152mm 17mm 152mm brian thorne counselling and spiritual...

152mm 152mm17mm229m

m

Brian Thorne

Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment

Bridging Faith andPerson-Centred Therapy

ThorneC

ounselling and Spiritual Accom

paniment

“Brian Thorne’s uniqueness has been marked by his holding together what some have seen as polar opposites. He is the doyen of person-centred therapy in Britain and was a close colleague of Carl Rogers. Alongside this, Brian has lived the Christian faith which has shaped and marked his life. This twinning of what are often seen as conflicting paths has been Brian’s courageous project throughout his professional life. This book brings these two into convergence in a manner hitherto unavailable. It is a key contribution to both areas. It will offer benefits to practitioners in both worlds and will help to bring these two worlds into a more creative convergence.”

The Rt Revd Stephen Platten, Bishop of Wakefield

“This book brings together the person-centred counselling and theological worlds of Brian Thorne across more than thirty years of his writing. The unifying concept that describes both his faith and his therapy is his valuing of humanity. The task, whether we see it as religious or political, is to create conditions that nurture rather than seek to control the human being. Throughout the years depicted in this book, I have witnessed Brian’s struggle in relation to those forces that would dehumanize. I have seen Brian often tired, sometimes frustrated and not infrequently distressed in these encounters with the forces of dehumanization. But it is ‘tired’ that I remember most, because in those moments he knew that there would be no rest for him. From early in his life he had realized that giving up could never be an option. Whether the reader is a person of faith or an atheist like myself, I commend this book as a medium that can help us all to reflect upon our existence.”

Dave Mearns Professor Emeritus, University of Strathclyde

“Brian Thorne has always stood as a beacon for both the person-centred approach to counselling and life and also the mystical experience of spirituality. His new book, which includes both key writings and some striking new material, is a classic summation of his work. As ever it is written in a clear and courageous manner that challenges the reader to respond in kind. If you have an interest in the person-centred approach, the challenges of living a spiritual life in the modern world or both, then this book will be of great interest and great use to you.”

Dr. William West, University of Manchester

Counsellors and therapists are increasingly recognizing the central importance of spirituality in the lives of many clients. As a result, issues of spirituality - long the exclusive domain of the clergy – are rapidly gaining legitimacy and acceptance in the field of psychotherapy. Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment presents a collection of the most significant spiritually-focused writings of Brian Thorne, one of the most influential thinkers on the convergence of spirituality with counselling. Noted for his work on the spiritual dimension and applications of Carl Rogers’ groundbreaking person-centred therapeutic approach, Thorne reflects on his three decades of successful contributions to this burgeoning field, while also bringing readers up-to-date with his recent work on companionship and spiritual accompaniment.

Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment represents a provocative challenge to current trends in counselling and psychotherapy in its calling for a greater consideration of the role of spirituality in the pursuit of emotional health, happiness and well-being.

Brian Thorne is Co-founder and Professional Fellow at The Norwich Centre for Personal, Professional and Spiritual Development, Emeritus Professor of Counselling at the University of East Anglia, and a Lay Canon of Norwich Cathedral. Thorne is an internationally recognised figure in the field of person-centred therapy, and was a close colleague of Carl Rogers.

pg3628File Attachment9781119950813.jpg

ffirs.indd viffirs.indd vi 7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM


ffirs.indd iffirs.indd i 7/17/2012 12:11:20 AM7/17/2012 12:11:20 AM

Praise for Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment “ Brian Thorne ’ s uniqueness has been marked by his holding together what some have seen as polar opposites. He is the doyen of person‐centred therapy in Britain and was a close colleague of Carl Rogers. Alongside this, Brian has lived the Christian faith which has shaped and marked his life. This twinning of what are often seen as conflicting paths has been Brian ’ s courageous project throughout his professional life. This book brings these two into convergence in a manner hitherto unavailable. It is a key contribution to both areas. It will offer benefits to practitioners in both worlds and will help to bring these two worlds into a more creative convergence .”

The Rt Revd Stephen Platten Bishop of Wakefield

“ This book brings together the person‐centred counselling and theological worlds of Brian Thorne across more than thirty years of his writing. The unifying concept that describes both his faith and his therapy is his valuing of humanity. The task, whether we see it as religious or political, is to create conditions that nurture rather than seek to control the human being. Throughout the years depicted in this book, I have witnessed Brian ’ s struggle in relation to those forces that would dehumanize. I have seen Brian often tired, sometimes frustrated and not infrequently distressed in these encounters with the forces of dehumanization. But it is ‘tired’ that I remember most, because in those moments he knew that there would be no rest for him. From early in his life he had realized that giving up could never be an option. Whether the reader is a person of faith or an atheist like myself, I commend this book as a medium that can help us all to reflect upon our existence .”

Dave Mearns Professor Emeritus, University of Strathclyde

“ Brian Thorne has always stood as a beacon for both the person-centred approach to counselling and life and also the mystical experience of spirituality. His new book, which includes both key writings and some striking new material, is a classic summation of his work. As ever it is written in a clear and courageous manner that challenges the reader to respond in kind. If you have an interest in the person-centred approach, the chal-lenges of living a spiritual life in the modern world or both, then this book will be of great interest and great use to you .”

Dr. William West University of Manchester

“ For me Brian Thorne is the most inspiring person‐centred therapist in the tradition of Carl Rogers. With his brilliant empathic capacity, full of depth and humour, he lives an outstanding model for everyone who wants to see that powerful and tender therapeutic skill in action. Brian has not only explored the limits of psycho-therapy and counselling, he has enriched and transcended the body of knowledge and practice by his personal spiritual experiences. This results in a refreshing deepening of the therapeutic encounter, with unexpected turns in conversations and actions. Again and again Brian Thorne enters sacred ground in such a way that this book can be seen as a guide to divert frontiers and connect to transpersonal sources .”

