What is spiritual welfare according to the pastor explanation?

Dear Jedi,

I am working on my Initiate Programme, task 0. The explanation of the Pastor is ,,overseeing the spiritual welfare of the temple`` I was wondering what does it mean to oversee the spiritual welfare of the temple, what is spiritual welfare and what does it mean to be a pastor, what is his / here role in the Jedi Order?

May the Forge be with us,

Aqua

Spiritual welfare is the spiritual well being, or spiritual health...

The pastor oversees this...acting as a guide

RyuJin wrote: Spiritual welfare is the spiritual well being, or spiritual health...

The pastor oversees this...acting as a guide

Thanks for your explanation, still I don't understand ''acting as a guide'' Do you mean that the Pastor is an officer that act like some kind of psychiatrist of the temple? And if the Pastor is some kind of psychiatrist, what is it that makes the Pastor so valuable to the order? How does he oversee this whole welfare?

I am sorry if I ask you to many questions.. ,RyuJin, I want to understand how this system works, so I have a better foundation for the knowledge that I will find on my journey of the Temple.

We are a religion, and like most religions we have Clergy - a body of priests who guide and support the spiritual side of the community here.

Think of a priest from any religion. Perhaps they prepare sermons, and deliver messages that way. Perhaps they engage in pastoral care, approaching people in need to see if they can offer them comfort and support, or lead them to seek these things themselves. Perhaps they lead others in meditation or contemplation. Perhaps they preside over important ceremonies or festivities. Perhaps they hear the confessions of others.

Pastor is like "Head Priest". He leads the administrative aspect of the Clergy, including allocation of sermons, supporting pastoral care and any and all other things which come to his door. The Pastor oversees and guides the activity of the Clergy as a whole, but at his core he is simply a priest, engaged in the same activities as the rest of the Clergy.

I hope that helps.

Spiritual welfare is not the same as psychological welfare, but may influence it...to my immediate knowledge we don't have any psychiatrists or psychologists here (I may be wrong)...we do have numerous members that work in healthcare...if a member needs something we do not have here we do come together to help find what it is that is needed...

We're merely guides, we show the way to finding answers and open the door...it's up to the individual to step through and see for themselves what they seek...

tzb wrote: We are a religion, and like most religions we have Clergy - a body of priests who guide and support the spiritual side of the community here.

Think of a priest from any religion. Perhaps they prepare sermons, and deliver messages that way. Perhaps they engage in pastoral care, approaching people in need to see if they can offer them comfort and support, or lead them to seek these things themselves. Perhaps they lead others in meditation or contemplation. Perhaps they preside over important ceremonies or festivities. Perhaps they hear the confessions of others.

Pastor is like "Head Priest". He leads the administrative aspect of the Clergy, including allocation of sermons, supporting pastoral care and any and all other things which come to his door. The Pastor oversees and guides the activity of the Clergy as a whole, but at his core he is simply a priest, engaged in the same activities as the rest of the Clergy.

I hope that helps.

Thank you for sharing your experience about priests. The explanation from the FAQ is different than your explanation. But I see some similarity!

Thanks for answering my question, may the force be with us,

~Aqua

Aqua wrote: Thank you for sharing your experience about priests. The explanation from the FAQ is different than your explanation. But I see some similarity!

How so? As a member of the Clergy I'd be interested to see if the FAQ is giving out different information. Because either I'm wrong, or it is but so far as I can see, what I've said is just an expansion of the main Clergy FAQ: http://www.templeofthejediorder.org/clergy

Well then ...

I'm sort of glad you've brought this up ... We really don't get to talk about it very often.

Ryu's response was really about as precise as one can be to the question. The "spiritual" well-being though not distinct from the physical and mental welfare does address that there is a dimension that goes through and beyond these two. What it is, what the "soul" is, I can't tell you for I do not know. Then again, no one does.

So, if we don't know what the soul is, how can we possibly tell if it is doing well or not ? The answer to this problem lies primarily in the very broad questions about how one may feel and how well one can relate to the feelings of others. But then we would have to get around to exploring what these "feelings" are we are on about ...

We are not going to get a clear re-presentation of what exactly is healthy (or un-healthy) with regard to 'spiritual' health by trying to define ; definitions are not going to clear things up. The soul is something which is only present, nothing can truly re-present it. So, what I would suggest about making any spiritual 'diagnoses' (only a clumsey term here and only employed to relate it back to the concept of 'health') relies on where does one feel, how or what feels well or un-well ?

