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Worship as Pastoral Care Across the Generations

As I contemplated the proposed topic for this article, I made a decision to employ the topic as a way to focus on the importance of across the generations. A look at Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary offers a number of possibilities for the meaning of across: (1) from one side to the other side of (think of a bridge); (2) intersecting (lines that pass over each other); (3) opposite (side of the room); and (4) in contact with (to come across an old friend). This is not a comprehensive list of meanings, but they are the ones that will guide my thoughts about worship and pastoral care. I have been an ordained minister in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America for almost twenty-three years and have served a congregation for fifteen of those years. In addition, I write this article as a pastoral theologian and as a liturgical practitioner, not as an expert on liturgical practices or ritual theory. In worship we intersect with the past, present, and future of the Christian church—the whole company of saints—and its worship practices. We regularly come into contact with multiple generations collected in one place on a Sunday morning or other times when an individual congregation gathers for worship (wedding, funeral, time of crisis, etc.). We are traversing time and space even as we are building bridges within the body of Christ. The lives of the individuals who make up our congregations intersect in worship with opportunities that no other occasion or structure permits. Since this is so, there is no ministerial role, function, or task that does not demand of the minister pastoral sensitivity or the ability to be caring. Pastoral care is an integral part of how a minister conducts herself in every situation. Who are the ones who attend faithfully week in and week out even when we (the ministers) fall short of the mark? Who are the ones we would like to encourage to attend but are currently absent? In what ways does our worship leadership style contribute to or diminish our ultimate goals? These are some of the questions I’ll attempt to address in the pages that follow. So how does worship function as pastoral care? We shall see.