Prof. Dr. Mia Leijssen KU Leuven, Belgium

“ Relevant, meaningful and as daring as ever, this collection of key writing from Brian Thorne on spirituality and counselling is a must‐have for seasoned and new practitioners in helping relationships. There are classics here as well as new reflections on spiritual accompaniment for all those who are weary of skills based, tick box, reductionist approaches to human relating. Brian Thorne ’ s integrity, fearlessness and faith in the human spirit are a beacon of hope and encouragement for those searching and yearning to articulate the fullness of their humanity. His deep sharing of his experiences and thinking over the last 30 years will provide invaluable companionship to anyone wishing to embrace their aliveness in relationship to others and the world .”

Suzanne Keys Counsellor and Supervisor, Private Practice

ffirs.indd iiffirs.indd ii 7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM


Bridging Faith and Person-Centred Therapy

Brian Thorne The Norwich Centre for Personal,

Professional and Spiritual Development

A John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., Publication

ffirs.indd iiiffirs.indd iii 7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM

This edition first published 2012 © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Wiley-Blackwell is an imprint of John Wiley & Sons, formed by the merger of Wiley’s global Scientific, Technical and Medical business with Blackwell Publishing.

Registered Office John Wiley & Sons Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK

Editorial Offices 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148-5020, USA 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK

For details of our global editorial offices, for customer services, and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at www.wiley.com/wiley-blackwell .

The right of Brian Thorne to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books.

Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publisher is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold on the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services. If professional advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional should be sought.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Thorne, Brian, 1937– Counselling and spiritual accompaniment : bridging faith and person-centred therapy / Brian Thorne. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 978-1-119-95082-0 (hardback) – ISBN 978-1-119-95081-3 (paperback) [DNLM: 1. Nondirective Therapy. 2. Counseling. 3. Spirituality. WM 420.5.N8] I. Title. 616.86′06–dc23

2012018031

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Cover image: Silhouette of man praying © Steve McAlister / Getty Images. Cover design by Cyan Design.

Set in 10.5/13pt Minion by SPi Publisher Services, Pondicherry, India

1 2012

Thorne_ffirs.indd ivThorne_ffirs.indd iv 7/18/2012 4:35:45 AM7/18/2012 4:35:45 AM

http://www.wiley.com/wiley-blackwellhttp://www.wiley.com/wiley-blackwell

Dedication

In affectionate thankfulness for the lives and examples of Carl Rogers, George Lyward, Stuart Tayler and Gerard Irvine – two

psychotherapists and two priests of rare humanity

ffirs.indd vffirs.indd v 7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM

ffirs.indd viffirs.indd vi 7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM7/17/2012 12:11:23 AM

Contents

Preface ix Acknowledgements xii

Part I From: Person-centred Counselling: Therapeutic and Spiritual Dimensions 1

Introduction 3

Chapter 1 In Search of Value and Meaning (1979) 8 Chapter 2 Intimacy (1982) 17 Chapter 3 The Quality of Tenderness (1985) 31 Chapter 4 The Blessing and the Curse of Empathy (1989) 42 Chapter 5 Carl Rogers and the Doctrine of Original Sin (1990) 61 Chapter 6 Carl Rogers: The Legacy and the Challenge (1990) 72 Chapter 7 The God Who Comes: Good Friday 1946 (1991) 86

Part II From: Person-centred Counselling and Christian Spirituality 91

Introduction 93

Chapter 8 The Two Carls – Reflections on Jung and Rogers (1983) 98

Chapter 9 The Personality of Jesus and the Process of Therapy (1991) 110

Chapter 10 Spirituality and the Counsellor (1993) 117 Chapter 11 Julian of Norwich: Radical psychotherapist (1993) 121 Chapter 12 Jesus, the Incarnation of Holiness

(Three Sermons, 1993) 134 Chapter 13 Developing a Spiritual Discipline (1994) 146

ftoc.indd viiftoc.indd vii 7/12/2012 11:04:23 AM7/12/2012 11:04:23 AM

viii Contents

Chapter 14 The Counsellor as Prophet (1994) 150 Chapter 15 Counselling and the Spiritual Journey (1997) 165

Part III From: The Mystical Power of Person-Centred Therapy 179

Introduction 181

Chapter 16 The Human Person: Hope or Despair? 187 Chapter 17 The Person-centred Therapist as Secular

Priest and Prophet 197 Chapter 18 The Spiritual Discipline of the

Person-centred Therapist 209 Chapter 19 The Use of Self 220 Chapter 20 Intimacy and Sexuality 231 Chapter 21 ‘Alive Alive’ 242 Chapter 22 When the World Stopped Turning 255

Part IV Ceasing to be a Therapist 265 Prologue 267

Chapter 23 The Heart’s Surrender (2005) 270 Chapter 24 The Counsellor and the Lay Canon: Different Routes

but the Same Journey (2007) 293 Chapter 25 A Collision of Worlds (2009) 306 Chapter 26 The Fully Human Jesus (2009) 312 Chapter 27 Sacred Intimacy: Spiritual Accompaniment

for our Times (2010) 329 Chapter 28 In Correspondence (2010) 341

Epilogue 343 Index 345

ftoc.indd viiiftoc.indd viii 7/12/2012 11:04:24 AM7/12/2012 11:04:24 AM

Preface

During the last thirty years or so, I have on numerous occasions consciously attempted to integrate my experience as a person-centred therapist with what I have come to understand as key aspects of my spiritual development and understanding as a life-long Christian and as a member of the Anglican Church. During that period there has been an increasing recognition in therapeutic circles of the central importance to many clients of their spiritual lives and a preparedness to see the spiritual dimension of reality as a legitimate and sometimes essential part of a therapist’s concern. The days are now past when issues of religion or spiritual enquiry were deemed to be the domain solely of the clergy or, at worst, to be signs in a client of incipient mental disorder or even of psychosis. Spirituality is now firmly on the therapeutic map and most contemporary therapists acknowledge its importance even if many may doubt their capacity to venture with confidence into its terrain.

