Psychoanalysis as a vocation

Psychoanalysis may be seen as caught between two different trends of disenchanted modernity: rationalization, which leads to the framing of our work as a professional discipline subordinate to the dictates of instrumental rationality, and self‐analysis, which frees us from the dictates of orthodoxy, inequality, and authority. But a further difficulty lies within the aspect of enlightenment, which has not only provided a greater role for our subjectivity but disguised relations of authority, conformity, and objectiflcation in our work. Psychoanalysis has objectified the other while idealizing its knowledge as objective, has paradoxically denied the very subjectivity that must serve as the source of the analyst's knowledge. However, the reaction against this condition, which may tend to produce counter‐ideals of not‐knowing and mutuality, must also be carefully deconstructed. Differences in the meaning given by different schools to the use of the analyst's subjectivity suggest that pluralism will make new knowledge demands on psychoanalysts. Analytic training should include the development of critical abilities that help to meet these demands within a context of education as a collaborative, democratic process. Knowledge itself can be used homeo‐pathically as an antidote to the old ideal of the knowing authority.     

The pastoral counselor as specialist within ministry

The article attempts to demonstrate the continuity of the specialized ministry of pastoral counseling with all Christian ministry. By the use of a case fragment from a pastoral counseling case, it attempts to raise three central issues which, in terms of how they are dealt with, can determine whether or not a particular experience of counseling is Christian ministry. These issues are: the role of the minister and the context for ministry; the way in which the method of counseling can be shown to be related to a norm for Christian ministry; and the way in which the counseling process is interpreted and understood.His article is an extensive revision of an address given to the annual convention of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors in April, 1980.     

The ministry of counseling

Conclusion Somewhere in religion there is the awareness of and reach toward a divine agency beyond the purely human, whether the divine activity is conceived to be found in Holy Scripture, or a divinely guided Church, or in the stilling of creaturely thoughts in a Friends meeting. All religion asks of psychotherapy is that God be given a chance to will and to do of his good pleasure in us. Religion may fearlessly ally itself with a therapeutic spirit in which the role of man is the humble one of providing the field of action for the Holy Spirit. The therapist is a Christ-bearer, as we are all called to be Christ-bearers in our measure, confirming the intimation of the Spirit that we are sons of God and capable of growing into his image from glory to glory.