Articles of Interest to Pastoral Counselors

Pastoral Counseling is a unique and challenging career. Individuals must develop and maintain skills in two distinct areas – counseling and ministry. It is a major challenge to sustain professional competence in these two unique fields. As a Pastoral Counselors and Faith Based Therapists become more and more accepted and utilized by the mainstream public, the need for reputable, independent organizations that will evaluate and certify the skills, knowledge and abilities of this particular type of mental health service provider is growing.
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Choosing a Pastoral Counselor
In the largely unregulated marketplace of Pastoral Counseling you must have great discernment when choosing a pastoral counselor as your mental health service provider. This article is intended to provide you with a list of questions to use when choosing a pastoral counselor. This is only intended to be a guide and starting point for a frank and in-depth discussion with your potential pastoral counselor.
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Evaluating Certification Orginizations
As a Pastoral Counselors and Faith Based Therapists become more and more accepted and utilized by the mainstream public, the need for organizations that will evaluate and certify the skills, knowledge and abilities of this particular type of mental health service provider is growing. Unfortunately, there are many people and organizations that are more than willing to issue credentials to unsuspecting counselors. When the counselor’s peers, clients, or the public investigates the substance of the credentials, there is often nothing holding up the fancy certificate. This is causing significant harm to the individual counselors that obtain the credentials and also to the entire field of Pastoral Counseling.
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Just What Do You Mean Christian Psychology?
by Doug Trouten, The Plain Truth Online, March/April 2002
The Christian world isn't exactly at war with psychology, but the relationship is at best a tenuous truce. Some Christians believe that psychology is nothing more than man's effort to solve his own problems apart from God, and that Christian psychology is a contradiction in terms. But others see psychology, like modern medicine, as just another tool God can use to bring healing.