Is it the 'mind' ? the 'heart' ? If neither of these concepts match the 'spot' of the feeling, then one is quite likely having affair with the 'soul'.

I am very reluctant to put forth a definite method of spiritual custodianship. Spiritual matters are not confined to 'cause-effect' linearity. Should the soul be a transcendent aspect of us, then its care must also be from transcendent angles ... We would seek mythic, or metaphorical, not factual grounds ; we would open to the global possibilities, not close in on specifics or details ...

Most of the time, in most cases I've encountered as a Minister of the Force, caring for the spiritual wel-fare of the Temple has been a matter of presence (the act of "presenc-ing"), of being there, attentive and caring for one of my fellows in the time I must and all of them in all other time. It is an extension of empathy, of feeling with others - sharing Joy to augment it and sharing sorrows and fears to lighten them ; "Where there is darkness, (I shall bring) light(-ness) ..."

Ergo - albeit I cannot lay out a scheme for 'spiritual guidance', I can tell you that it is not 'direction' by doctrine or dogma. It is guidance from 'with' and 'among', not from 'above'. I have said before that our Clergy do not "preach", we 'accompany' ; it is very plausible that our souls, whatever they may be, are much healthier when they are together and not isolated.

Alexandre Orion wrote: Well then ...

I'm sort of glad you've brought this up ... We really don't get to talk about it very often.

Ryu's response was really about as precise as one can be to the question. The "spiritual" well-being though not distinct from the physical and mental welfare does address that there is a dimension that goes through and beyond these two. What it is, what the "soul" is, I can't tell you for I do not know. Then again, no one does.

So, if we don't know what the soul is, how can we possibly tell if it is doing well or not ? The answer to this problem lies primarily in the very broad questions about how one may feel and how well one can relate to the feelings of others. But then we would have to get around to exploring what these "feelings" are we are on about ...

We are not going to get a clear re-presentation of what exactly is healthy (or un-healthy) with regard to 'spiritual' health by trying to define ; definitions are not going to clear things up. The soul is something which is only present, nothing can truly re-present it. So, what I would suggest about making any spiritual 'diagnoses' (only a clumsey term here and only employed to relate it back to the concept of 'health') relies on where does one feel, how or what feels well or un-well ?

Is it the 'mind' ? the 'heart' ? If neither of these concepts match the 'spot' of the feeling, then one is quite likely having affair with the 'soul'.

I am very reluctant to put forth a definite method of spiritual custodianship. Spiritual matters are not confined to 'cause-effect' linearity. Should the soul be a transcendent aspect of us, then its care must also be from transcendent angles ... We would seek mythic, or metaphorical, not factual grounds ; we would open to the global possibilities, not close in on specifics or details ...

Most of the time, in most cases I've encountered as a Minister of the Force, caring for the spiritual wel-fare of the Temple has been a matter of presence (the act of "presenc-ing"), of being there, attentive and caring for one of my fellows in the time I must and all of them in all other time. It is an extension of empathy, of feeling with others - sharing Joy to augment it and sharing sorrows and fears to lighten them ; "Where there is darkness, (I shall bring) light(-ness) ..."

Ergo - albeit I cannot lay out a scheme for 'spiritual guidance', I can tell you that it is not 'direction' by doctrine or dogma. It is guidance from 'with' and 'among', not from 'above'. I have said before that our Clergy do not "preach", we 'accompany' ; it is very plausible that our souls, whatever they may be, are much healthier when they are together and not isolated.

I am glad that you are happy this Thread gave you the possibility to talk about Souls and spiritual guidance, If I understand your post right, you say:

,,So, if we don't know what the soul is, how can we possibly tell if it is doing well or not ''

It is a very beautiful question, I want to learn more about this life question; If I can find enough time in my live I shall try to learn more about it..


But maybe I`m going a bit offtopic now, I don't know.. but why is it that people don't talk about this subject often? You give me more questions now hehe

There are lots of questions that we don't get around to exploring very often. I don't know why ; I could only guess that it is because, as contemporary humans of the post-modern age, we feel intimidated by questions that do not have clear answers. Or, perhaps we are simply bored by them.

But, boredom being a form of melancholy, that seems to take us right back to the previous topic !