Here are a few highlights of what is just finished, is finishing, is starting, or in the near future. Well… I guess that pretty much covers it.

Just Finished: We had a great visit with Chaplain Renato and Dr. Joy Eustaquio. They serve God in Bocaue, Bulacan. They have a center there (“The Chaplain’s Office”) that is involved in Corporate Chaplaincy, Hospital Chaplaincy, and problems with eyesight (‘low vision’). Chaplain Renato is a supervisee of Chaplain Celia, and has been a friend or partner of Bukal Life Care for many years. This last Sunday, he shared a short inspirational message on corporate chaplaincy and ministry for the CPO group.

Is Finishing: We are entering the final leg of our online Clinical Pastoral Orientation (CPO). This group of 8 with Chaplain Celia have been meeting on Sundays online for several weeks. The second weekend of October, they will all gather IRL (‘in real life’) for their final meeting, and celebration.

Is Starting. Groups of Chaplains Vo and Lyn are just starting CPE groups. Chaplain Vo’s group with working with a local ministry named KABSAT (by the way the word “kabsat” is Ilocano for “friend”) and is doing much of their practical ministry in the cancer center of Baguio General Hospital.

In the Near Future. On October 15. the Munsons were asked to join a training involving Childhood Trauma. Chaplain Celia will be one of the resource speakers for this.

Also in the near future we should have our Bukal Life Journal done. It is pretty much complete now. Just waiting on some corrections on one article. Hope to have good news soon.

Our book, “The Art of Pastoral Care” has been used for Intro to Pastoral Care and Counseling, as well as Clinical Pastoral Orientation and Clinical Pastoral Education classes here in the Philippines. Not surprisingly, the largest number of this book have been given or sold here in the Philippines.

Strangely, the second largest number of this book purchased has been Canada. Not sure why. Upon doing a bit of searching, it seems that there are a couple of Christian colleges using that book as a textbook for Intro to PC&C. That is great.

We have been asked to teach a Pastoral Care course for Bible college students in the US sometime in the next few months. It will be interesting to see for ourselves how the book works for a “Western” audience.

Anyway, it is great that the book is finding use outside of the Philippines. We are looking into writing a book on Pastoral Theology as a follow-on to “The Art of Pastoral Care” and our other book, “Dynamics in Pastoral Care,” and finding that people are using our other books and benefiting from them certain encourages us to invest time in the research and writing.

The book is available at a number of places online (both paperback and e-book). But in honor of Canada, I will give a Canadian link.

1. CPO. Chaplain Celia is supervising Clinical Pastoral Orientation with young leaders of a church in Caloocan City. So far 3 weeks done with 6 more to go.
2. CPE Both Chaplains Vo and Lyn will be starting online CPE groups towards the end of September. Both are expected to be online.
3. PC club. Our office is on the campus of PBTS. The student council opened up interest clubs. In that, one our our trainees set up a Pastoral Care Club. It their activity but we are excited about this group. They are using the office and we assist as we can.
4. Congratulations. Last month Chaplain Lyn earned her status of Diplomate Supervisor. This month, she has taken on the role of Chaplain at a school in Cebu. Also, her plans are to establish a counseling and training center in Cebu— ” Atiman Life Care Center.” We join in prayer that this will come to pass soon.
5. It looks like Chaplain Celia will be participating as a speaker for a seminar on pastoral care and childhood trauma. The date is Sept. 17. More info to follow.

We tend to emphasize our work with clinical pastoral training and to a lesser extent, pastoral counseling. But there are other things we do as well. One of these is Missionary Member Care (MMC). Actually, we are partnered with OSB, a missionary sending organization in the Philippines to provide MMC services. We also partner with Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary in their 555 program as part of their work in supporting Filipino missionaries while home.

August 16-18, 2022, OSB had their National Missions Conference in Koronadal City. Two from Bukal were able to attend to represent our organization. It was a great time and exciting to see how radically the Philippine church is revisioning it’s role in the world… embracing it’s role as a mission senders.

Leaving the Pandemic behind, things have gotten a bit busy.

August 2. We had the Commissioning for our Mid-year half unit.

Above: Supervisors Celia and Vo with Trainees: Thao, Joeseph, Bhab, Jezza, Peter, Charlemagne, Mark, Jonas, Al, Ceasar, and Karlo.

August 7. Started CPO online with a ministry group in Manila. This will continue for the next 7 weeks.

August 16-18. Bob and Celia Munson are representing Bukal Life Care, especially work in Missionary Member Care, in the National Missions Conference of One Sending Body (2022)

Late August. We are anticipating leading a training in Crisis Defusing in Baguio. This is with an NGO that works with schoolchildren. More info when that happens.

Other things going on such as a PC club (not founded by us, but by one of our trainees… and we hope to assist) here at PBTS. Also, making good progress on our Bukal Life Journal. We are at around 30 pages. Hope to finish before October.

On July 30, 2022, Chaplain Merlita (“Lyn”) Montecastro had her board for Diplomate of Pastoral Supervision with CPSP-PHILIPPINES. For several years Chaplain Lyn has served as a Chaplain and Supervisor-in-Training with Bukal. Chaplain Celia served as her Supervisor.

Successful in passing her board, we look forward to seeing what is ahead for her.

Photos of our two face-to-face groups in Half Unit Intensive.

r online group will hopefully be starting in the not too distant future. More info to follow.

Our mid-June half-unit CPE is underway with 11 trainees divided between two supervisors. These are face-to-face. Another group should be starting up in July that is online.

This August an online CPO group will be held for 9 weeks.

We would also like to note that Dr. Paul Tabon of Global Community is leading a Community Chaplain training course in Baguio. He has 20 trainees in that group.

Two CPE groups, led by Chaplains Vo and Lyn, are finishing their Summer Intensive. This is a full unit completed in about 11 weeks. The planned final evals is June 17.

CPE starts up a week later with two half-unit intensive groups. They will be led by Chaplains Celia and Vo. These will be face-to-face groups. Chaplain Lyn is planning an online CPE groups at this time as well.

Dr. (and Chaplain) Lyn Montecastro led a seminar “Confronting Well” in Angeles City, on May 21, 2022. It is nice to be able to join together for activities like this now!