Where Do Broken Hearts Go?

An Integrative, Participational Theology of Grief

W. Ross Hastings

• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781498278478
  9781498278492
• eBook ISBN:
  9781498278485
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Ministry

Grounded in the narrative of the loss of his own wife, Ross Hastings seeks to provide insight into the universal human condition of loss and grief . . . and speaks comfort. All kinds of losses produce grief--loss of jobs, homes, friendships, health, losses through divorce, and loss through death of parents, children, and spouses--and we are often unprepared for it. Applicable to all who go through loss, this book will also offer skills for pastors, pastors-in-training, and friends seeking to offer comfort to grieving people. It will weave together first-order theological, as well as integrated psychological insights that relate to loss and grieving, interspersed with personal stories. The ultimately redemptive nature of grief is highlighted, with sensitivity to the grieving process. It offers comfort for the grieving found in fresh awareness of the orientation and action of the triune God who is for us, who invites us to participate in his life and love, and gathers up our grief, and in Christ, suffers with us. It beckons us towards spiritual attentiveness, permission for emotional honesty, normalization of the grief process, practices that enable coping and redemptive transformation in the present, and hope grounded in future resurrection reality.

Table of contents

• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: A Grief Shared . . . Introducing the Story
• Chapter 2: A Grief Shared . . . Universally by Humanity, and with Divinity
• Chapter 3: The Mystery in Grief and Loss
• Chapter 4: How We Know What We Do Know
• Chapter 5: The Source and Nature of Grief - Insights from Trinitarian Theology - Modeling
• Chapter 6: The Source and Nature of Grief - Insights from Trinitarian Theology - Participating
• Chapter 7: The Source and Nature of Grief - Insights from Psychology
• Chapter 8: Moving towards Adaptation - Grief Sharing With the Triune God in Deconstruction
• Chapter 9: Moving towards Adaptation - Grief Sharing With the Triune God in Recontsruction
• Chapter 10: Moving towards Adaptation - Theodicy of the Triune God Who Suffers
• Chapter 11: Moving towards Adaptation - Grief Sharing With the People of the Triune God (1)
• Chapter 12: Moving towards Adaptation - Grief Sharing With the People of the Triune God (2)
• Chapter 13: Moving towards Adaptation - Grief Sharing with God Through Personal Practices
• Bibliography