Post-Secular Negotiations in Pastoral Care: Models in a Danish Podcast Series

Abstract

AbstractThis article explores the theoretical and practical importance of post-secular negotiations in intercultural pastoral care. Post-secular negotiations are negotiations between secular and religious discourses within specific activities such as pastoral care. While intercultural pastoral care has established a focus on the encounter between religious others in pastoral care, this article focuses on the encounter between Christian and secular discourses. Analyzing 10 Danish pastoral care conversations, the authors find that such post-secular negotiations occur in a variety of ways (explicit and implicit, initiated by pastor and care seeker), in a variety of settings (not only secular settings such as hospitals but also in ecclesial settings) and with various results (reception, rejection, misunderstanding, and circumvention). Drawing upon psychotherapeutic literature, the authors argue that explicit and respectful post-secular negotiations initiated by the pastor at the beginning of the conversation, either formalized or contextualized, might create better conditions for pastoral care conversations in the post-secular world.