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I've long identified with Mary's fire. Now I want to learn from Elizabeth.

I recently did a stint as an interim pastor. Here are a dozen things I learned—or relearned—about pastoral ministry:

1. It is through pastoral care that pastors earn credibility, acceptance, and therefore authority—or not. 
2. Listening is perhaps a pastor's most important tool. People are not likely to remember anything you said to them when they were in crisis; they will remember that you spent time listening to them.

The Poway, California, synagogue shooting made plain something a lot of us didn’t want to admit: the Pittsburgh massacre was no one-off. Amidst resurgent white nationalism, Jews in America feel unsafe, and justifiably so.