Lay counselors and pastors are popular people to go to when there is a need for faith-based counseling. However, few are actually formally trained to be an expert in this area. Although these individuals may be “qualified” to render aid, there is an ever-increasing need of specialized care for people in dire need of emotional and mental breakthrough.

A degree in Christian counseling will help individuals earn licensure, certification, and a higher level of professional education that will lead to the creation of a reputable Christian Counseling practice.

Earning a Christian Counselor Degree

Earning a degree in Christian Counseling will enable you to utilize your gifts to help other people. Individuals who find joy in helping others overcome challenges and analyze the roots of their problems are qualified for this career. There are lot of fulfilling challenges to address in the areas of mental health, childhood, family relations, and work. There is also that exciting possibility of being self-employed or collaborate with other people to form a private practice.

Skills and qualities that will make an impact in the pursuit of a degree in Christian counseling are communication, empathy, listening, compassion, mentoring and leadership.

There are a big variety of Christian Colleges to choose from in the country that offer a Degree in Christian Counseling. Most accredited learning institutions have the common desire to give future counselors an education that is faithful to both textbooks and the Bible. There is also a strong emphasis in the importance of leading a life of kindness and integrity.

C.J. Harrison is an educational writer and editor for a number of top educational directories, including the Degree in Christian Counseling directory where students can compare accredited universities offering Christian Counselor Degrees and Programs.

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The journey to become a Christian counselor is a lot like earning the standard counseling credits. However, there are a few added elements that are part of the mix.

If you feel you are called to become a Christian counselor, the proper training is critical in order to make this happen. There are several excellent Christian colleges that offer courses in psychology and counseling. Degrees on all levels – bachelor’s, master’s and a doctorate – are available for this type of career goal.

Other learning institutions even offer Christian counseling classes on evenings and weekends. This is a great option for people who want to become a Christian counselor but have current work commitments. There are also part-time study options available for people who can only devote a specific amount of time to study in a given week.

There are individuals who have to juggle responsibilities at home and in the workplace. There are current roles to fulfill such as being an employee, a spouse and a parent all at the same time. If you can relate to this scenario, you can be a Christian counselor by opting to take classes online. This presents an ideal situation for your current lifestyle. It allows you to participate in classes in your free time and minimizes time spent commuting to and from campus.

You must also be open to joining to professional associations if you would like to become a Christian counselor. Efforts in connecting with other people in the same field may open doors for you. Networking by attending special seminars and conferences will help you out. You new contacts may be your go-to people for advice, mentoring, and training. You will also receive a lot of assistance in terms of getting licensed and certified. Finding out about hot job openings are also a great bonus!

The most important foundation in order to become a Christian counselor is to have a firm faith in the foundations of Christianity. There must be a thorough and solid understanding in the core beliefs. You will need this knowledge to impart as you help someone go through a deep healing process.

C.J. Harrison is an educational writer and editor for a number of top educational directories, including How to Become a Christian Counselor, where students can learn more about pursuing a degree in Christian Counseling.

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Afterwards, it became clear to me that his understanding of hypnosis and mine were quite different. And any good debate must begin with a clarification of terms. Too many reasonable discussions deteriorate into pointless argument because no one fully defines himself.

What do we mean then by trance and hypnosis? More specifically, what do Christians who fear hypnosis mean by it and what do ethical clinicians mean by it? For our purposes today, we will leave the madmen out of it.

The Christian Definitions or Concerns:

1. “Mesmerism”

It is very important to address this because what Christians fear about hypnosis is something rather fearful: deliberation manipulation, external mind control, or spell-casting that leaves a person open to spiritual corruption. They form their impressions of the technique from what they have read in popular media (including the early reports on “Mesmerism,” which was presented as a demonic seduction of young women by irresistible and wretched old men), watched on TV, or seen in lounge acts where hypnosis is reduced to having some poor sot play air guitar or bite happily into an onion.

It is not hard to see what makes them uneasy. And, what is worse is that there are people in the world who use hypnotic trance unethically. They may not be madmen, but they should not be calling themselves healers or professionals by any means.

