, informing persons and institutions about our uniqueness and what we have to offer.

The Changing Character of CPSP

18 years ago this month 15 persons met in Virginia and decided unanimously that we should create a new certifying community, that the then functioning organizations were not serving the professional community adequately. In the intervening years we have now grown to a community of more than 600 persons. Our progress has involved very little exchange of money, and no paid leadership. It has relied on grass roots motivation and the initiative of emerging leadership. We attract persons who want responsibly to shape their own professional destiny. Persons who like to rely on direction from corporate offices tend not to be interested in us.

Read Futher: Pastoral Report the online Journal of the College of Pastoral And Psychotherapy

Edwin Friedman Thinking Systems

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“The painful irony is that the minister, who wants to touch the center of men’s lives, finds himself on the periphery; often pleading in vain for admission….He never seems to be where the action is.” I wonder if this says more about Henri Nouwen than it does about the minister’s involvement in critical and crisis situations.“ George L. Buck Ph.D. The minister, the story tells us, is sitting among the poor, binding his/her wounds one at a time, waiting for the moment when he/she will be needed. The minister is called to be the wounded healer, the one who must look after his/her wounds and at the same time be prepared to heal the wounds of others.” --- Henri Nouwen. In his article titled “Wounded Healers”, Thomas Maeder quotes a child of psychiatrists (both parents): “I Think my parents were crazy, I think that, somehow, being psychiatrists kept them in line. They used it as a protection. They’re both quite crazy, but their jobs give them really good cover.” It is no secret that the so

Master Fezziwig Knew How to Celebrate Employees Borne there by the Spirit of Christmas-Past the scene opens: It is Christmas once more and Scrooge is standing outside the warehouse where once he was an apprentice. They go inside and Scrooge is delighted to find his former boss – Mr Fezziwig. Mr Fezziwig is instructing a young Scrooge and his fellow apprentice, Dick, to ready the premises for their annual Christmas party. The scene fills as in come a fiddler, Mrs Fezziwig, all the other Fezziwigs together with all the employees. They enjoy music and dancing and when finally the joyous evening comes to a close Scrooge is forced to reflect on his own treatment as an employer regarding his staff. “When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr and Mrs Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side of the door, and shaking hands with every person individually as he or she went out, wished him or her a Merry Christmas. When everybody had retired but the tw

Clinical Pastoral Education

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