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INTRODUCTION
The aim of this introductory chapter is to present the research problem. This chapter also provides some background to the study, as well as its outline aims, objectives and its relevance. Furthermore it offers an overview of all the chapters of the thesis. Finally some key terms and concepts used in this research are explained.
This research focuses on pastoral care in the context of poverty, within a practical theological framework. In addition the research aims to be a search for a pastoral care model that is relevant and contextual, specifically in the context of poverty. The research methodology used is qualitative in orientation, with in-depth interviews with participants who live in poverty.
Participants in this research are from members of the Lutheran church In Kagiso, Extension 12, which is an exclusively black residential area, which started as an informal settlement, but which is gradually in the process of being formalized and developed. This is done as liberation theologians say:
“from the belly of the whale” (Herzog 1970: cf. Rieger 1999). This research makes efforts to study and understand poverty from both the perspective of literature, as well as from the experience of the poor themselves by interviewing some of them. This is theology from the “underside of history” (Gibellini 1987:1; cf. Martey 1993:7, Herzog 1999:2). It will be a theology born out of the struggle, as Martey says: For those coming from the underside of history, theology has always been a struggle against all enslaving and dehumanizing forces (Martey 1993:7).
As liberation theologians insist, this is a study of the reality from below, in addition to what the literature under review says. The literature that is critically reviewed includes pastoral care in particular, practical theology in general and liberation theology on the one hand and literature on poverty that deals with socio-economic and political realities of South Africa on the other hand.
BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
While I no longer regard myself as part of the poorest of the poor, I was born and grew up in poverty. In this section which is a description of part of my personal childhood journey through the wilderness of poverty I use the personal pronoun “I” instead of the normally academically acceptable and distant word, “the researcher” or “the author” which in this context will sound cumbersome. Only in subsequent sections will I use the normally accepted word “researcher”, instead of “I”. I was born in a single room mud-house in the oldest township of Bloemfontein, called Batho location, Bantu lokasie according to our then white masters. The single-room house, which was divided by curtains, was occupied not only by my two parents, my two brothers and myself, but also by other members of the extended family, from both the maternal and paternal side of the extended family.
As a result of the large family and the slave wages earned by my father and mother, there was often little if not nothing to eat. When I hear phrases like the often quoted phrase in the circles of the poor: “the poor not knowing when or from whom they would have their next meal” to us this was not an academic notion but a constant reality that we experienced.
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION TO THE RESEARCH PROBLEM
1.1. Introduction
1.2. Background to the study
1.3. The Research problem
1.4. Theological Methodology
1.4.1. Liberation Theology
1.4.2. Pastoral Care Methodology – Gerkins narrative hermeneutical model
1.5. Aims, Objectives and the relevance of the study
1.6. Research Method
1.7. Definition of key terms and concepts
1.7.1. Gerkins narrative hermeneutical model
1.7.2. Grounded theory
1.7.3. Pastoral care
1.7.4. Poverty
1.7.5. Theoretical sampling
1.8. Conclusion
CHAPTER TWO REVIEW OF LITERATURE
2.1. Introduction
2.2. Pastoral Care with a Practical theological framework
2.2.1. The importance of locating Pastoral Care within a practical theological framework
2.2.2. Brief history of the development of Practical Theology
2.2.3. Definition of Practical Theology
2.2.4. Methodology in Practical Theology
2.2.5. Practical Theology as Empirical Theology
2.2.6. Practical Theology as theory of communicative action
2.2.7. Theory – Praxis relation
2.2.8. The task of Practical Theology
2.2.9. Sub-disciplines of Practical Theology
2.2.10. Pastoral Care as one of the five sub-disciplines
2.2.10.1. Pastoral Care and other pastoral activities
2.2.10.2. The importance of the definition of Pastoral care
2.2.10.3. Definition of Pastoral Care
2.2.10.4. A critique of Pastoral Care
2.3. Liberation Theology – Theological Methodology
2.3.1. What is Liberation theology
2.3.2. Liberation Theology and poverty
2.3.3. Preferential option for the poor
2.3.4. Methodology of Liberation Theology
2.4. Context
2.4.1. The importance of context
2.4.2. The main features of the South African context
2.4.2.1. A divided South Africa
2.4.2.2. Poverty and inequality
2.4.2.3. Illiteracy
2.5. Conclusion
CHAPTER THREE RESEARCH METHOD AND DESIGN
3.1. Introduction
3.2. Research design
3.3. Qualitative Research
3.4. Grounded theory
3.5. Data Collection technique – In-depth Interviews
3.6. Benefits of in-depth interviews
3.6.1. Flexibility
3.6.2. Participants’ perspective
3.6.3. Higher response rate of an interview
3.7. Population
3.8. Theoretical sampling
3.9. Data analysis
3.10. Ethical considerations
3.10.1. Welfare of participants (informants
3.10.2. Voluntary participation
3.10.3. Confidentiality
3.11. Conclusion
CHAPTER FOUR REPORT ON EMPIRICAL RESEARCH
4.1. Introduction
4.2. Selection of participants
4.3. Invitation to participants
4.4. Brief profile of participants
4.4.1. Reality of poverty as experienced by participants
4.4.2. The main features of poverty
4.4.2.1. Food and Clothes
4.4.2.2. School fees and transport to school
4.4.2.3. Housing
4.4.3. Understanding of Poverty
4.4.4. Causes of Poverty
4.4.4.1. Apartheid and its legacy
4.4.4.2. Education
4.4.4.3. Failure of Government
4.4.4.4. Low salaries
4.4.4.5. Personal Responsibilities
4.5. The role of the church in addressing Poverty
4.6. Understanding Pastoral Care
4.7. Conclusion
CHAPTER FIVE DATA ANALYSIS- CONSISTENCIES AND CONTRASTS WITH LITERATURE
CHATER SIX TOWARDS A MODEL OF PASTORAL CARE
CHAPTER SEVEN CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