In fact, the worst of these “trance inducers” have nothing to do with lounge acts or private practices. There are at least two times a day when most people are in the deepest, most vulnerable and suggestible trances they are ever in: When they are driving in their cars and when they are at home watching television. And the messages they receive in those states-usually corporate advertising-are what they are unconsciously absorbing.

2. Spiritual Bankruptcy

In Christianity’s beginnings, as in early Judaism, sickness (or insanity) was seen as a function of sin or possession. And the ONLY thing that could cure sin was God and our faith in Him. Anything that interfered with that relationship and dependence on God was prohibited. In those days, that interference usually took the shape of idolatry and pagan religions.

When seen as “mesmerism” or as a loss of control to an unknown entity (e.g., the intentions or spirituality of the hypnotherapist), hypnosis leaves the individual vulnerable to literally who-knows-what-malevolent suggestion, criminal manipulation, and demons.

As Father Russell Radoicich, an Orthodox priest from Butte, Montana, wrote, “Christianity has always called people to live in full awareness, in reality, with nothing having mastery over us except God.” When hypnosis is defined as making one person subject to another (spiritually or mentally), is it any wonder that it is seen as questionable if not downright dangerous?

Hypnosis seen this way-as a quick fix with little depth-can also be considered a crutch or a deterrent to spiritual growth, which is why Father Russell reminds us that “the spiritual work must be done or there is no true rehabilitation. People may lose weight or stop smoking, but the deeper matter has not been addressed.”

Hypnosis, when used as a proper tool in a healing manner, can actually help to facilitate what Fr. Russell is referring to as “the spiritual work” or “the deeper matter.” Again, it is in the hands of the practitioner and the patient as to where the work goes. And in this regard the choice of clinician is important.

3. The Loosening of Moral Inhibition

One of Christianity’s great fears about hypnosis is that it induces a moral laxity and makes the prohibited permissible in the patient’s mind. And, again, when hypnosis is seen this way its prohibition is understandable.

The truth, however, is that clinical hypnosis cannot make anyone do anything that would undermine their moral or ethical resolve.

In an article interview on Hypnosisnetwork, Paul Durbin, a United Methodist minister with a long history of clinical and pastoral service, recalls a famous story about Milton Erickson, M.D., one of the great hypnotherapists and psychiatrists of the last century.

One day Dr. Erickson went to his secretary and told her he was tired and wanted to rest. If anyone called, he told her, she was to say that he was out of the office. She agreed to do this for him. Some time later he put her in a hypnotic trance. He then made the same request-to tell people he was out of the office when he was in fact taking a break. While still in a formally induced trance, she refused him. “Why?” he wanted to know.

“Because,” she said, “it would be a lie.”

Ironically, in hypnosis she had a stronger moral resolve than in her normal waking state.

Hypnosis is not “brainwashing,” as Durbin points out. Brainwashing can be accomplished at any time, with or without formal trance simply by the constant repetition of suggestion. In our culture we call this advertising and media bombardment.

Let us now take a look at how responsible clinicians see hypnosis and how it can be helpful and safe for Christians to utilize it in their own healing process–whether that’s from a back injury, a surgical procedure, or a painful divorce.

The Clinical Definitions:

1. Trance As An Ordinary State of Consciousness

Perhaps the most important definition from the clinical point of view is that hypnosis only utilizes a state of consciousness that is already natural and normal. Trance is not something that is artificially induced in a person. It is not something the hypnotherapist “does” to the patient. It is simply a state of awareness in which we are more focused on an internal process (breathing, thoughts, heartbeat) and most importantly it is something all of us move in and out of all day.

Trance is normal rather than exceptional. What a good clinician will do is utilize that ordinary ability to shift awareness so that pain can be relieved, psychological blockages removed (e.g., fixations on traumatic events), and healing can be facilitated in a variety of ways.

This normal shift of awareness is even more common and spontaneous when we are frightened, hurt, or ill, which is why Verbal First Aid works so well to help stop bleeding, reduce an inflammatory response, and lower blood pressure. We can see it even more dramatically when it is used with children who enter fairly easily and frequently into “trance.”

2. Hypnosis is a Tool. Healing is Spiritual.

Healing is not dependent on one technique. A good healer or responsible clinician has more than one tool in her tool kit. Hypnosis may be one of them, but it is almost never the only one.

