Cody J. Sanders argues that spiritual care is inherently cultivated in every vibrant community--congregations and otherwise--and that every community member contributes to providing care for others. However, many congregation and community members lack confidence in their caring skills. In Spiritual Care First Aid, Sanders provides an accessible introduction to spiritual care characterized by mutuality, empathy, and compassion.
Recognizing that not everyone is a clinician, Sanders provides instruction in basic skills of spiritual care in a way nearly anyone can use. The book offers an approach of hearing, helping, and healing so whoever is near can serve as a spiritual-care first responder when and where needed. Readers will gain skills and confidence in their abilities to provide peer-to-peer care that contributes to their communities in life-sustaining ways.
Spiritual Care First Aid is an ideal training resource for seminary classrooms, particularly skill-building or pastoral care and counseling courses for non-clinicians. The book will also serve as a go-to field manual for lay ministry schools, congregations, and adjacent communities such as campus ministries and nonprofit organizations that train laypeople in spiritual care, as well as for pastors who desire to develop robust, practical care skills.
Cody J. Sanders is associate professor of Congregational and Community Care Leadership at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota. He has published seven books in the area of congregational ministry and spiritual care and is a nationally recognized leader in LGBTQ+ spiritual care. He is a frequent lecturer in churches and seminaries across the country.
Introduction
Chapter 1. Hearing with Compassionate Presence and Attentive Listening
Chapter 2. Hearing with Questions, Answers, and Silence
Chapter 3. Hearing Stories and Spiritual Narratives
Chapter 4. Hearing Feelings and (with) the Body
Chapter 5. Hearing Identities and Embodiments
Chapter 6. Helpful Expectations, Boundaries, and Introductions
Chapter 7. Helping with Goals and Desires
Chapter 8. Helping through Fear, Anxiety, Grief, and Loss
Chapter 9. Helping amid Anger and Sadness
Chapter 10. Helping amid Crisis and Disaster
Chapter 11. Healing that is Trauma-Aware
Chapter 12. Healing Support amid Addiction
Chapter 13. Healing Support for Mental Health and Suicide
Chapter 14. Healing Support amid Abuse and Violence
Chapter 15. Healing through Spiritual Practices
Appendix I: Organizing Spiritual Care First Aid in Your Community
Appendix II: Helpful Organizations and Resources
"Many people attend church dreaming about the redemptive care they will receive from Jesus one day in the future, while unconsciously diminishing their very own caring potential for others in the here and now. In this book, Cody Sanders offers an easy-to-follow blueprint for a scaffold of communal care by and for congregants that can reinvigorate the weariest church community and beyond." --Pamela Ayo Yetunde, pastoral counselor and author of Casting Indra's Net: Fostering Spiritual Kinship and Community
"From a wise pastor and scholar deeply acquainted with current literature in his field and with the human condition comes this thoughtful and practical guide to providing spiritual care. Whether a layperson or ordained minister, a reader will find astute insight for their practices of care for those who need companionship through their suffering and journey toward healing. I commend this as a textbook for seminarians, pastors, and lay ministers. Its reflection on hearing the other is especially well crafted, identifying where a person's story becomes a key resource in the movement toward wholeness." --Molly T. Marshall, president, United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities
"You may know how to pack a medical first-aid kit, but do you know how to pack a spiritual first-aid kit? Cody Sanders gets specific: words, phrases, beautiful questions, practices to use, and avoiding things done with good intention that often make matters worse. Focusing on strengths and stories, Sanders prepares individuals and teams to hear difficult things, to help immediately while professionals are on the way, and to support healing around life's deep difficulties. Spiritual Care First Aid equips us to be the trusted (often untrained) first responders to address the spiritual-care situations that will most certainly come our way. Full of example scripts and practice exercises, Spiritual Care First Aid is easily adaptable for classrooms and care teams. The world needs confident and capable people who, with the help of this book, carry spiritually grounded basic skills through this messy, beautiful world, more prepared to meet those unexpected moments when spiritual first aid is needed now." --Mindy McGarrah Sharp, associate professor of practical theology and pastoral care, Columbia Theological Seminary, and author of Misunderstanding Stories: Toward a Postcolonial Pastoral Theology and Creating Resistances: Pastoral Care in a Postcolonial World
"Cody Sanders is a gifted teacher, pastor, and caregiver, and in this highly useful and lovingly written book, he shares his gifts with us. Spiritual Care First Aid exemplifies all the patience, attention, and compassion it explains. It offers practical advice to its readers, along with profound and essential pastoral grounding and orientation. It will be an indispensable pastoral and practical resource for anyone--lay or ordained, novice or expert, in almost any caregiving context--who hopes to care for others in need." --Matthew Ichihashi Potts, Plummer Professor of Christian Morals and Pusey Minister in the Memorial Church, Harvard University
