Spiritual Interventions in Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy

Abstract

Spiritual Interventions in Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy. Donald F. Walker and William L. Hathaway (Eds.). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2013, Pp. 282, Pb, Reviewed by Tami Sullivan (Roberts Wesleyan College, Rochester, NY).Spiritual Interventions in Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy puts at our disposal a comprehensive guide from which psychotherapists who work with children, adolescents, and their families can acknowledge and integrate religious and spiritual principles into their professional work. The authors successfully navigate a compendium of religiously guided assessments, interventions, and case conceptualizations that aid psychotherapists in discerning the importance of culturally diverse religious beliefs and practices of their child and family clients.In the first section, the authors lay a foundation in which the reader can understand the role of religion in a child and adolescent's life from an ethical, contextual and developmental perspective that is respectful of different religious orientations. With the emphasis that religiouslyminded treatment can be integrated with secular interventions or stand on its own, the second section introduces practical guidelines and considerations from different theoretical models for psychotherapists interested in incorporating religion and spirituality into their work.Chapter 1: Ethics, Religious Issues, and Clinical Child Psychology provides the reader with solid guidance to issues pertaining to client spirituality through the introduction of compelling case studies and the application of the American Psychological Association's code of ethics.Chapter 2: Assessment of Religious and Spiritual Issues in Clinical Child Psychology authors present general guidance for assessing the role of religion and spirituality in the child or adolescent's presenting problem. The Faith Situations Questionnaire, an assessment of Judeo-Christian religious behaviors is discussed in some detail.Chapter 3: Addressing Parental Spirituality in Family Psychotherapy follows a systematic exploration of the interrelationships between parental spirituality and child and adolescent psychopathology. A useful relational spirituality framework is presented in which psychotherapists can assess and come to understand how child and adolescent problems are situated in familial religious practices, and design ecologically valid interventions.Chapter 4: Spiritually Oriented Interventions in Developmental Context presents a conceptual model for understanding the religious and spiritual development of children and frames interventions within developmentally appropriate cognitive, psychosocial, and spiritual domains.Chapter 5: Acceptance we are generously reminded of the universality of acceptance in psychotherapeutic approaches. The authors' supposition that acceptance is a spiritual intervention is evidenced through a detailed analysis of both an object relations and child-centered therapeutic approach.Chapter 6: Spiritual Awareness Psychotherapy opens up a therapeutic path in which the child and adolescent's journey is guided by the psychotherapist through accord with the universe, or the divine, that ultimately bring about a spiritual awareness that leads to awareness, hope, and growth. …