Gula SS, Richard M, Ethics in Pastoral Ministry, Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1996, 166 pp, $14.95.
Richard Gula has written an excellent book on topics of enduring importance. His writing maintains spiritual depth while giving professional guidance. This achievement sets the book well above moral guidance manuals. Pastoral ministers, both Protestant and Catholic, will find here a sensitive, nuanced but clear review of the ethical issues they might face in their ministry.
After an eight-page introduction there follow seven chapters. Simply stating their titles will indicate rather well the range of coverage: Theological Foundations; The Minister's Character and Virtue; Professional Duties; Power in the Pastoral Relationship; Sexuality; Confidentiality; A Proposed Code of Ethics.
In recent years there has been a great increase in the teaching of professional ethics for people working in the secular world. But very little attention has been given to ethical problems related to religious ministry. Father Gula indicates that "the particular interest of this book is the moral demands that arise from the professional exercise of any pastoral ministry. The intended audience for this book is pastoral ministers who serve the church in a professional ministerial capacity, especially priests, deacons, pastoral administrators, pastoral care ministers, spiritual directors, youth ministers, campus ministers, directors of religious education, and catechists" (p 5). Thus, it is not restricted to clergy.
Some pastoral ministers claim that since they have a "religious vocation" they are above professional rules and expectations. Perhaps they think that being professional means "applying technical competence...in an insensitive, cold, detached, and uninterested manner...But being ‘professional,' in its classic sense, does not mean any of these things. The positive meaning of being professional connotes a specialized competence, a commitment to excellence, integrity, selfless dedication to serve the community, and to holding the public trust. These are features everyone wants to consider characteristics of pastoral ministry as well" (p 13).
The medium and the message are tied together in ministry: the character of the minister is as important as the skills in performing the work. Character refers to motives, intentions, attitudes and dispositions. The author presents a thoughtful account of the various dimensions of character, relating abstract moral rules to personal virtues to professional behavior.
Father Gula organizes his chapter on professional duties according to four features: "(1) specialized knowledge and skills; (2) service of fundamental human needs; (3) commitment to the other's best interest; and (4) structures for accountability" (p 51). He believes that the first three are usually present but "the one area of great difference between pastoral ministry and other professions lies in having structures of accountability" (p 63). He emphasizes that much work is needed in this area. The author devotes an excellent chapter to the sources and use of power. He discusses with great insight the boundary issues of sexuality and confidentiality.
The ten-page code of professional ministerial responsibility offered by the author at the end of the book expresses professional obligations in an organized series of concise statements. It is thorough and practical. A blurb on the back cover of this paperback volume claims that: "Richard Gula offers a refreshing positive perspective. With candor and insight, he examines the sensitive pastoral issues of power, sexuality and confidentiality. Pastoral ministers, ordained and lay, will find here both vocational support and professional guidance for their work. The book is sure to find appreciative welcome as a text in both university-based and diocesan-sponsored ministry training programs. Field education faculty and formation directors in particular will find this an essential resource."
It's very true. Often, praise on book jackets is vastly overstated. But this reviewer agrees completely with the above excerpt and believes it expresses well the quality and the usefulness of this very timely and readable book.
ST