Reflections on Spirituality in Pastoral Psychotherapy

Sims

• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Year: 2013
• eBook ISBN: 9781498271080
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Reflections of Spirituality in Pastoral Psychotherapy supports the pastoral and counseling practitioner's assurance that spirituality is imbedded within the human experience and may be presumed to be a positive resource for remediation and reconciliation. The work is at once autobiographical and theological. In many ways the author's approach echoes the pilgrim's path of the faithful disciple. A clear distinction is provided by which one may identify the spiritually sensitive counselor. Leon Sims sketches a treatment program, but emphasizes how one may explore theoretical materials germane to a faith community to reframe approaches to clients' problems and personal pain. Although the approach is based on Christian principles, there will suggestive resources for divergent orientations. The model for theoretical reflection is a major strength of the book.

1

Perspectives

Pastoral counseling has been practiced by parish pastors for centuries, since long before the psychological disciplines became prominent. Within the last several decades, however, the church has recognized a group of specialists who have specific training in both theology and the behavioral sciences. The field, previously dominated by clergy, is presently shifting to non-ordained practitioners who work in secular settings as well as church agencies.1 And although there are practitioners who label themselves “Christian,” there is a notable urgency to clarify requisite clinical skills within their ranks. The term “Christian” immediately connotes a viable theological perspective and, concurrently, does not assure clinical competence. Likewise, members of other helping professions are only recently incorporating spiritual disciplines. The very best presentation of this guild of specialists—pastoral psychotherapists—enriches and amplifies their clinical practice with spiritual sensitivity and theological articulation.

A review of various perspectives on natural and revealed theologies undergirds both of these practices.

What exactly is pastoral psychotherapy? I pose this question immediately in this project since several dimensions of experience are implied. Whereas “counseling” per se might refer to short-term behavioral change, “psychotherapy” implies alteration in personality reorganization. Pastoral psychotherapy may be viewed as a careful effort to attune the client’s inclinations toward health and wholeness, utilizing contextually parallel modalities of story, myth, and metaphor drawn from faith traditions. Carroll Wise2 has previously developed and refined this process. Ideally, pastoral psychotherapy integrates the best of sacred presence with counseling expertise. At the core of this project is the tandem of revelation (i.e., how God discloses) and epistemology (i.e., how God is appropriated and appreciated as a known reality). It honors two movements: recognition of the prevenient grace offered to all and facilitation of the latent health moving toward a horizon of renewal. Our common experience portends that tension exists—or, at best, a dialogue exists—between natural and revealed theologies. This essay develops these themes.

Although it is commonplace that the work of psychotherapy is done within a Christian context, it is apparent that counselors will interact with people of other religious orientations and, of course, many “nones” who claim no religious affiliation at all. It follows, then, that on the one hand, the counselor actively awaits some “aha” moment that signifies a sacred apprehension by the client. This event signifies the tenets of natural theology. On the other hand, a counselor may feel compelled to represent and speak for a belief system derived from revealed theology. That witness may be foreign to the client and may or may not enhance the healing process. I plan to explore alternatives with the prospect of developing a reliable theological posture that avoids the errors of either path solely taken.

Pastoral counseling and pastoral psychotherapy require a firm grounding that authenticates the term “pastoral.” How these issues of revelation and epistemology are raised and settled impact directly therapy as an enterprise. The term “pastoral” immediately introduces the theological presuppositions a clinician may bring to the counseling process. How shall the sacred be identified, or discussed? A counselor may limit one’s philosophical approaches to the communication of the Gospel story or scriptural passages. Alternately, someone may lean toward a natural theology wherein God demonstrates activities generally as the world is and may be understood as such. The professional may adopt the concepts of Barr3:

Traditionally, “natural theology” has commonly meant something like this: that “by nature,” that is, just by being human beings, men and women have a certain degree of knowledge of God and awareness of him [sic], or at least a capacity for such awareness; and this knowledge or awareness exists anterior to the special revelation of God made through Jesus Christ, through the Church, through the Bible.

Barr, here, sets the stage for both revealed and natural theologies since they both emerge from the Bible. One may recall St. Paul’s sermon in Acts 17. He must have sensed, as he was involved in life, that God has always provided a witness. In the Areopagus address, Paul supposes that people have a religious “instinct” and builds and proclaims on it. This assumption is echoed, of course, in his discussion of Romans 1:20f. Both of these references signal a dialogue—perhaps even a tension—between what is perceived to be God’s general revelation in nature and the special revelation of God in the unique person of Jesus the Christ.

As Paul suggests, God has not left his creation without a witness. The vast range of human encounters with the mysterium tremendum4 is chronicled broadly in the major religions of the world. Anthropological groundings suggest that human creatures have responded to divine revelation in a “piecemeal, discontinuous, and ambiguous” way since the dawn of consciousness.5 Tillich6 discusses the prophet’s “ecstasy” as awareness of mystery, the ground of being and meaning. Sebastian Moore7 proposes that human awareness of a relationship with the Divine, preceding the advent of religion per se, is based on the deep consciousness of dependence on mystery as the very source or ground of being. More specifically, and coming to the fore, are these perspectives that strongly buttress a natural theology.

Stanley Hauerwas’s8 Gifford Lectures stimulate this lively debate. He takes on William James and Reinhold Niebuhr, and follows in the lineage of his hero, Karl Barth. Hauerwas’s expositions helpfully mark out the divergent paths of revelation as perceived, discerned, and appreciated by students of theology. It is helpful at this point to identify how these paths diverge with the commentary representing each camp. Regarding revealed theology, Hauerwas introduces us to the position championed by Karl Barth. Other authors who echo Barth to some degree include George Lindbeck, John Milbank, Lesslie Newbigin, and Georg Reiger. Their comments follow.

Hauerwas9 states that Barth regarded natural theology as “every formulation of a system which claims to be theological, i.e., to interpret divine revelation, whose subject differs fundamentally from the revelation in Jesus Christ and whose method therefore differs equally from the exposition of the Holy Scripture.” The particular stance that Barth has taken in the Dogmatics is that theology cannot begin with hum...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Perspectives
• Chapter 2: Tools
• Chapter 3: Spirituality
• Chapter 4: Identity
• Chapter 5: Fragments
• Chapter 6: Awesome
• Chapter 7: Serving
• Chapter 8: Community
• Chapter 9: Growth
• Chapter 10: Longing
• Chapter 11: Hope
• Chapter 12: Postscript
• Bibliography