Twenty years ago Colin Whurr, the proprietor of Whurr Publishers – now part of the Wiley-Blackwell empire – had the foresight with his Series Editor, Windy Dryden, to see the beginnings of an important new development in the therapeutic field. I was encouraged to produce a collection of papers and previously published chapters and articles which tentatively touched on the spiritual arena, and in 1991 there appeared Person-centred Counselling: Therapeutic and Spiritual Dimensions . This book seemed to find a ready readership and was reprinted many times. It remains in print today and is frequently cited in the professional literature. Seven years later in 1998, emboldened by the success of the first book, I decided – with the full support of publisher and Series Editor – to produce a second book which drew much more overtly and explicitly on my Christian experience and commitment. Person-centred Counselling and Christian Spirituality contained much of the text of a previous publication,

fpref.indd ixfpref.indd ix 7/12/2012 11:03:47 AM7/12/2012 11:03:47 AM

x Preface

Behold the Man , which had appeared many years previously under a religious imprint as primarily for Christian congregations; it also featured a number of sermons which I had been invited to give in various cathedrals and university chapels. As far as I know, these remain the only published sermons of a person-centred therapist that exist anywhere in the world!

The explicit use of the word ‘Christian’ in the title meant that this second book attracted attention from the religious press, and to this day readers are drawn from both the therapeutic community and from those whose pri-mary concern is to see its relevance to pastoral theology and Christian formation. Like its predecessor, it remains in print and attracts a steady trickle of new readers each year.

I suspect that Colin Whurr, while pleased with the success of these two books, was perhaps not wholly delighted that the Whurr imprint had been utilised to bring together, for the most part, articles and chapters which had previously been published elsewhere. It was about time, he courteously sug-gested, that Whurr Publishers had an option on a newly minted volume which might do justice to the gradual evolution of my work during the pre-ceding years. This tactful encouragement resulted, in 2002, in the publica-tion of The Mystical Power of Person-centred Therapy and, with its publication, I believe I was able to give full expression to my growing belief that person-centred therapy is essentially a spiritual undertaking which owes much to the Christian tradition and requires the kind of spiritual dis-cipline which we might often associate with those who have committed their lives to a monastic order or a religious rule of life. Of all the books I have written, this slim volume gave me most satisfaction and the response to it has provided me with some of the most moving and exquisite letters that I have ever received from readers, including colleagues in the therapeutic profession, priests and ministers, students and erstwhile clients of counsellors and psychotherapists. Since I have now retired from therapeutic practice, I have come to see The Mystical Power of Person-centred Therapy as perhaps my last word on the essential heart of person-centred therapy as I had come to experience it during nearly forty years of therapeutic practice. Like its two predecessors, this third book remains firmly in print, and its relevance today is perhaps even more striking in the light of the bureaucratisation of the therapeutic profession and the continuing debate about statutory regulation.

Perhaps it is good that these three books, which constitute milestones in my own professional and spiritual odyssey, should remain in print and I rejoice that they have, thus far, had so generous a shelf-life. I am conscious,

fpref.indd xfpref.indd x 7/12/2012 11:03:47 AM7/12/2012 11:03:47 AM

Preface xi

however, that not everything that appears in them is of equal interest and quality and there have been other developments which have relevance. Behold The Man , for example, is once more triumphantly back in print under its original religious imprint (Darton, Longman and Todd, 2007). Most significantly, I have not retired to my deckchair on a Mediterranean beach but remain active in the field of spiritual accompaniment where my therapeutic and Christian experiences are put at the service of those who desire to draw nearer to God or to the essential meaning of their own existence. I have come increasingly to regard this field of activity as of potentially major importance in a world which faces cross-cultural and environmental challenges which, unless they are met, threaten the very existence of humankind.

This present volume, then, has two objectives. Firstly, it brings together some of the writings which appear in the previous three books in a kind of ‘omnibus’ edition. Secondly, it includes more recent contributions – both published and unpublished – that reflect some of my preoccupations as I move through my eighth decade. This section contains some of my reflections on the practice of spiritual accompaniment and the relevance of this activity to the needs of those who strive to find meaning and anchorage in an often frightening and unpredictable world. It is my hope that having, between two covers, this collection of writings (which span some thirty years) may be of value to those who try to make sense of the continuity and the evolution of their own personal, professional and spiritual journeys.

fpref.indd xifpref.indd xi 7/12/2012 11:03:47 AM7/12/2012 11:03:47 AM

Acknowledgements

I am indebted to Darren Reed without whose initiative and encouragement this book would never have been conceptualised let alone produced. Together with Karen Shield and Toni Halliday, colleagues at John Wiley, he has been a steady source of support especially at times when my enthusiasm has waned.

My technical ineptitude has been wonderfully compensated for by the expertise of Sue Hitchcock at the University of East Anglia and of Suzanne Large and Barbara Frances at the Norwich Centre. They have laboured with gracious good humour despite my perfectionism and in the midst of frenetic administrative lives.

