Book Cover
Table of Contents
Preface 1
Chapter 1: Church Social Work
Chapter 2: Congregations as Context for Social Work
Chapter 3: Congregational Leaders
Chapter 4: Leading in Worship and Christian Education
Chapter 5: Weaving Nets
Chapter 6:
Leading in Missions
Chapter 7: From Charity to Justice
Chapter 8: The Path
Appendix 1: Congregational Social Workers—The Characters
Appendix 2: Glossary
Appendix 3: The Research Project
Appendix 4:
Sample Job Descriptions
References
Endnotes
Indices
Preface
This book was written backward. We began writing a book to report
on a research project we designed to describe the field of
congregational social work. `As we wrote our findings, however,
the manuscript grew into a much broader description of this
field as we reflected backward on (1) what we have learned from
our own professional experiences; (2) our understanding of the
culture of congregations developed from living more than six
decades grounded in congregational life; (3) what our students
have taught us as they have practiced social work in
congregational settings; and (4) what we have most recently
learned in our field research.1
Congregational social work has been around since the beginning of
the social work profession, but very little ink has been used to
describe or define it. We define congregational social work as
providing social work services in and through a religious
congregation, whether the employer is the congregation itself or
a social service or denominational agency working in
collaboration with congregations. Over a three-year period, with
a generous grant from the Louisville Institute, we interviewed a
convenience sample of 51 congregational social workers to
develop a full-orbed description of congregational social work.
As we studied the stories these congregational social workers2 told
us about their work, we came to understand that congregational
social work is a field of practice as diverse as the social work
profession itself. The congregational social workers we
interviewed serve people in poverty and people who are not. They
work with young children and pregnant women; they work with
older adults and families grieving the death of a member; and
they work with individuals and families in all the stages
between birth and death. They provide crisis intervention and
counseling and prevention services; they lead support and
educational groups; they train members in service; and they
organize and lead community development programs in their
congregations’ neighborhoods and on the other side of the world.
As congregational leaders, their work has taken them into the
fields of health and mental health, child and family services,
aging services, economic and social development, criminal
justice, community development, and education. Moreover, we
discovered that many of these social workers lead worship and
Christian education, preach and teach Bible studies, and weave
congregations into communities of support and care.
Their stories caused us to reflect on the 40 years of each of our
own professional lives in which we have both worked in and
consulted with congregations, religiously affiliated
organizations, denominational agencies, and Christian schools of
social work. As we learned about the work of these social
workers, we developed new frames for seeing our own experiences.
We had expected simply to tell their stories, and did not expect
to have our understanding so dramatically altered as we studied
the stories of
51 social workers finding their way into this field of practice and
how they grew and changed as they served. As we listened, we
felt the tug of connection to our own stories that surprised us.
We also began to reflect back onto other research we have conducted
with congregations, on our experiences as denominational
employees, as consultants with congregations, as well as
teaching and supervising congregational social workers. We
backed into writing a much broader book than we set out to
write, based on our own experiences as well as our research.
Through the stories of these social workers as well as our own,
this book will attempt to define how social work in the setting
of a congregation is both like other settings where social
workers serve as well as how congregations are unique settings
for doing social work. We have shared our experiences with you,
our understanding of what those experiences have taught us about
working with congregations, and the meaning we have found in
Christian scriptures for understanding our work. This book is a
mix of reporting what is, that is, what we learned as the
actual realities of social work practice from several of our
research projects, with our own opinions of what ought to be,
or our own distillation of what we have formed into
principles for practice.
We interviewed social workers in a wide range of congregations from
different traditions and worldviews. The social workers in these
diverse settings have defined their practice in very different
ways and probably would differ with one another—and with us—on
any number of issues. We will try to express their voices as
well as our own—and to be clear when those voices differ. We do
not agree with how all these social workers have squared their
work with best professional practices and the ethics of the
profession, and no doubt, they would disagree with one another.
You may disagree with us as well. We encourage you to read this
book critically. We hope that you will use our work to craft a
vision for what congregational social work can be in your faith
tradition and community.
