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Busy Weekend at Bukal Life Care

Friday, we held our CPE commissioning for half unit trainees. They began their training 6 weeks ago in early June. There are 14 trainees, 10 of whom were doing half unit intensive. The 10 are Matthew, Jymar, Ely, Eleazar, Claribel, Bhab, Shoneem, Charles, Nap, and Jerry. Most are associated with Philippine Baptist Theollogical Seminary or Lutheran Theological Seminary. Their supervisors (SITs) are Chaplains Vo and Edgar. Chaplain Celia is supervising the other four who will complete their work in September.

Many joined the celebration which culminated with a dinner social at the Bukal Life Care Office. We were blessed with some special guests. These include Dr. Armand Canoy the president of PBTS, and Dr. Aloysius Schwartz, OT professor of LTS. Additionally, Dr. Sim Dang-Awan Jr. spoke briefly on military chaplaincy, and Ptr. Renato Eustaquio spoke briefly on Marketplace (or Corporate) Chaplaincy.

Image may contain: 10 people, including Violeta Cristobal Canoy and Bob Munson, people smiling, people standing and indoor

Image may contain: 16 people, including Violeta Cristobal Canoy and Fhey Kindipan-Coyoy, people smiling, people standing and indoor

Today, Saturday, we are have certification board for four. These four have completed four (4) units of CPE and are seeking certification in clinical chaplaincy.

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Pastoral Care Training Partnership

Our counseling center has a partnership with Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary, particularly in terms of the Clinical Pastoral Education program. More recently, the partnership has expanded to developing degree programs focusing on pastoral care. This work has been aided through further partnerships with specialists.

Bob wrote an article for the Fellowship of Baptist Educators that speaks to this partnership.  The newsletter is attached.

http://thefellowshipofbaptisteducators.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/EDUCOMIS-Spring-2018.pdf

Ministry Trip to Sangilo

This was technically not a Bukal Life Care ministry trip. Rather, it was a project of one of the mission classes at PBTS. It is a class taught by Bob Munson (administrator at Bukal). They choses to do a seminar in Family Relations ina small mining community in Sangilo, Itogon. The two resource speakers were Atty Ben Gaab, and Celia Munson (the latter being a counselor at Bukal Life Care).

We had a great time. Pictures are available at Bob and Celia’s personal blog, HERE.

Addressing Questions of Suffering

Here is a quote by Howard Stone from “The Word of God and Pastoral Care”

Over the years, while making pastoral carecaution2bagainst2bbad2badvice visits and especially hospital visits, I have sadly encountered many people whose well-meaning friends and acquaintances have responded to their why questions with theological answers that left them terribly upset and proved actually to be destructive: ‘This is God’s punishment on you and for your sins.’ ‘This is God’s will; you have to accept it.’ ‘This has happened to bring you to the Lord.’ ‘God wanted your dear one with him in heaven.’ ‘If you hadn’t skipped out on your wife, this wouldn’t have happened.’ ‘If you had stayed home with your children where God wants you to be, they wouldn’t have started taking drugs.’

More recently I have also come across another whole class of answers — more psychological than religious — to theodicy issues: ‘You are responsible for your illness.’ ‘You are sick because of your destructive thoughts.’ ‘The cancer inside you is pent up anger; you’ve got to release it to get well.’ ‘You are what you eat; if only you had cut out salt and exercised more.’ Some people are so eager to give their answers that they scarcely wait for the questions to be asked. The results are often quite grim.

When I first began pastoral care work, I would have thought such pronouncements were rare, or occurred only in the more conservative denominations. Not so! Things such as this happen everywhere, regardless of the conservative or liberal orientation. Simplistic and damaging answers flow from well-meaning people at a time when their hearers are in considerable distress, vulnerable, and unable to talk back. I raise the issue here because if ministers care only for people’s emotional pain and do not respond theologically to the issue of theodicy, parishioners will inevitably get their theological education elsewhere, and it may not be the kind we would have wished for them. In other words, if ministers will not respond, sooner or later, to the vital questions of theodicy, neighbors and friends are likely to do so, and not always in a helpful manner.                                       –page 165

February Updates

January 20st.  CPSP-Philippines Board of Trustees Meeting was held at Bukal Life Care.

February 16th.  Hot Springs Trip for Drug Surrenderer Group.

March 8th.  Graduation of PBTS. Also graduation of two CPE groups (9 total), and our CPO group (6 total).

March 12 and 13.  Summer CPE Orientation.

April 26-27.  Quirino Ministry Trip

May ____.  Dr. Doug Dickens trip to Philippines.

May ____.  Bob Munson (Administrator of Bukal Life Care) trip to Philippines.

Upcoming Activities

November 7.  Start of CPE Extended Unit. Supervisor is Celia Munson. This group meets from 6pm – 9pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays. (It is possible that there will be a second group that meets on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.) Contact us at bukallife@gmail.com if interested or have questions.

November 14.  Drug Surrenderer Program Family Day.

January 8-10.  Lide-Walker Conference. Guy and Roxanne Grimes from the Relationship Warehouse.

Other trainings upcoming.

A Parable of Three Cars

MMM -- Munson Mission Musings

My wife and I were having an a somewhat impromptu conversation with a couple of our ministry partners (they know who they are). As we talked the issue of achieving one’s dreams (or failure to do so) came up, along with issue of regret. That led me into what I hoped was a somewhat inspirational speech of sorts. Well, with some further reflection, I think maybe I should have said it this way instead.

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John and Bill were next-door neighbors and were in their 60s. Bill came over to John’s yard where John was working on his car. John had a sports car. It was pretty obvious that it once was a sleek powerful machine. But now it looked quite beat up, and the oil stain on the driveway suggested that this car was really struggling. Bill asked him about his car.

John said, “Oh I have had this baby…

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