Finally, my gratitude, as always, to the numerous colleagues, friends and clients who have done me the honour of reading my books over the years and have assured me that my efforts have been worthwhile.

flast.indd xiiflast.indd xii 7/12/2012 11:03:10 AM7/12/2012 11:03:10 AM

Part I

From: Person-centred Counselling: Therapeutic and Spiritual Dimensions

(First published 1991)

p01.indd 1p01.indd 1 7/12/2012 11:05:00 AM7/12/2012 11:05:00 AM

p01.indd 2p01.indd 2 7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM

I have opted in this book to arrange the chapters chronologically. This was not the case when they were originally published in book form. It seemed then that it made for greater coherence to adhere to a thematic ordering of the contents. Today, however, I am concerned to understand more of the development of my own experience and thinking and to discern something of the continuity, where it exists, of the processes that have brought me to where I find myself now as I approach my 75th birthday. I have concluded that to track my writing through the sequence of its composition might afford some insight into my personal evolution, although I am also conscious that external factors such as the persistence of editors or initiatives from conference organisers might well have been unduly influential in persuading me to write at the time that I did. Even if that is the case, however, the fact remains that I responded to such requests without, as far as I recall, overmuch resistance and this presumably indicates a readiness on my part to go public on subjects that were significant to me and to risk the reaction of potential readers.

The first chapter appeared in 1979 and originally saw the light of day in the journal Theology . Two things strike me about this. In the first place, I recall that the article was invited by the then editor of the journal, which suggests that my theological interests were well known in the relevant circles at this time. Secondly, it is also certain that the invitation was extended to me in the knowledge that I was a practising therapist and held a senior position in a university. In other words, the editor of Theology , over 30 years ago, was alert to the fact that the disciplines of theology and

Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment: Bridging Faith and Person-Centred Therapy, First Edition. Brian Thorne.© 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Introduction

p01.indd 3p01.indd 3 7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM

4 Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment

psychotherapy might enter into dialogue and that my own internal debate might well offer material for such a conversation. The second chapter is, again, the result of an invitation from what might be described as the ecclesiastical side of the equation. This time it was the Norwich Diocesan Board for Social Responsibility that requested me to give a keynote address to the annual clergy school of the Norwich Diocese of the Church of England. The outcome of this event was itself somewhat explosive but it also provided a foretaste of the controversies to come.

In retrospect, I have come to think that those who invited me to speak to the assembled clergy – and they included the Diocesan Bishop – thought of me as a committed lay Anglican who was also a counsellor. They had not expected me to speak as a counsellor who was also a Christian. It was therefore difficult for them when I used my counselling experience and understanding (as I had also done in the Theology article) to explore the implications of an acceptant and empathic response to those whose beliefs and lifestyle diverged from the conventional parameters of Christian orthodoxy. The tentative approach to interpersonal relationships based on revisiting the concept of conscience and on an attempt to explore with renewed insight the contentious areas of physicality and sexuality proved too provocative for some of those present. It was clear that they saw me not as the faithful Christian they had imagined but as a maverick heretic who threatened the model of the Christian family and the fabric of Christian morality. When the text of my address was published, courageously I now realise, by the Diocesan Board for Social Responsibility, I discovered that it was unobtainable in the Norwich Cathedral Shop. The rumour that it had been banned by the Bishop spread rapidly, with the result that the city’s secular bookshops quickly sold out of copies.

The remaining chapters in Part I can be seen as evidence of my increasing willingness to throw caution to the winds and to remain true to my experience as a person-centred therapist without denying my Christian convictions. At the same time, however, the fact that I had made a public declaration of my dual allegiance meant that I was now open to all manner of attack. I have often said that this was a period when I felt that I was standing as a somewhat lonely figure on a bridge which spanned a river flowing between the world of counselling and psychotherapy on the one side and that of Christianity and pastoral theology on the other. It was a dangerous place to be located because it seemed that I made an irresistible target for those in both camps who perceived either my counselling psychology or my pastoral theology to be wrong-headed and even

p01.indd 4p01.indd 4 7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM

Introduction 5

potentially harmful. On the one hand, there were those Christians who aligned themselves with such writers as Paul Vitz (Vitz, 1977 , 1994) who believed me to be wedded to a subtle form of selfism which denied the essential sinfulness of humankind and its need for redemption, and on the other there were those person-centred scholars and practitioners who believed that I was contaminating Carl Rogers’ thorough-going empirical humanism with intimations of a mystical spirituality which threatened the very core and legitimacy of the therapy in which they had been trained and to which they owed their professional identities. In this latter camp were those who had earlier in their lives professed a religious (especially Christian) faith but had become disenchanted – sometimes violently – because of their experiences at the hands of their co-religionists or by the authoritarian attitudes of church leaders. They could also point to the biography of Rogers himself, who had as a young man intended to become a Christian minister but who subsequently turned his back on Christianity and remained reluctant to discuss religion or spirituality for the greater part of his professional life (see Thorne, 2003 ).

My Christian detractors criticised me for my naïve and over-optimistic view of human nature. Not infrequently they accused me of undermining the validity of the doctrine of Original Sin and denying the centrality of the atonement, as they understood it, whereby Jesus sacrificed himself on the cross in order to redeem humankind from its wickedness and perversity. My person-centred opponents, it seemed, were disturbed by Carl Rogers’ last book, A Way of Being , because they saw much of it as the unsubstantiated fantasies of an old man who was beginning to suffer from grandiosity and the inflated desire to save the world. Such ramblings, they feared, especially Rogers’ exploration of a spiritual and transcendent dimension, threatened to destroy his – and their – hard-won reputation as a pragmatic, research-based, empirical practitioner whose emphasis on the relationship in therapy and the underpinning attitudes of the therapist sprang from meticulously observed practice and solidly grounded theory and not from fanciful ideas about healing forces engendered by tapping into spiritual reality.

