Training:

1. Shepherd in Every Pew. Provides a simple format look at pastoral counseling with the goal of having helping church members be an effective part of the pastoral care ministry of a church.

2. Disaster Response Counseling. Provides training for counselors to effectively provide relief to disaster victims through counseling leading to stress mitigation and finding “a new normal”. Focuses primarily on the NOVA model.

3. Introduction to Pastoral Care and Counseling. Somewhat like Shepherd in Every Pew, but less targeted. Provides a basic understanding of the purpose and methods of pastoral care.

4. Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE). We work with Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary (PBTS) and the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy (CPSP) in this. Rev. Joel Aguirre is the head of Shepherd’s Oikos, as well as the CPE Supervisor at PBTS.

4. We are regularly expanding in this area… adding new training as the need arises.

Symposium:

1. Our first Shepherd’s Oikos Pastoral Care Seminar was in 2009 with Dr. Raymond Lawrence (General Secretary of the College of Pastoral Care and Psychotherapy) as our lead speaker. This year, our 2nd annual symposium will be on May 1st (2010) with Rev. Charlie Benton (Virginia Baptist Mission Board Disaster Response Trainer) as the lead speaker.

Literature:

1. We are hoping to begin developing materials contextualized for the Philippines. We are also looking to develop an electronic journal.

Practical Ministry:

1. We look to help people who are suffering by providing pastoral care services. We started this by working with hospitals and shelters (through CPE) as well as with Disaster Relief (after Typhoon Pepeng in November 2009).