30th Annual Psychotherapy & Faith Conference
Faith in the Life and Work of the Therapist: Turning the Lens Around
Friday, November 5, 2021 | 8:30 AM - 3:00 PM CT | Held virtually
5.25 CEU/CME available for physicians, psychologists, addictions professionals, social workers, licensed professional counselors
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Faith in the Life and Work of the Therapist: Turning the Lens Around
Understandably, our professional education mainly focuses its lens on the needs and wellbeing of persons we endeavor to help. To the extent that psychotherapy and other forms of counseling encompass religion and spirituality in their purview, they turn their attention toward the health and flourishing of their clients. But this routine focus leaves a gap in the education of therapists, because it leaves out the clinician’s spirituality and its role in treatment.
In this conference, presenters turn the lens around, focusing on themselves and, more specifically, the role of their faith in their work. Moreover, the role faith plays in their work cannot be divorced from its role in their life. This shift in orientation is consistent with ethical practice, which encompasses self-care and associated wellbeing. As it is in life, the conference will elucidate the sheer diversity of forms that faith takes—religious, spiritual, and secular. All forms of faith are shaped by professional and cultural contexts superimposed on individual diversity in life experiences.
Alongside their diversity, the presenters share a conviction that conducting psychotherapy as well as the broader range of healing practices is best sustained by faith. Presenters will elucidate some the innumerable forms faith might take through their personal experience in life and work, using a self-directed close-up lens
Agenda:
Jon G. Allen, PhD
Making Room for Faith in Psychotherapy
Konjin Gaelyn Godwin, Abbot, Houston Zen Center
Zen Meditation and the Heart of Psychotherapy
KEYNOTE:
Lisa Miller, PhD - Columbia University Teacher’s College
Fostering Faith Development
Carolyn Jacobs, MSW, PHD
For Such a Time as This: A Call to Draw Strength from Spirituality
Panel Discussion: Turning the Lens Around
Stephen Thorney, MDiv, MA
Manizeh Mirza-Gruber, MD
Andrea Stolar, MD
Shweta Sharma, PsyD
Integration – A Conversation Between
Jim Lomax, MD and Kenneth Pargament, PhD
Speakers and Panelists:
KEYNOTE: Lisa Miller, PhD
Konjin Gaelyn Godwin, Roshi
Kenneth Pargament, PhD
Carolyn Jacobs,, MSW, PHD
Manizeh Mirza-Gruber, MD
James Lomax, MD
John Allen, PhD
Andrea Stolar, MD
Shweta Sharma, PsyD
The Psychotherapy and Faith Conference - Celebrating 30 Years
In the summer of 1992 Dr. William Cantrell retired as an Adjunct Faculty to the “Institute of Religion” and asked me to take his place. I agreed even though I knew almost nothing about the Institute, except its location in the heart of the Texas Medical Center. At my first meeting I met a passionate member of the Institute’s Board of Trustees, Mrs. Loise Wessendorff. Mrs. Wessendorff wanted to start a new conference with a very clear motivation and mission: “Preachers and Doctors don’t talk to each other enough. They should. I want to do something about that!” Loise knew that when people are hurting with emotional distress they often turn to their faith community with important questions about what is wrong with them and what type of help they need. For 30 years the Annual Psychotherapy and Faith Conference has been a forum for mental health professionals and faith community leaders (Clergy, Chaplains, Theologians, and religious study academicians) to discuss shared topics of concern. Topics have ranged from clinical (depression, anxiety, and grief) to powerful emotions and yearnings (faith, hope, and love), to critical activities (child rearing and sanctification--illuminating the sacred in healing relationships). Neither mental health professionals nor clergy are predictably well informed about their counterpart’s perspectives. The conference brings together local and regional faith leaders and mental health professionals, interested laity, and distinguished scholars to discuss topics of common concern. We have the chance to appreciate our diverse conceptual approach in ways that enrich the “practices” of all involved.