Many of the chapters in Part I can be seen as the outcome of the experi-ences of the lonely figure being shot at by both Christian and person- centred detractors. It would seem that from the early 1980s onwards I was defiantly determined not to hide behind a cloak of ambivalence but to declare my Christianity and my person-centredness and to assert their compatibility whatever others might be saying or insinuating. The Quality of Tenderness , which took the form of a public lecture in the University of

p01.indd 5p01.indd 5 7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM


East Anglia in 1983, asserted the essentially mystical potential of the core conditions when they were fully implemented and I was later at pains to draw out the uncanny similarities between my own experience as a thera-pist and that of Carl Rogers as he describes it in some of the more remark-able passages in A Way of Being . What is more, as I explore my ‘quality of tenderness’ I am ready to invoke as witness Teresa of Calcutta and to draw on the work of the Catholic monk and theologian, Sebastian Moore, in my attempt to present a new approach to the doctrine of Original Sin. I am also struck on re-reading this essay today how much it owes to Carl Gustav Jung whose work I had first encountered as an undergraduate at Cambridge.

The autobiographical chapters (Chapters 4 and 7) provide further evidence of the profound influence on me of my early Christian experiences and how those formed the bedrock for my future psychological and psychotherapeutic training. Unlike those whose previous religious or spiritual understanding seems often to have been undermined or demolished by their subsequent exposure to psychology or investigative science, it would seem that in my case these fused into an integrated response to experience and that it was this integration which I became increasingly determined to proclaim. The chapters on the later Carl Rogers and his legacy (Chapters 5 and 6) seek to explore a similar integration in Rogers’ own work. This is not to suggest that I attempt to reclaim Rogers for Christianity because it is clearly documented, and I know from my own conversations with him, that he remained highly sceptical about the claims of Christianity until his dying day. I do believe, however, that in the final years of his life Rogers was confronted by the indisputable reality of the spiritual dimension in human experience and – perhaps reluctantly and to his own surprise – he was faced with the task of making sense of a mysterious complexity which he had previously sought to deny or discredit.

The Quality of Tenderness gives clear evidence that by 1983 – by which time I had been a practising therapist for 15 years – I was in no doubt that therapeutic activity could lead to experiences which could not readily be described in language normally associated with psychological processes. My struggle to discover words which could give adequate expression to the transcendent experience of being both in profound contact with another person and also being linked to forces beyond us was, I believe, an important aspect of my determination to hold in healthy tension the psychological and spiritual worlds that constituted the backdrop to my day-to-day existence. If I was to be true to my experience, there was no way I could deny either the astonishing moments of intimacy and connection that

p01.indd 6p01.indd 6 7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM

Introduction 7

occurred in the counselling room or the entry into a world of transcendent wonder which sometimes took place, without warning, as I gave myself over to prayerful meditation or participation in a eucharistic celebration in a cold church on a winter’s morning. The person-centred therapist and the Christian pilgrim were one and the same person and both had their questions, doubts, anxieties and ecstasies. In The Quality of Tenderness I threw down a gauntlet to myself, and in many ways, I have been attempting to respond to the challenge ever since. How, I asked, could these two realities be united, not fleetingly, but in a permanent embrace and what were the implications for me as a person and as a professional for seeking and maintaining such integrity? Using not a new language but the existing ones, perhaps I was being foolhardy enough to face the implications of seeking to be both congruent and holy.

References

Rogers , C R ( 1980 ) A Way of Being . Boston : Houghton Mifflin . Thorne , B ( 2003 ) Carl Rogers , 2nd ed . London : Sage , pp. 21 – 23 . Vitz , P ( 1977 ) Psychology as Religion: The cult of self-worship (revised 1994). Grand

Rapids, MI : William B Eerdmans .

p01.indd 7p01.indd 7 7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM7/12/2012 11:05:01 AM

Counselling and Spiritual Accompaniment: Bridging Faith and Person-Centred Therapy, First Edition. Brian Thorne.© 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

In Search of Value and Meaning 1 (1979)

The word ‘counsellor’ is open to such misunderstanding that I feel it necessary at the outset to quote from the literature of my own professional association so that the word can be more adequately understood in its educational context:

Clients consult a counsellor because they are in difficulties and hope that by discussing their concerns with the counsellor they will gain fresh insights and move towards a more creative response to their problems. The professionally trained counsellor is seldom an advice giver … Instead he will try to assist a person to see his own situation more clearly and then provide the opportunity for looking at ways of behaving differently or of arriving at decisions … The client himself is the primary judge of what is or what is not an appropriate concern to take to a counsellor. Counsellors should be prepared and equipped to respond to a wide range of personal, emotional, social and educational difficulties … All counsellors observe a code of professional confidentiality and information is not divulged to others unless the client gives specific permission for this to occur. Often a single interview with a counsellor may be enough to point the way forward. On the other hand, where someone is experiencing more serious difficulties it is possible for him, if he so wishes, to maintain contact with a counsellor for longer periods of time, in which case counselling may continue over many sessions. (Association for Student Counselling, 1977 )

1

1 From Th eology LXXXII , no 685, 1979, with permission. Chapter 6 in the original publication.

c01.indd 8c01.indd 8 7/12/2012 10:45:09 AM7/12/2012 10:45:09 AM

In Search of Value and Meaning (1979) 9

This, then, is the nature of the work in which I have been engaged for a decade and during that time I have met with increasing frequency the intelligent man or woman who can find no value or purpose in living. For me such an encounter constitutes a challenge and a threat, for each time it happens I am faced again by the task of re-examining the purpose of my own life and the nature of my own beliefs. In short, it calls for the kind of faith which risks its own extinction by offering intimate companionship to pointlessness and absurdity.

