Pastoral Care
In times past, the BIC denomination produced a “Minister’s Manual” that was provided to all credentialed pastors. That practice was discontinued but The Pastoral Way website seeks to provide a modern version of that manual with many different kinds of resources. The intent is that these resources can be a shared pool and that others will contribute from their collection. As additional items are contributed by pastors, they will be added to this site.
Ceremonies and Services
Below are examples from other churches and denominations to help you with the planning of rites and ceremonies of pastoring people through the seasons of life. Hopefully these resources will be time-savers for you during the busyness of church ministry, especially for those newer in their ministry calling. The links below are links to a Google drive folders. When you click on a link, a new browser tab will open revealing a nested set of files and folders related to the parent category you have selected.
Abuse Care
Pastoral care extends well beyond the normal ceremonies and rites of ecclesiastical life. As a pastor you may find yourself helping people through some very difficult and complex situations including a variety of forms of abuse. Some of these are forms of abuse that did not even exist a few years ago (e.g., online predators and exploitation). More than likely, many of those situations are beyond the scope of your seminary training and you may feel ill-prepared for them.
Mennonite Central Committee has a developed a number of excellent resources that are available at their Abuse Response and Prevention website. We would encourage you to familiarize yourself with the materials that MCC has made available as they could be very helpful in some difficult pastoral situations.