Surrendering the Self: Pastoral Counseling at the Limits of Culture and Psychotherapy

Abstract

Explicates the meaning and movement of egocentrism, ethnocentrism, multiculturalism, and metaculturalism and the implications for pastoral counseling. Claims that pastoral counseling should try to achieve awareness of the ways in which self and culture bind while faith releases. Opines that pastoral counseling ought to embrace a multicultural perspective, be viewed as an example of interpathic presence, and have as its goal not the integration of the client's self and his or her culture but rather a surrender and encounter with the Lord.