Many years ago now, a student I knew uttered words which I have never forgotten: ‘I feel I am adrift on a limitless ocean of relativity.’ He was not a person who was overtly struggling – on the contrary he was sociable and articulate, he had friends of both sexes and he was an above-average student in academic performance – in short he possessed many of the distinctive features of the successful young man.

More recently Penelope, a young woman of 23, entered my office and collapsed on the floor after indicating that she had taken a mild overdose – a mixture of her mother ’ s and her grandmother ’ s sleeping tablets. It was only later that I discovered that, by putting herself to sleep in this way, she had successfully avoided a consultation with her GP with whom she was to have discussed contraception at the insistent request of her boyfriend who wished her to go on the Pill.

An American therapist, Clark Moustakas, in his recent book Creative Life (1977) tells of Don, an adolescent who during the course of therapy changed from an inhibited, restricted individual to an outgoing, socially effective person. His parents and teachers regarded the change as a blessing, but Moustakas himself became alarmed when Don began to boast about his conquests and achievements over peers to whom he had once felt distinctly inferior. He was troubled even further when Don told him gleefully of the strategies by which his mother was twisting money out of an insurance company with the help of lawyers and accountants who were only too happy to connive at covert dishonesty. When therapy ended – abruptly and prematurely in Moustakas ’ s eyes – it was deemed highly successful by Don ’ s parents in that the problems which had brought the boy to the clinic were now resolved. Moustakas himself was conscious of letting loose on the world a young man who had learned to be assertive and autonomous, but who remained totally divorced from any knowledge of the moral core of his being.

These three people were confronting or failing to confront the task that constitutes the individual ’ s stiffest challenge in his search for identity – the

c01.indd 9c01.indd 9 7/12/2012 10:45:09 AM7/12/2012 10:45:09 AM


task of establishing value and meaning or, as I should prefer to define it, of being rooted in the knowledge of what is good and just and true. Moustakas puts it well: ‘Being free to be is the right of every human being. Freedom is necessary to maintain one ’ s humanity; the denial of freedom is equivalent to giving up an essential human characteristic. Freedom within the framework of ethical and moral value means not simply the will to choose but choice growing out of a knowledge of the good and a willingness to choose the good’ (Moustakas, 1977 , p.75).

It is important to say more about this sense of moral and ethical value for it is not the same as a value system . The latter refers to beliefs, hopes, expectations, expressed preferences which can offer direction to a person and influence his or her decisions and choices. Such a system may indeed be grounded in the sense of moral and ethical value, but it need not be. Hitler had a value system. The sense of value to which I refer is the dimension of the self which unites and integrates. Without it there can be no wholeness. With it there is a commitment to life and to the enrichment of life in its highest forms. With it, too, there is meaning. It is the highest sense of identity and it is the most crucial of all in the development of the individual and in the evolution of a civilisation. Furthermore, I believe it to be much neglected in our society. Neither in education nor in counselling do I see it as a primary concern, let alone the central force. And so it is that much that happens in education and in counselling is destitute of enduring value and that even freedom, knowledge and autonomy are sometimes bereft of meaning. Shortly before he died, the humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow gave an interview to Professor Willard Frick and at one point, with great emotion, he cast an ominous shadow over the theory of human needs which he had himself so painstakingly evolved.

I ’ d always assumed … that if you cleared away the rubbish and the neurosis and the garbage and so on, then the person would blossom out, that he ’ d find his own way. I find especially with young people that it just ain ’ t so sometimes. You get people who are in the … beautiful … need-gratifying situation and yet get kind of a value pathology. That is, it ’ s possible to be loved and respected, etc., and, even so, to feel cynical and materialistic, and to feel there ’ s nothing worth working for … Especially in younger rather than older people you can see this. It ’ s sort of a loss of nerve, and I think we ’ re at this point where the traditional culture has broken down altogether, and for many people they just feel, ‘My God, there ’ s nothing’. (Frick, 1971 , p.27)

c01.indd 10c01.indd 10 7/12/2012 10:45:09 AM7/12/2012 10:45:09 AM


In the face of such an existential vacuum – and how immediately recog-nisable it is to any counsellor working in higher education – it becomes clear that we cannot be content with education which focuses primarily on knowledge, skill and professional competence, nor can we place trust in a therapeutic process which is concerned primarily with change towards self-confidence, social effectiveness and realness in expression. Maslow himself had indicated the answer to his own dismay when a decade before he had insisted that education and therapy reach into the moral realm and enable the individual to encounter the inner experience of value from which comes the will and the strength to become more honest, good, just and beautiful.

It is perhaps hardly surprising that teachers are slow to engage in a battle for moral truth and that counsellors shy away from encountering their clients in the area of moral and ethical value. The spectre of meaninglessness haunts this battlefield and the fear of drowning in the limitless ocean of relativity is never far distant. But what, after all, is the point of teaching anything or counselling anyone if there is no moral value and thus no meaning to life? What kind of counselling success is it if my client feels loved and autonomous and utterly futile? What kind of satisfaction is it for a teacher when his student gets a first-class degree but sees no point either in his success or in his life ahead? What more natural, then, that counsellors and teachers alike should remain indifferent to the moral realm in order to cherish a false sense of accomplishment? If I do not seek to enter the world of my client ’ s futility or of my student ’ s pointlessness, I can congratulate myself on my effective performance – see how independent he is after my counselling, or what a brilliant examination script he has produced after my teaching!

