21st-CENTURY CHRISTIAN COUNSELING

A Definition of an Emerging Professional and Ministerial Orientation

The following is a Statement for credentialing and public communication to be advocated by the American Association of Christian Counselors and the International Board if Christian Counselors. March, 2008

As an organization of dedicated counseling professionals, the AACC believes:

Base Definition

Modern Christian counseling derives its basic orientation and authority first and foremost, from the Bible as the Word of God, which is the primary source of all wisdom and Christian spiritual formation; and secondly, from a balanced utilization of contemporary mental health therapies, the behavioral sciences, and sound clinical practice. Christian counseling, across the entire spectrum of care, is also intended to be holistic, purposefully taking into account the bio-psycho-social-spiritual assessment of individuals. Furthermore, the treatment and prevention of mental/emotional/character disorders is aligned with the goal of moving toward Christian maturity and wellness. At its best, professional and ministry-based Christian counseling builds upon biblical truth and spiritual practice along with the relevant theoretical and practical contributions of various mental health traditions to help produce Christ-like character, behavior, and contentment in the lives of the people and systems that are served.

Christian Counselors

Professional and ministry-based Christian counselors are both confessing believers and also duly licensed, credentialed, or certified mental health providers. Whenever appropriate, these counselors bring the life of Jesus Christ into the work of counseling; psychotherapy; medical and psychiatric treatment; testing and evaluation; mediation and arbitration; counselor supervision; teaching; research; administration; consulting; small group facilitation; coaching; speaking; writing; and church, court-related, and legislative testimony.

Christian counselors of all kinds – when in the client’s interest, with their consent, and when appropriate in the counseling process – pray for and with clients; read the Bible and make reference to Scripture; encourage the confession of sin, the practice of forgiveness, and the making of amends; support the practice of the spiritual disciplines; and give assistance or make referral for spiritual interventions and other specialized practices. When consent does not exist, Christian counselors may still be engaged in some of these activities silently and implicitly, always functioning in the best interests of their clients. These spiritual practices are not illegal, unethical, or illegitimate, nor are they antagonistic to the aforementioned clinical/ministerial purposes and practices. Christian counseling is not dichotomized into sacred and secular compartments, but from the perspective of the mental health professions, is rightly seen as holistic, adjunctive, and building upon the Word of God.

This integrative work is a central aspect of the Christian counselor’s lifelong challenge to become a helper of both excellence and ethical integrity. Christian counseling practice is not excessively complex, nor is it simplistic and reductionistic. Christian counselors also understand and revere the spiritual dimension of human nature and change – best known through personally encountering Christ and growing in a life of faith in Him. They also diligently search for, evaluate, and apply the best data and practices of the behavioral and social sciences. Tying these various threads together in clinical and ministerial practice, Christian counselors understand and respect the role of cognitive, behavioral, moral, emotional, relational, spiritual, and environmental forces in human and social change. They invite God’s presence and power to guide this change and to transform and sanctify the person being helped – properly using God’s Word and the ministry resources of His universal church.

Common Values, Practices, and Ethics

Christian counselors accord the highest respect to the triune God revealed in the Holy Scriptures – the foundation of faith and ethical conduct. They are also dedicated to the best interests of their patients and clients, to the law and the ethical standards of their respective clinical and ministerial disciplines, to their contractual obligations in the church and workplace, and to proven research and data from the bio-psycho-social sciences. A client’s right to self-determination and the opportunity to be treated with respect regarding matters of faith and a Judeo-Christian worldview, is strongly advocated.

However, regardless of religious creed or preferred clinical theory, Christian counselors are bound together by the following common goals and ethics: knowing and loving God; loving and serving others; avoiding all harm toward clients and others; bringing truth, healing, and agreed upon change into people’s lives; assisting people in being set free from sin, spiritual bondage, mental disorders, and emotional distress; making peace and doing justice; and assisting the church, community, and profession to grow to their full maturity.

Christian counselors strive to come alongside those seeking help, listen with heart, mind and spirit, and speak the truth-in-love to those served. They are dedicated to listen carefully to clients, to respect them, to understand their hurts, sins, and fears, and to encourage faith, hope, and love. Christian counselors humbly challenge client distortions and wrongdoing and, by mutual consent, help clients renounce the ways of sin in order to support change in the direction of growth and maturity in Christ. They offer the empathic heart of understanding, the consoling voice of comfort, the guiding hope of godly reason, and the assertive challenge to change – depending on what is needed within the therapeutic process.

