(DOWNLOAD) "Foundations for a Psychotherapy of Virtue: An Integrated Catholic Perspective (Essay)" by Journal of Psychology and Christianity * Book PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Foundations for a Psychotherapy of Virtue: An Integrated Catholic Perspective (Essay)
- Author : Journal of Psychology and Christianity
- Release Date : January 22, 2009
- Genre: Religion & Spirituality,Books,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 245 KB
Description
Recent efforts have explicated Catholic anthropological foundations for clinical psychology (Brugger & the faculty of the Institute for the Psychological Sciences, 2008), incorporating a positive developmental and therapeutic psychology paradigm in terms of three levels: basic virtues, character strengths, and practices (Titus & Moncher, in press). In this article, we consider a psychology of virtue, which draws from a virtue-tradition with its achievements in philosophical and theoretical psychology (see, e.g., Aristotle, trans 1941; Aquinas, 1270/trans 1981; Hauerwas, 1981; John Paul II, 1998; McIntyre, 1981; Pinckaers, trns 1995, 2005; Titus, 2006). From within this tradition, we have identified certain anthropological principles relevant to the task of psychotherapy that spring from theological and philosophical sources (Moncher, 2001). Inasmuch as we take an explicitly CatholicChristian perspective, we differ from other recent efforts to re-appropriate virtue in psychology, both those that assert a non-normative framework and those that take a relativistic approach to moral norms. On the one hand, the positive psychology paradigm of character strengths and virtues has attempted to abstract itself not only from particular religious traditions, but also from moral norms as such (e.g., Seligman, 2002; Peterson & Seligman, 2004; Joseph & Linley 2006; Snyder & Lopez, 2007). For example, Peterson and Seligman (2004) claim their "richer psychological content and greater explanatory power" (p. 88) is descriptive of character strengths, but without normative reference. While seeking moral references for good character in a pre-empirical moral anthropology (through the construal of the nature of virtue and the notion of positive human nature), they distance the inner motivation of the virtues from moral considerations (laws and principles) and from the normativeness of human nature. Such a separation of virtue and ethical sources (moral inclinations, sentiments, law, and principle) renders both psychological guidance and moral agency indecisive. While this approach may give some clues for positive growth, we find that it has not yet succeeded in understanding the role of virtue in psychotherapy (Titus & Moncher, in press; Titus, 2008). On the other hand, others see psychotherapy as moral discourse (e.g., Cushman 1990, 1993) and affirm the necessity of moral borders. Cushman (1993) sees the psychotherapist as a resource in the patient's discernment of moral issues (see also Tjeltveit, 1999), and claims that "It is the job of a psychotherapist to demonstrate the existence of a world constituted by different rules and to encourage patients to be aware of available moral traditions that oppose the moral frame by which they presently shape their lives" (p. 109). Moreover, he postulates an empty self, which is filled by ambient historical, cultural, and moral contexts, but only with relativistic references.