Adapting Secular Post‐Graduate Education in Counseling to Meet the Needs of Ministers

Abstract

As the demand for counseling within a religious setting increases, clergymen are expressing a need for more counselor education. If pastoral counseling is considered distinctly different from other counseling, then pastoral counseling education is the province of the seminaries. If the pastoral counselor is not considered basically different from other counselors, a secular counselor education program can serve the needs of ministers as well as other counselors by having a central core of required professional courses and then optional branches for specialization in counseling. Finding appropriate instructors for the pastoral counseling courses could be a problem. Candidates for pastoral counseling should be as carefully screened and tested as other graduate students in counseling. The counseling program should offer ministers the opportunity to learn about group work and, ideally, the opportunity for supervised practicum work in several different settings. There should be some provision for individual and group therapy for the pastoral counselors themselves as a means of enhancing their own effectiveness. When a secular institution feels that it cannot adapt its regular program to fit the needs of pastoral counselors, it can be of service by arranging special workshops and conferences for the clergymen of the area, and counselor educators can be available as consultants to seminaries and churches that request assistance.