Intellectual humility, spirituality and counselling

Gordon, E. C. (2018) Intellectual humility, spirituality and counselling. Journal of Psychology and Theology, 46(4), pp. 279-291. (doi: 10.1177/0091647118807185)

Abstract

Although therapists often work with clients with whom they share a great many beliefs, there remain many cases where the therapist and client have very little in common. Spirituality is, especially in the latter kind of case, one specific area in which clashes and similarities may be important. However, recent evidence suggests spirituality is to a surprising extent ignored in therapy when exploring it would be therapeutically relevant (e.g. Hathaway et al. 2004) and, even more, that counsellors often struggle when training to more effectively engage with client spirituality (Pargament, 2011). These results are problematic, especially when taken together. In this paper, I attempt to address this vexing issue in a way that brings together work on counselling and spirituality with recent discussions of intellectual virtue in contemporary epistemology. In particular, I show why it is important for the therapist to cultivate and maintain the virtue of intellectual humility with respect to spirituality in a counselling context. To this end, I explore, with reference to a particularly promising model of intellectual humility (Whitcomb et al. 2015), how the therapist can be attentive to—and own—their limitations in a productive way when dealing with a wide range of spiritual backgrounds.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Gordon, Dr Emma
• Authors: Gordon, E. C.
• Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > B Philosophy (General)
• College/School: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Humanities > Philosophy
• Journal Name: Journal of Psychology and Theology
• Publisher: SAGE
• ISSN: 0091-6471
• ISSN (Online): 2328-1162
• Published Online: 11 November 2018
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2018 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Journal of Psychology and Theology 46(4):279-291
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher

Related URLs

• University of Glasgow Library Catalogue