Professional Chaplaincy and Clinical Pastoral Education Should Become More Scientific

Does the scientific process belong in pastoral counseling? Professional Chaplaincy and Clinical Pastoral Education Should Become More Scientific: Yes and No examines the widespread ambivalence among pastoral caregivers and educators over the growing inclusion of science in pastoral care and counseling methodologies. Twenty-three seasoned professionals in the field give candid and sometimes emotional accounts of their interest inand reservations aboutthe role scientific research plays in their profession. Some authors look at the issue from a historical perspective; others voice additional concerns. A few make concrete proposals on how chaplaincy can become more scientific. The result is a unique insight into the relationship between the secular and the religious. The question of whether science belongs in pastoral care and counseling is moot; pastoral care already makes extensive use of psychological testing and psychotherapeutic skillsall products of scientific thinking. But as technology becomes more dominant and health care delivery reflects a more corporate perspective, pastoral caregivers and educators are divided on whether the changes represent the significant opportunity to improve a ministry or the surrender of the ministry's very essence. The essays collected in Professional Chaplaincy and Clinical Pastoral Education Should Become More Scientific: Yes and No go a step farther, breaking down the issue of faith versus science into more specific questions for pastoral caregivers, such as: - Can what you do be measured? - Do you have an obligation to embrace the challenge of change? - Is becoming more scientific a necessity for staying in touch with your health care peers? - How cost effective is the pastoral care you provide if it doesn't include the scientific process? - Could a reluctance to incorporate science into your counseling cost you your job? Professional Chaplaincy and Clinical Pastoral Education Should Become More Scientific: Yes and No presents thoughtful and thought-provoking debate that is a must-read for all pastoral caregivers and educators.

Larry Van de Creek

- Preface: What Has Jerusalem to Do with Athens? What Has Pastoral Care to Do with Science? - Chaplain No: Should Clinical Pastoral Education and Professional Chaplaincy Become More Scientific in Response to Health Care Reform? - Chaplain Yes: Should Clinical Pastoral Education and Professional Chaplaincy Become More Scientific in Response to Health Care Reform? - Should Clinical Pastoral Education and Professional Chaplaincy Become More Scientific? It's a Matter of Salt - Spirituality and Data: The Need for a New Paradigm - To Be, or Not To Be More Scientific? That Is the Question: Yes, Absolutely, But - Chaplains and Science - Chaplaincy Is Becoming More Scientific. What's the Problem? - Clinical Pastoral Education and the Value of Empirical Research: Examples from Australian and New Zealand Datum - Health Care Chaplaincy as a Research-Informed Profession: How We Get There - Science and Ministry: Confusion and Reality - Siblings or Foes: What Now in Spiritual Care Research? - Research or Perish? - Ministry for the Good of the Whole - Chaplain Yes and Chaplain No: Both Are Correct; Neither Is True - Language and Tools for Professional Accountability - Four Fatal Flaws in Recent Spirituality Research - In the World but Not of the World: Going Beyond a Dilemma - At the Poles Eventually All You Get Is Cold - But What Are We Trying to Prove? - She Said, Some Patient Needs Get Dropped Due to More Pressing Issues - Respecting the Dual Sided Identity of Clinical Pastoral Education and Professional Chaplaincy: The Phenomenological Research Model - The Search for Truth: The Case for Evidence Based Chaplaincy - Health Care Reform: Opportunities for Professional Chaplains to Build Intentional Communities of Learners by Integrating Faith, Science, Quality, and Systems Thinking - The Chaplain as the Complete Philosopher - Rediscovering Mystery and Wonder: Toward a Narrative-Based Perspective on Chaplaincy - Attention to the Scientific Benefits of Pastoral Care Is a Blessing and a Curse - Index - Reference Notes Included