Why Integrate Religion into Therapy?

Clients bring a powerful healing resource into our offices every day, yet few of us know it, let alone use it to help them recover. Most of us don't realize that this valuable resource has the potential to create a strong therapeutic alliance early on, promote engagement with treatment, and increase our clients' likelihood of experiencing positive change. For those of us who do know about this resource, few have received training on how to integrate it into treatment. It's time for a change.

You've probably gathered from the title of this book that I'm going to say that this healing resource is religion. If so, you're correct, but you don't need to take my word for it. An accumulating body of scientific research shows that our clients' religious beliefs, practices, and resources can have the positive and powerful impact described above when integrated into psychotherapy.

Does Religion Belong in Psychotherapy?

I hear this question a lot from mental health practitioners. Here's my short answer: If religion is important to our clients, religion will be part of psychotherapy whether we discuss it or not.

I say this because clients can't check their worldview, spirituality, or values at our door any more than we can choose to leave our hands and feet behind when we go to work. A religious identity and worldview are integral aspects of how religious clients think about, experience, respond to, and take action upon their world, which makes for a good chance that their religious faith is a lens through which they view their experience of depression and recovery. If we don't discuss their religious beliefs and worldview, we may be missing vital information and a significant way of improving their psychological well-being.

So, to me, the question isn't really, "Does religion belong?" but rather, "How can we help our religious clients engage with and use their faith as a healing resource in psychotherapy?" This book is my attempt to answer this important question.

Research shows that the majority of our religious clients want us to discuss their religious beliefs and practices with them. In a national poll of one thousand Americans, 83 percent said their religious beliefs and emotional health were closely related, and 72 percent preferred to see a therapist who respected and integrated their religious beliefs into therapy. Other researchers have found that between 53 percent and 77 percent of clients want to have a discussion about religious and spiritual issues with their therapist. In fact, the more religious a client is, the more likely she or he will want religion to play a role in therapy. Other research shows that clients think that therapists who integrate religion and spirituality are more competent than those who do not.

You might have noticed that there is a long history of antagonism between psychology and religion, despite both being healing traditions. Fortunately, things are starting to shift, as practitioners of each tradition see that together they might provide an even more powerful healing force for those in need. For example, of 153 American marital and family therapists surveyed, 72 percent believed that spirituality is relevant to clinical practice, and 54 percent wanted to learn ways to assess for and integrate spirituality into treatment. Similarly, in a recent survey completed by 262 members of the Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapists, 96 percent reported that religious and spiritual issues are "sometimes" to "always" relevant to mental health, and 64 percent were "mostly" to "very much" interested in receiving further training in this area. However, another survey found that only 30 percent of psychologists discussed religion and spirituality with their clients.

What we see from the literature is that the majority of therapists and clients are answering the question, "Does religion belong in psychotherapy?" with a resounding "Yes!" But many mental health professionals aren't taught how to engage with religious issues in therapy, meaning that this resource for our clients often goes unnoticed and untapped. That's one of the reasons I think we really should be examining the question, "How can we help our religious clients engage with and use their faith as a healing resource?"

To answer this question, we as mental health practitioners first need to know the benefits of addressing our clients' faith in psychotherapy. Then we need an organizing therapeutic approach and a set of practical tools to enable us to integrate religion effectively into treatment, and that's what this book is designed to provide. Below, I've tried to anticipate the questions you might have about integrating religion in psychotherapy. As I attempt to provide answers, I'll say more about the benefits of incorporating our clients' religious beliefs and practices in therapy, and will introduce a therapeutic approach that helps us do just that.

If I'm Treating Depression, Why Do I Need to Know about Religion?

Let's take a look at some statistics to help answer this question. First, a little about depression, which is a serious public health problem. It's the leading cause of disability worldwide, and national surveys reveal an alarming prevalence of depression in the United States. Every year, 25 million Americans experience symptoms severe enough to warrant a diagnosis of depression. That's almost equivalent to the entire population of Texas! Twenty-five percent of women and 10 percent of men will experience an episode of depression in their lifetime. Sadly, more than half of these individuals will go on to experience at least one more episode of depression. If you're in clinical practice, no doubt you have worked with many individuals experiencing depression.

National polls also reveal that America is a religious nation. Seventy-nine percent of Americans consider themselves affiliated with a religion, 93 percent believe in God or a higher power, and 77 percent consider themselves to be religious. Although the United States is a religiously diverse nation, and is becoming more so each year, the majority of Americans — 77 percent — consider themselves Christian. Put these two sets of statistics together, and the chances are excellent that we will treat, and have already treated, Christian clients who are depressed.

At one time we might have considered religion to be just...