Items of interest

with contributions from Kim Roberts, Paul A. Roberts, Edward Lee Pitts

"Many secular therapists ... tackle ... stress and relationship problems, and send [patients] to a minister to deal with ... spiritual concerns. But to [Dr. Mary] Coady-Leeper, spirituality is an important part of therapy. 'Everybody has been influenced by religion to some extent,' said Coady-Leeper, a psychotherapist at Kairos Psychological in West Omaha. 'To ignore spirituality in therapy is to ignore an important part of a person's mind-set.' Many mental health care workers are beginning to see the value in allowing and even encouraging clients to talk about God.

"'Four years ago, there wasn't much out there in the way of training counselors about how to incorporate spirituality in therapy,' said Marlene Kuskie, a counseling and school psychology professor at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. 'Now there are a lot of seminars out there. Everyone is talking about it.'

"The trend is due in part to America's growing spiritual awareness, Kuskie says. It is a hot topic everywhere from Oprah to news magazines and medical journals. Even college psychology departments, which have shied away from spiritually based counseling methods for fear of ridicule from colleagues, are getting on board. Duke University, the University of Illinois at Springfield, the University of California-Irvine, and Widener University in Pennsylvania are among the universities that have offered courses or seminars that discuss the relationship between psychology and faith."

Send a comment to the editors

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit

Items of interest

We'd love to hear from you!

Sign up for unlimited access