Spirituality in Systemic Family Therapy Supervision and Training (Focused Issues in Family Therapy)

This book examines the implications of exploring spirituality through the lens of human relationships. It addresses systemic supervision and training and explores a systemic approach to the development of the self. The book provides an educational methodology that lays a foundation in describing an operational model of spirituality that is applicable for both theistic and nontheistic perspectives. In addition, it details how spirituality is itself a diversity as well as explores spirituality through a lens of diversity. In addition, a pilot research project on spirituality set in a MFT Live Supervision Group illustrates how to apply a systemic approach to spirituality. Finally, the book offers examples of practice using spirituality in various training settings.

· How a systemic approach to spirituality enables the lens of relationship and diversity to enrich supervising and teaching family therapy emerging from the self of therapist concerns.

· Theoretical perspectives that connect systemic practice with spirituality in an approach for family therapy.

· How a systemic spiritual approach can be used in training marriage and family therapists.

· Interventions that focus on how a relational systemic approach views transcendence and immanence from both clinical and spiritual perspectives.

· Concepts that inform supervision and training with the goals of educating students to be spiritually literate and spiritually sensitive.

· Barriers to implementing this approach with examples of how to address such obstacles.

Spirituality in Systemic Family Therapy Supervision and Training is a must-have resource for researchers, professors, graduate students as well as clinicians, supervisors, and professionals in clinical psychology, family studies / family therapy, and public health as well as all interrelated disciplines.

Suzanne M. Coyle, M.Div., Ph.D., is the Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology and Marriage and Family Therapy at Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis. She directs the Master of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy program which is COAMFTE accredited. Dr. Coyle holds a M.Div. and Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary. An ordained clergywoman and spiritual director, she trained at the Ackerman Institute for the Family in New York and the Dulwich Centre in Adelaide, South Australia. She is a Clinical Fellow and Approved Supervisor in the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy and was designated Diplomate American Association of Pastoral Counselors, a historic organization which has now merged with the Association for Clinical Pastoral Education. Dr. Coyle is a member of the Society for Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration, the International Family Therapy Association, and the Society for Pastoral Theology. She has presented nationally and internationally at both family therapy and pastoral theology conferences. Dr. Coyle’s private clinical practice focuses on work with culturally diverse families as they identify new stories in their lives that empower them and release them from oppressive discourses.