Pastoral Relationship with People with Intellectual ... - Theses

155assumptions and internal frame-of-reference of the pastoral practitioner can bemost appropriately brought to bear on the task of authentic analysis. Withappropriate reflective processes this analysis will lead to valid pastoralunderstanding and action.5.3 Key Constructivist CharacteristicsFor the purposes of this extended reflection the most relevantconstructivist characteristics are to be understood from an incarnationalperspective. This is because the constructed reality under consideration, that is,the institutions in question, is thoroughly concerned with incarnational matters,namely humanly-constituted relationships, personal and structural, and thestruggle for liberation.5.3.1 Contextualised UnderstandingAn essential component of a constructivist design is that lived context isthe fundamental source for information gathering, analysis and understanding.Outside of this, information becomes speculative, second-hand and, in relation tomore scientific forms of data gathering, generic in application. As Bednar et al.assert in describing the constructivist viewpoint, “[t]he environmental context iscritical ... Learning always takes place in a context and the context forms aninexorable link with the knowledge embedded within it.” 413In reference to this extended reflection, it is the institutions that form thecontext in which the lives of the people in question are described and understood.The narrative that these people proffer can only be understood within their livedenvironment because their story, both personal and collective, is fundamentallyshaped by their immediate lived context.In terms of this qualitatively-based extended reflection, knowledgeacquisition and learning are understood not primarily in terms of systematisedknowledge derived from outside the context and generically applied to varioussettings. Instead, they are principally understood as being acquired from theunique institutional context under consideration. 414413Bednar, Anne, Donald Cunningham, Thomas Duffy, and David Perry, Theory intoPractice, 26.414 ibid., 30.