The ocean of relativity was partly induced by my student ’ s university education. The development of a critical, enquiring mind has often been acknowledged as the primary aim of higher education and such an aim has a long and honourable history. Students are required to examine their basic assumptions and to reject them if they do not stand the test of rigorous intellectual scrutiny. There is no doubt that, through such a process, many individuals are delivered from ignorance and prejudice and from false and lazy thinking. However, the very same individuals can be confronted simultaneously by a world where everything seems to depend on a point of view and where there are no longer any certainties. Such apparent relativity can often be the herald of meaninglessness. In a society where values are secure and traditions strong, such uncertainty – and even the loss of

c01.indd 11c01.indd 11 7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM


meaning itself – can often be contained, at least long enough for the individual to reorient him- or herself and rediscover some firm reference points. But at a time when traditions and values are themselves crumbling, the individual is horrifyingly vulnerable. The individual cannot rely on a prevailing stability within his culture to see him through his personal crisis. He has only his personal resources to call upon.

Cardinal Newman saw a university as a place for the exercise of the whole intellect and for him a truly great intellect was ‘one which takes a connected view of old and new, past and present, far and near and which has insight into the influence of all these, one on another’ (Newman, 1852 ). Owen Chadwick has recently suggested, however, that there is a fatal flaw even in Newman ’ s vision, and if Chadwick is right it is all the more surprising when one remembers Newman ’ s religious convictions (Chadwick, 1976 ). Newman, according to Chadwick, believed that mental development could take place independently of or at least without direct reference to ethical development and that a university should be primarily concerned with the former. I do not believe that in a post-Christian era this can any longer be advocated without condoning the irresponsibility which springs from failing to make the essential connection between thinking, feeling and caring. We now know only too well that mental development can indeed proceed without ethical growth and we see the results all around us and in the history of the twentieth century. The time has come to affirm what logical thought reveals to us without any possibility of contradiction – that mental development must not proceed independently of ethical development if we are to have any chance of halting our present gallop towards self-extermination. In short, I am suggesting that unless a university commits itself to the creation of an environment where emotional and ethical development command parity of esteem with mental development, it will not nourish the logical thought processes which can alone come to grips with the appalling problems of the contemporary world.

Commitment is a word that strikes terror in the hearts of many. It means taking a stand and affirming values. There are times at the end of a day when I feel engulfed by a wave of despair that we cannot affirm two simple values which, if we embraced them, might transform education overnight. The first would be an affirmation that mankind is of infinite worth and the second that the world is worth saving.

These two values are certainly not reflected in the society on which educational institutions uncomfortably depend. Competitive materialism remains the motivating force there, however much politicians may wrap it

c01.indd 12c01.indd 12 7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM


up in fine-sounding words – although of late they have ceased even to do that. Unashamedly now, we are exhorted to exercise self-denial but only so that we may have more goodies later. We must sacrifice one motor car this year so that we may have three in five years ’ time. What kind of democracy can it be where men are prepared to down tools and take up industrial arms not because they lack money but because their differentials have been eroded? In the face of such a secular ethic, the universities seem at present to stand powerless. They must either collude with it or somehow pretend it has nothing to do with them – the academic washing of hands which betrays the irresponsibility of educators who are no longer inspired by what William Arrowsmith described as ‘a care and concern for the future of man, a Platonic love of the species not for what it is but what it might be’ (Arrowsmith, 1967).

The situation of Penelope, the second student, was different but no less common. Caught in a network of conflicting values and judgements, she could dimly hear her own voice but not act upon it. She consequently felt ashamed and impotent and finally desperate. Her actions demonstrated her almost complete inability to stay in touch with her own sense of value. In conflict about her relationship with her boyfriend, she went home to a house inhabited by a depressive mother and an ailing grandmother – a home she knew she should not visit in a vulnerable state. Once there she was swept into an addiction culture and stole tablets (of which she heartily disapproved) and used them to avoid a consultation about contraceptive measures which she did not wish to take. Only after this grisly process of self-betrayal was she able, in the counselling relationship, to affirm her own sense of value and to hear her own voice stating plainly that she did not wish to have intercourse without commitment, that she wanted to take responsibility for her own convictions and that she scorned pills as a means of deadening psychological pain or relieving tension. With support she was then able to live out this sense of value and confront her boyfriend with her deep feelings about the physical side of their relationship. Most strikingly, Penelope ’ s experience illustrates that when a person ’ s own essential nature is encouraged and supported his or her sense of value assumes its rightful authority. Penelope was initially unable to act upon the messages ema-nating from her own sense of value and therefore her sense of shame was intense and her despair predictable. She experienced what I have come to recognise as appropriate guilt – i.e. a guilt which springs from having failed to be true to the deepest regions in oneself. Such guilt bears no comparison with the inappropriate guilt experienced by so many which springs from

c01.indd 13c01.indd 13 7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM


having failed to live up to someone else ’ s judgement or expectations. For the counsellor, nothing is more crucial than his or her ability to help a person distinguish between these two forms of guilt, for the one points directly to the personal sense of moral and ethical value, whereas the other blocks the individual ’ s path to such a sense and lumbers him instead with a burden which he often finds himself both unable to carry and unable to reject. Appropriate guilt calls for forgiveness and an affirmation of the nature which has been betrayed. Inappropriate guilt calls for the identification of the usurping judge and a refusal to accept his authority. Both states cause great distress and demand all the love and understanding a counsellor can muster if the context is to be created in which the necessary work – so different in the two cases – can be done.

