Gregory the Great was the leader of the Western Church in the sixth century. In the preface to the Third Book of his work titled Pastoral Care, Gregory suggests that church leaders along with their congregants must be in agreement if they want the church to be edified through the Scriptures.
Such accordance would allow these leaders to preach the same doctrine of the gospel but using different ways to exhort. Gregory writes, “every teacher, in order to edify all in the one virtue of charity, must touch the hearts of his hearers by using one and the same doctrine, but not by giving to all one and the same exhortation” (p. 90). By “the same doctrine” Gregory refers to the gospel message, while the term “exhortation” includes not only preaching but also counseling.
The diversity of exhortative means, for Gregory, must be reflected in the way church leaders counsel and exhort the flock. Gregory recognizes forty different kinds of persons and how they should be exhorted (pp. 8, 90-91). Among some, Gregory invites church leaders to distinguish between men and women, old and young people, slaves and masters, the meek and the choleric, those who confess their sins and those who do not, and the like. This suggestion is noteworthy because it acknowledges the plurality of people that form a congregation. In addition, it calls church leaders to know their audience in both senses: corporally and individually.
Knowing a church corporally means that a pastor should know, in general terms, how their congregation is formed and what are the most important corporal needs of the parish, for example. Knowing individually an audience means a leader should be aware of the spiritual needs of most members of their congregation. In other words, leaders ought to know which of their members are suffering, experiencing loss, sadness, who need prayer. Consider what would happen if the pastor of a congregation ignores completely the spiritual wellness of their members. Think about the issues those members would face in the long term. Would the pastor’s preaching be effective to this congregation? As Gregory suggests, pastoral care must be exercised individually and corporately. In the end, the good or bad administration of pastoral care in a church setting depends on how the pastor approaches Christian leadership. This twofold way where pastoral care is exercised can help church leaders to understand better the nuances of each dimension and how each can be a powerful means to edify the people of God —the main goal of Christian leadership.
Although the idea of knowing individually the pastor’s audience is difficult to put into practice in a large congregation, the lack of attention to this area may be detrimental to the spiritual wellness of such a congregation. Gregory uses the metaphor of the harmony in a melody to make this point: “[T] strings give forth a harmonious melody because they are not plucked with the same kind of stroke, though plucked with the one plectrum.” (p. 90) Pastors use the Scriptures to proclaim the message of the gospel and exhort people, but in the parish, the needs of each person vary. A person might need to hear something in particular, while another one might not. This diversity of needs challenges church leaders to strike a balance between how they lead the church and how they take care of the needs of the congregation.
Furthermore, Gregory’s use of Scripture for moral teaching is worth mentioning as one observes that he does not use the Bible as it were a self-help book. Instead, Gregory engages his pastoral concerns with the Scriptures in order to find insightful counsel from a biblical perspective.
In Admonition 3, for example, Gregory claims the poor and the rich must be admonished differently. While to the poor the teacher “should offer (…) the solace of encouragement against tribulation,” the rich should be “inspired with the fear of being proud.” (p. 93) Gregory bases his reasoning on what it says in Isa 54:4; y 48:10 and Paul’s charge to the rich in 1 Tim 6:17. The passages in Isaiah deal in some way with the consolation of the poor (e.g., widows) and how God is their consolation. The Pauline text, in contrast, is a thought-provoking charge Paul makes to the rich to embrace humility. By connecting these passages to his pastoral concern, Gregory makes an interesting conclusion: the poor should be consoled while the rich should be charged. The integrative character of Gregory’s method remained useful for many years in the church. There is, of course, the risk of abusing of this method. However, one aspect that can be noted in Gregory’s examples is the idea that Scripture provides pastors the ‘raw matter’ they need for their work to be done. Scripture is always a means God will use to bring healing to people both physically and spiritually. One aspect important to highlight here is the usefulness of emphasizing the moral sense of Scripture for the believer’s life. In many Christian circles, the use of the Bible for pastoral care is seen, at least, as an inadequate application of the Scriptures. It seems that this is part of the reactionary position to the rampant rationalism of modern Western culture.
Considering Gregory’s approach to pastoral care and leadership, the use of Scripture for pastoral care would not be supplemental or secondary, but the primary source with which church leadership works.
There are some challenges important to note.
First, Gregory’s approach might raise questions about the application of his model in a medium-size or large congregation. How can a large congregation offer adequate pastoral care to all members? One thing to keep in mind is the definition of pastoral care in modern terms versus Gregory’s understanding of the term. For Gregory, pastoral care seems not to be reduced merely to an individualized practice, but it also has a communal dimension. Pastoral care can be exercised broadly through preaching and exhortation. This makes pastoral care in a large congregation could be done through preaching that invites congregants to increase their self-awareness of their human condition and need for Christ.
Second, the context of Gregory’s Pastoral Care happened where the church had embraced the idea that a pastor/teacher resembled the image of a public administrator. Ambrose’s On the Office promoted this idea. Probably against this notion, Gregory promoted the idea that a pastor/teacher must be more than a mere administrator, but a physician of the soul (following Gregory Nazianzen). It is for this reason that in Pastoral Care, especially the Part III, Gregory the Great invites church leaders to increase their self-awareness. Pastor and teachers must practice what they preach. In the case-by-case examples offered, Gregory discusses how leaders should live and how they can counsel congregants. The spiritual issues described in the book not only happen to congregants but clergy as well.
Considering this historical context, I read Gregory’s Pastoral Care as an invitation to understand the office of the pastor/teacher as a balance between church administrator/pastoral caregiver. Gregory’s treatise about pastoral care/leadership brought renewal to the early medieval church. The clergy were encouraged to focus on the spiritual needs of the parish and to avoid overlooking such an important task. One may say that for Gregory pastoral leadership and pastoral care were not different ‘coins’ but two faces of the same ‘coin’, where the pastoral leader is called to shepherd the flock using the Scriptures as the means to support their ministry. Gregory’s Pastoral Care has a lot to offer to the modern church regarding taking the Scriptures seriously for living a life according to the gospel and the will of God. The Scriptures speak the same message to different people in different ways, and this makes “the same exhortation is not suited to all” (p. 89). Although an ancient pastoral care manual, Gregory’s words remain useful today for their holistic approach to ministry and balanced perspective.
*All references taken from Henry Davis, Gregory the Great: Pastoral Care.