Reaching for Comfort: What I Saw, What I Learned, and How I Blew it Training as a Pastoral Counselor

A candid memoir about clinical pastoral education, hospital chaplaincy, grief, and the difficult art of offering spiritual care.

In 2004, Sherri Mandell won the National Jewish Book award for The Blessing of the Broken Heart, which told of her grief and initial mourning after her 13-year-old son Koby was brutally murdered.

Years later, with her pain still undiminished, Sherri trained to help others as a pastoral counselor, one of the first in Israel's hospitals.

Could a stranger offer comfort ...