Leading and preaching in the storm: (Re)locating ourselves faithfully amid trauma and chaos
We need to consider not only how we respond but how we locate ourselves as those called upon to speak and act faithfully, writes Kimberly Wagner.
Trauma, and its cycle of social, psychological and genetic damage, is as old as humanity’s time on this earth. Humanity – adapting in myriad forms, some good and others not – has survived, but at what cost? PTSD, genetically inherited damage, lived helplessness can trap us and the generations that follow in patterns of fear, poor health and mental illness.
How, then, can we minister to a pain that is, for many, cellular? How can we minister to God’s people in a world fraught with images of violence, with memories of misery? How can we minister to the human trauma that is a minute-to-minute life in the world God created for us?
In this issue of the Presbyterian Outlook, we discuss the practical theology of trauma-informed ministry that can foster healing of wounds both seen and unseen.
We need to consider not only how we respond but how we locate ourselves as those called upon to speak and act faithfully, writes Kimberly Wagner.
We often fail to identify common stories as trauma or to recognize their impact, writes Chanequa Walker-Barnes.
"It pains me to witness those I love in pain. But that is the nature of love, and its responsibility," writes Teri McDowell Ott.