We set out to define this field across religions, hoping to
interview social workers in not only Christian congregations but
also those in other traditions as well. One social worker in a
synagogue volunteered for the project. We have included what we
learned from her. The remainder of the sample consisted of
social workers in Christian congregations. As we steeped
ourselves in their stories, we realized that it was enough of a
challenge to describe congregational social work from a
Christian perspective, one where our own professional
experiences have occurred. We found it important to ground our
work in our understanding of the culture of Christian
congregations and our knowledge of Christian history and texts.
We trust others to determine far better than we can what we have
done and said that is adaptable in other religious contexts.
We are grateful for the lives of C. Anne Davis, Alan Keith-Lucas,
and David Sherwood. We were privileged to work with each of
them, and to learn from them. They were our colleagues as well
as courageous pioneers in defining social work from a Christian
worldview. Their work provided the foundations for our
understanding of the relationship of social work and Christian
faith, and for our understanding of social work practice in a
congregational setting. We continue to use their work to teach
our students about the ethical integration of Christian faith
and social work practice, and about the church as a context for
social work practice. Anne and Keith have preceded us into the
next life, and were no doubt welcomed as good and faithful
servants; we miss them. David Sherwood continues to be our
faithful friend, and we are grateful for the care and
encouragement he gave us in reading and editing the manuscript.
We are grateful for our dear friends and colleagues Ellen Netting,
Helen Harris, and Michael Kelly, who carefully read the
manuscript from their differing perspectives, giving us the gift
of their encouragement, insight, and critique.
Class after class of our students read drafts of early chapters as
course readings and gave us their thoughts. We are particularly
grateful to our graduate assistants: Laurel Cluthe, Adreanne
Dugger, Jessica Fancher, Bethany Molinar, and Emily Mosher. They
have helped with interviews, emails, telephone calls, setting up
spreadsheets and maintaining data bases, doing literature
reviews, helping create presentations, and indexing. Their
collective work has been invaluable to us.
Terry Wolfer took on the arduous task of editing the final
manuscript. Terry has been a dear friend for decades and a
frequent research partner in several of the research studies
described in the book. Several years ago, we enjoyed teaching a
course in congregational social at Baylor University, partnered
with Terry and a class he was teaching concurrently at
University of South Carolina. Teaching and conducting research
with Terry have been important contributions to this book, in
addition to how we have benefited from his editing. Virtually
every page is better because of his wise counsel and engagement
with our ideas. At the same time, we sometimes stubbornly
ignored his advice, so we bear responsibility for what we have
written.
We are grateful to the Louisville Institute that provided us with
financial support we needed for the research project that
challenged us to write this book.
We are most profoundly grateful to the 51 social workers who shared
their professional lives with us, and to the students who have
taught us as they learned social work practice in congregational
field placements.
Finally, our families have supported and encouraged us. I (Diana)
want to thank David Garland, who has been my husband for 44
years and a frequent co-author. David is a New Testament scholar
and dean of the George W. Truett Theological Seminary at Baylor.
I have benefited immeasurably from his deep biblical knowledge
and insight, and I am grateful for how our lives and callings
are woven together. We understand firsthand the meaning of the
multiple roles that characterize congregational social work that
Gaynor and I will describe later in this book—we are colleagues
in the workplace, co-authors, consultants together in
congregations, friends, co-parents and co-grandparents, and
spouses who love one another deeply. Moreover, David is
compassionate about the focus that writing a book requires and
patient with the more than- occasional crankiness writing evokes
in me.
I (Gaynor) want to thank all of the people in my life (some may
call them clients) who have been very patient and taught me,
through person to person, person to family, and person to
community interactions how to be a social work practitioner with
a dual identity as a minister in the context of congregational
social work. I am grateful to dear friends and colleagues, in
social work and out, who have walked the paths of learning and
experience with me. I am grateful for congregations and
denominational agencies that have given me freedom to do social
work in a congregational and agency context. Most of all, I am
grateful to God, for parents who modeled for me what Christian
service to, and with, others means.
Despite this wonderful host of friends and family, mentors,
colleagues, and editors, responsibilities for the limitations
and errors in our thought remain with us. We offer this book to
you as a beginning effort. So much more needs to be done. But
the time has come to share our thoughts and experiences with
you, in the eager hope that you will respond and build upon our
work and replace it with greater insight and best practices for
congregational social work.
Diana Garland
Gaynor Yancey
January 2014
