One of the most powerful practices of pastoral care is being in the present moment.

It is always very tempting when we encounter someone in emotional or spiritual pain to offer a solution or advice or to tell them about when something similar happened to us. None of these responses is helpful because they take the person in pain out of the moment.

What we want when we’re in pain is for someone to understand it’s OK to be in pain. When I’m grieving the loss of a loved one I don’t want you to tell me that I will eventually move on. I want you to agree with me that this is a terrible thing that’s happened. I don’t want you to tell me about when you lost someone you loved. This devalues my experience and I feel devalued and abandoned by you.

When I am struggling with dysfunctional, hurtful or even illegal behaviour, I need you to tell me in no uncertain terms that what I am doing is wrong. Deep down I know that already but it needs to be brought into the open and said. But I then need you to be present with me in my pain. This may take a long time as I slowly come to trust you, but I need you to accept, unconditionally, me and the pain I’m in. Don’t accept my bad behaviour. Accept the pain. Accept me.

When you accept the reality of the pain I’m in you accept me and I have found another person who is able to just be with me in the moment and through that I am empowered and begin to discover how God himself is with me, even in my pain.

Allan had been a member of an outlaw motorcycle club and had also become drug addicted. Somehow, in the providence of God, he stumbled into a Christian community that accepted him unconditionally. These Christians appointed several men to mentor Allan and form a circle of accountability around him. This gave him a small group of friends who showed they cared about him and provided friendship outside of his criminal contacts.

As these men gave Allan some protection and were simply present with him, accepting him as himself, a person in pain, Allan began to feel that he was a real person, no-longer one who had to prove his toughness, no-longer one who had to try to escape through drug use. He said that as he felt that acceptance by God’s people he just simply began to do his own rehabilitation.

Our prison chaplains are seeing men and women genuinely converted. When they get out of prison they want to join a church but it’s just so strange. Too many of them fall away. They need mentors and people to form a circle of accountability around them. The exciting news is that our prison chaplains are beginning to train these mentors. Men and women who have only known church on the inside of prison walls are being supported and welcomed into churches on the outside.