Christian counselors are committed to disciplined learning and faithful growth in counseling knowledge, gifts, and skills. When appropriate, Christian counselors testify to the saving grace and sanctifying power of Jesus Christ. They avoid imposing their values and beliefs on clients, but on the other hand, they are not silent about God’s love, mercy, and grace. Christian counselors strive to maintain their integrity to Christ and His revelation in Scripture, while also contributing to the growth of psychological knowledge and clinical skill that is inherent to all counseling practice and development. They are dedicated to a continual evaluation and improvement of their practices in order to fulfill the call to excellence as mental health practitioners and as Christian counselors.

Christian counselors serve their clients with excellence and ethical integrity – practicing with the utmost respect, sensitivity, honesty, energy, and capability. They do not use clients for their own personal gain and strictly avoid all client harm and exploitation. They avoid activities that violate or diminish the civil and legal rights of clients and client systems. They do not discriminate in the provision of client services – even if ethical referral is all that is done – on the basis of gender, race, ethnicity, disability, religious creed, denomination, socio-economic status, national origin, or sexual orientation.

Aspiring to honor Christ in all things, Christian counselors are committed to moral purity and honesty and to maintain personal, professional, and organizational integrity. Aspiring to excellence in service, they know and respect the limits of their competence, offer consultation, make appropriate referrals, network with other service providers, and continually study to improve their excellence in service to Christ and to others. Christian counselors maintain professional integrity in relations with the state, with licensing boards, with the church, with professional and ministerial associations, and with employers and colleagues. They understand both their duties to the state and other organizations, and the limits of the authoritative powers these states and private institutions hold.

Christian counselors have the right – a right grounded in Scripture and protected by the religion, association, and free speech clauses of the First Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution – to identify publically as Christian counselors and to always maintain this integrated clinical-spiritual practice regardless of professional association and/or licensure status. This right to explicit Christian counseling practice cannot be abrogated or substantially diminished by any court, state legislature, licensure board, or professional association.

The Christian Counseling Profession

Christian counseling is a dynamic, expanding, and multidisciplinary field of practice. Over a half-century of development and growth has witnessed a complex professional-ministerial-social organism coming to fruition in this 21st century. There are now numerous Christian counseling professional associations that are national in scope, including the nearly 50,000 member strong American Association of Christian Counselors. Dozens of Christian-oriented graduate training programs exist in all parts of the country – integrating with the disciplines of psychology, counseling, social work, marriage and family therapy, nursing, and pastoral care. There are tens of thousands of mental health professionals across all fifty states who also identify publically in some manner, as Christian counselors.

More specifically, the AACC has published the Christian Counseling Code of Ethics and, with the International Board of Christian Counselors, is now delivering national practice standards and credentials in Christian counseling. Many refereed national and international journals on Christian counseling are being printed. Hundreds of books are published annually. Training, seminar, and conference resources are mushrooming at many levels. Most all of the managed care groups across America either have already, or are beginning to recognize and refer specifically to Christian counselors as more and more insured subscribers are demanding this orientation. Finally, dubious though it may be as a mark of professional maturity, liability insurance can now be purchased for Christian counseling practice.

Christ is the bridge by which Christian counseling integrates both spiritual ministry and professional mental health practice. Since all truth is from God, Christian counseling facilitates understanding and integration between empirical truths of general revelation and the truth of God’s special revelation in Christ. Christian counseling is an emerging profession that is distinctive in its ministry to Christendom and society-at-large, wherein people are able to identify as Christian counselors and grow in their personal and professional lives. It is also an interdisciplinary organism by which unity in Christ is genuinely possible. It holds out the potential of overshadowing the turf-protecting enmity and professional prejudice that often infects relationships between people and disciplines of ministry within the church as well as the larger world of mental health.

In Christ, helpers across the entire spectrum of Christian counseling, are challenged and encouraged to stand together in mutual respect and humble service – able to proclaim both their professional distinctives and their common Christian mission. In Christ and in Christian counseling we have all been given this sacred trust – to care for those who are hurting and in need of comfort – and therefore, we all stand together.