The case of Don is the most perturbing of the three, for it reveals the power of a culture to obstruct a person ’ s path to the deepest sense of moral and ethical value because it has lost the map of the world where such journeys have meaning. The search for truth, beauty, love, justice and wisdom makes no sense in a culture where the expertise of lawyers and accountants is exploited to develop fraudulent strategies to beat insurance companies at their own game, and where such behaviour is seen as both typical and normal. Materialism, if it is all-pervasive, affords no signposts for the journey to ethical and moral value and no nourishment for the would-be traveller. Furthermore, it creates a moral desert in which the conscience is stillborn.

Conscience is not a word which leaps from the pages of secular counsel-ling literature and, when it does, it is often presented as the harbinger of guilt, the rod with which a person continues to beat his already bruised back, the weapon of self-punishment. As such, it is seen as the enemy of growth or interpreted as the result of conditioning processes associated with religion or the outmoded moral code of a previous generation. But true conscience or conscience that is healthy does not collude with this world of inappropriate guilt nor does it feed the fires of self-rejection. On the contrary, it is the only capacity left to human beings with which they can continue to find the unique meaning of their own life in the face of crumbling values and waning traditions.

It is to his enormous credit that the Austrian psychotherapist Viktor Frankl has rehabilitated the conscience and in so doing has redefined it in such a way that words such as good and bad take on fresh significance. Looking to the future, Frankl sees that morality ‘will no longer define what is good and what is bad in terms of what one should do and what one must

c01.indd 14c01.indd 14 7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM


not do. What is good will be defined as that which fosters the meaning fulfilment of a being. And what is bad will be defined as that which hinders this meaning fulfilment’ (Frankl, 1977 , p.114). In line with this definition, Frankl sees the conscience as the ‘means to discover meanings, to ‘sniff them out’ as it were’. ‘True conscience,’ says Frankl, ‘has nothing to do with the fearful expectation of punishment. As long as a man is still motivated by either the fear of punishment or the hope of reward – or, for that matter, by the wish to appease the super-ego – conscience has not yet had its say’ (Frankl, 1977 , pp.116–117).

Let me summarise and then look at the implications for educators:

1. An ultimate moral sense is present in the deepest region of the self and it is this sense that establishes meaning and value. Unless it is encountered, the life of the individual hovers ceaselessly on the brink of meaninglessness.

2. In an age when values and traditions are in the melting pot, the individual receives little help from his environment as he seeks to confront the ultimate questions of his own meaning and value. Indeed, he may for a while be separated altogether from these questions by an all-embracing materialism.

3. It is tempting for counsellors and teachers to avoid confronting their clients and students in the moral and ethical realm, for to do so may be to call into question the very validity of what is being offered as therapy or education.

4. By focusing on the undoubted evils of inappropriate guilt and self-punishing shame, counsellors may fail to identify the healthy but equally painful guilt and shame which come from a failure to accept the responsibility of fulfilling the meaning of a personal and unique life.

5. It is the conscience which – however much it is prone to err – can alone serve the individual in her search for the unique meaning of her life. To neglect conscience or to repress it is to surrender the one human capacity that can give direction to the person lost in the ocean of relativity or the fog of meaninglessness.

The message in all this for the counsellor and the teacher is no easy one. Nobody can give meaning to someone else and the counsellor who tries to offer meaning to his or her client or the teacher who attempts to teach moral and ethical principles are both equally doomed to failure. The moral sense cannot be taught or imposed: it can only be discovered. The educator ’ s

c01.indd 15c01.indd 15 7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM


task, therefore, is to create a context in which such discovery can take place and no task could be more formidable. It involves a willingness to move beyond views of counselling and education which concern themselves with knowledge, skill, social effectiveness, personal autonomy, beyond even the revered concepts of self-acceptance and self-fulfilment. The counsellor and the teacher faced by such a task have no alternative but to demonstrate their own personal commitment to the search for truth and meaning. It is with their whole being that they will reveal the attentiveness and the obedience of their own consciences in the midst of the countless situations with which life confronts them. They will show that they are not afraid to enter the moral struggle and that they do so not as professionals doing a job but as human beings who refuse to be bound by rules, routines and the endless absurdities of bureaucratic and procedural red tape. They will show their willingness to risk even the deepest uncertainty in response to the internal directive which, to quote Clark Moustakas again, ‘keeps alive the mind and heart and soul of all humanity’ (Moustakas, 1977 , p.81).

In my own life I have come to the stark realisation that, when I lose contact with that internal directive, I risk inoculating others with despair – and that sounds cause enough for appropriate guilt and true shame in the breast of any counsellor. But I know, too, that when I am bold enough to affirm and embrace the meaning of my own life, with all the self-doubt and agony of spirit which that sometimes entails, I extend to others an invitation to do the same. There is no other way.

References

Arrowsmith, W ( 1967 ) The future of teaching . In: C B T Lee (Ed.) Improving College Teaching . Washington DC : American Council on Education .

Association for Student Counselling ( 1977 ) The Role of the Counsellor in Higher and Further Education . Policy document .

Chadwick , O ( 1976 ) Poet of the university ’ s timeless ideal . London : Times Higher Education Supplement (9 July).

Frankl , V E ( 1977 ) The Unconscious God . London : Hodder & Stoughton . Frick , W ( 1971 ) Humanistic Psychology: Interviews with Maslow, Murphy and

Rogers . Columbus, OH : Charles E. Merrill . Moustakas , C ( 1977 ) Creative Life . New York : Van Nostrand Reinhold Co. Newman , J H ( 1852 ) The Scope and Nature of University Education .

c01.indd 16c01.indd 16 7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM7/12/2012 10:45:10 AM

152mm 17mm 152mm brian thorne counselling and spiritual...

Documents