Helping people share their vulnerability and their story
By Les Gura
Of all the stories Rev. Ginny Tobiassen has heard in the hospital, there is one opening sentence she remembers best: “The day I was diagnosed, it snowed all day.’’
To Tobiassen, associate pastor of Home Moravian Church in Winston-Salem, it sounded like the start of a novel. Which is not surprising since Tobiassen was a book editor before being called to become a pastor a decade ago. The common ground in her old and new life is empowering people to tell their stories.
Narrating their lives
“There’s so much importance to the voice,’’ Tobiassen says. “What you do as a chaplain in the hospital is visit people and encourage them to tell their own stories.
“Narrating their lives gives people a power and an understanding they might not have if they think they have no story or think they shouldn’t tell their own story. It becomes harder for them to cope. But when encouraged to see their lives as part of a divine story of the world, it gives them a power that they need.”
She says she usually starts pastoral counseling with a simple question: “What brought you here?” The range of answers, she says, is amazing; some people begin with a diagnosis or the illness, while others take a biographical approach or talk about life in general and not illness.
“The details people focus on, the way they narrate, tell you a lot about who they are and what they focus on,’’ she says. “In a hospital, to the doctor you’re the patient in room 12 with a chest tube. But that patient will tell you a different story of his life.
“If they tell their illness narrative, what happened with their body, it’s a way to open up and also tell you about who’s important in their life, the work they’ve done, the passions they have, their hopes and fears, the religious understanding they have.”
A pastoral caregiver
Tobiassen obtained her MDiv degree from the Wake Forest University School of Divinity in 2010, then completed a residency in clinical pastoral education at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center. She said working with patients as a new pastor helped her learn to connect.
Jay Foster, DMin, director of chaplaincy and clinical ministries for Wake Forest Baptist’s Division of FaithHealth, says Tobiassen combines a penetrating intelligence with great compassion. He says those traits are why she is frequently sought out as a pastoral caregiver.
Today, Tobiassen is one of two pastors in a 1,200-member congregation. In that role, she is sometimes able to walk with patients and families through health challenges that last for years. Other times, she may meet a member only in time of health crisis, and once the crisis is resolved, the member may once again lose touch with the church.
But Tobiassen and fellow pastor Rick Sides work with the men’s and women’s fellowships at Home Moravian, as well as the Congregational Care Ministry Team, to stay connected with shut-ins and other members who are struggling.
Acknowledge sadness to find fuller life
Sometimes, Tobiassen notes, people who are ill don’t want to ask for assistance.
“I preach a lot on vulnerability; it’s one of my favorite topics,” she says. “If you don’t admit you’re vulnerable, if you’re embarrassed to be seen as ill, you can’t really connect at a heart level with other members of the congregation. That’s a learning I’ve carried with me from my clinical pastoral education at Wake Forest Baptist.”
Tobiassen mentions a recent movie, Inside Out, in which the characters were the different emotions in a person’s head.
“The lesson of the movie is the need to acknowledge that sadness colors our lives and our memories. If you try to ignore sadness and hardship, you won’t fully embrace your life,’’ she says.
“You don’t force a person to confront what they’re not ready to confront. But a pastor does try to encourage a person to say the things that scare them; to acknowledge their sadness so that we can talk about how they can use the sadness and the fear to find a fuller life, find a more hopeful life.”
