SPEAKING IN SIGNS

NARRATIVE AND TRAUMA IN PASTORAL THEOLOGY

Authors

  • Heather Walton University of Glasgow

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1558/hscc.v5i2.2

Keywords:

trauma, narrative theology, chaplaincy, storytelling, spiritual/pastoral care

Abstract

Narrative is often seen as the locus of a healing encounter between those who suffer and those who offer pastoral/spiritual care. Both canonical narrative theology, in which the story of Jesus gives meaning to all human stories, and constructive narrative theology, in which redemptive power rests in the human capacity for storytelling itself, can offer chaplains important theological and pastoral insights. But not all who suffer can find or create a narrative to fit them; not all who have experienced trauma can find words to tell their story. To respond to such a crisis in human narrative, we need to enable communication by means of image, symbol and metaphor, or even through learning to preserve a sacred and eloquent silence.

Author Biography

  • Heather Walton, University of Glasgow

    Heather Walton is Lecturer in Practical Theology in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, University of Glasgow

References

ANTZE, P. AND LAMBECK, M. (1996) Tense Past: Essays in Trauma and Memory. London: Routledge

FRANK, A. (1995) The Wounded Storyteller: Body, Illness and Ethics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press

HAUERWAS, S. (1990) Naming the Silences. Grand Rapids: Eerdman

LAUB, D AND FELMAN, S. Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis and History. London: Routledge

RICOEUR, P. (1991) A Ricouer Reader: Reflection and Imagination. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf

SCARY, E. (1983) The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World. Oxford: OUP.

WEISEL, E AND BEALE, T. (2,000) Strange Fire: Reading the Bible after the Holocaust. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.

Published

2013-05-31

How to Cite

Walton, H. (2013). SPEAKING IN SIGNS: NARRATIVE AND TRAUMA IN PASTORAL THEOLOGY. Health and Social Care Chaplaincy, 5(2), 2-5. https://doi.org/10.1558/hscc.v5i2.2

Most read articles by the same author(s)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 > >>