Toward an Understanding of Ministry of Presence

Abstract

Notes the importance CPE students often place on the notion of a ministry of presence and the confused understandings they express of it in their reflections on their CPE experience. Offers a description of presence gleaned from the writings of Gabriel Marcel and Martin Buber, and explicates Martin Luther's idea of the externality of the Word. Concludes by suggesting that ministry of presence might best be understood if it is viewed in a dialectical relationship with the externality of the Word.