Page 156 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 7

The Work and Thinking of David Benner

“Christian Counseling this, arguing that since existing secular theories

and Psychotherapy” from of therapy are built upon non-Christian pre-
suppositions, a truly Christian approach must
“Psychology and Religion” begin (and in some cases end) with the bibli-
cal view of persons. Concepts and techniques
(1987) are then drawn from secular systems if they are
found to be compatible with the new foundati-

In: David G. Benner (Ed.): Psychology and Re- on.
ligion. Grand Rapids. Michigan: Baker Book
House, 1988, 264 – 275. Thank you to the Ba- Current Approaches
ker Academic, a division of Baker Publishing One factor that makes it difficult to overview
Group for the permission, copyright date No- and classify current Christian approaches to
vember 12, 2014 therapy is the often unclear line of differen-
tiation between pastoral counseling and other
One of the more visible products of attempts forms of Christian therapy. Hiltner and Coltson
to integrate psychology and Christian theolo- (1961) demonstrated that the context of pasto-
gy has been the development of a number of ral counseling (usually a church) and the sym-
systems of counseling and psychotherapy qua- bols and expectations attached to the role of the
lifying themselves with the adjective Christian. clergy all serve to make it somewhat different
While many have viewed these developments from therapy offered outside an explicitly pa-
with enthusiasm, some have argued that it is storal context. However, as pastoral counselors
ridiculous to describe psychotherapy as Chri- have sometimes moved physically out of the
stian. To do so, they feel, suggests that there church to secular centers of pastoral psychothe-
is a unique procedure that a Christian should rapy, and as some psychotherapists have made
employ for every action. If it is appropriate to a more explicit and visible identification with
talk about Christian psychotherapy, then why Christianity and its values, the differences are
not Christian plumbing or Christian penman- often less apparent. Since pastoral counseling is
ship? However, the focus of psychotherapy is dealt with in a separate article, the primary fo-
obviously much closer to that of Christianity cus here will be nonpastoral therapy.
than is the case in activities such as plumbing In a recent summary of the major current ap-
or penmanship. Also, the value-laden nature of proaches to Christian therapy Collins (1980)
the therapy process necessarily makes it either identifies 17 systems, including 4 that are expli-
more or less Christian. citly pastoral, which he suggests to be distinc-
A more serious criticism is raised by Bobgan tively Christian. While these vary tremendously
and Bobgan (1979), who view psychotherapy in their sophistication, for the most part they
and Christianity as fundamentally incompatib- are quite simplistic and fall far short of being a
le. Contrasting the psychological way to health comprehensive system or model of therapy.
with the spiritual way, these authors assert that Ford and Urban (1963) suggest that a system of
psychotherapy is not a neutral set of scientific therapy needs to include a theory of personali-
techniques but rather a religious system, and a ty development, a theory of psychopathology, a
false one at that. The attempt to „Christianize“ statement of the goals of therapy, and the con-
psychotherapy is therefore seen as a further ero- ditions and techniques for producing behavior
sion of the spiritual ministry of the church. change. These ideals of a comprehensive system
While agreeing that psychotherapy cannot be are met imperfectly by most, if not all, models
seen as a value-free set of techniques, a good of psychotherapy. For example, Gestalt therapy
many Christian mental health professionals and reality therapy are usually seen to be defi-
and lay persons have seen that this is precisely cient in terms of their assumptions about both
why it is imperative that Christians subject their normal and abnormal personality develop-
theories and practice of therapy to rigorous bib- ment. Existential therapy has most commonly
lical evaluation. Others have gone further than been judged to be weak in terms of its therapeu-
tic techniques.
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