Hypnosis, when seen this way, as just another tool, becomes less threatening. Most clinicians acknowledge that the deepest healing is often spiritual in nature and that they are facilitators, not magicians.

Pope Pius addressed the concerns of Catholics regarding hypnosis in childbirth and stated that when used by a health care professional who was properly trained, treatment was permitted.

He also cautioned us that:

· Hypnosis was a serious issue and that it should not be toyed with;

· Practitioners should be guided by the same moral principles (Judeo-Christian ones) in their use of hypnosis as with anything else;

· The rules of good medicine must apply as much to hypnosis as to any other technique.

The truth is that no one other than God knows how healing actually occurs. We can suture one piece of skin to another, but how it knits together remains an ineffable mystery.

How Verbal First Aid Works in Alliance with Faith and the Faithful

If the definitions of trance as clinicians use it are accurate (and I believe they are) and the dangers are real as Christians see them (and I believe they certainly can be), how can the healing use of imagery work together with the faithful so that as Jesus said in John 10:10, “I am come that they may have life and have it more abundantly.”

In the beginning was the word.

That words are powerful is a familiar concept to those who read the Bible. According to many biblical scholars, the first sin was not pride, was not disobedience, was not sex. It was gossip-the misuse of words. And it is a most serious act with terribly dire consequences. The serpent whispers to Eve: “You shall not surely die.” He lied. He misled her and all of humanity, for with those words he surely brought us death.

And the only sin for which the Lord will not find us guiltless is using His name in vain.

Words have a prominent position in the Bible from the third sentence: And GOD SAID LET THERE BE LIGHT. He did not create with His “hands” or “eyes”. The “word” is used throughout to mean the “truth.” He spoke-”By the word of the Lord were the heavens made (Ps. 33).” To speak is to WILL into existence. What we say and how we say it is a co-creative act. What we say hangs somewhere between heaven and earth.

Words matter. The mystics have always known this. Only now is science catching up.

Why? Because they create images in the mind of the person to whom we are speaking. Those images and the thoughts that flow with them generate cascades of chemistry that dictate not only how we feel emotionally, but how fast or slow our hearts beat, how high our blood pressure goes, how profoundly we feel the pain of an injury, even the way our livers function.

We all use words all the time. And they have the power to help or to harm. This is already happening–on the streets, in our classrooms, on our cell phones, in our cars. What we say–and what we hear–changes the way we live and heal at the most fundamental levels. Isn’t it our obligation to make what we say as healing as possible? That’s what Verbal First Aid does–gives us the tools to be healing with our words.

Hypnosis is no different than a sermon, a lecture, a television show or a good book. It is the use of words to move us. When used in the right way with a proper intention, those words can help us heal.

Judith Acosta, LISW, is a licensed psychotherapist, crisis counselor and classical homeopath in private practice in New Mexico. She is the co-author of The Worst Is Over: What To Say When Every Moment Counts, hailed as the “bible of crisis communications.” She lectures around the country on Verbal First Aid, trauma, stress, and animal-assisted therapy. She may be reached at her website: http://www.wordsaremedicine.com/verbal-first-aid.

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Many home schooling parents choose Christian distance education as an alternative to public schooling. The curriculum is based upon Christian principles and beliefs. The Bible is the foundation for all subjects. Secular theories and ideologies are not presented as truth. In addition to the benefits of avoiding the influences of drugs, alcohol, and crime, the laws governing the separation of church and state do not restrict Christian distance education students. For example, prayer is allowed. Students acquire a high school diploma, while simultaneously strengthening religious and moral beliefs.

Beyond the high school diploma, Christian distance education affords individuals the opportunity to study for the ministry. Students may aspire to become a full-time pulpit minister or a youth minister. Contrary to popular belief, speaking on Sunday is only a small portion of ministry, and education is necessary. Ministers counsel, teach, comfort, and physically labor for the various needs of a congregation. In addition, youth ministers answer to the unique needs of today’s youth. Many youngsters come from broken homes. With drugs and alcohol so prevalent in today’s society, home may no longer be a child’s safe haven from the world’s troubles. Youth ministers may fill the roles of a parent, friend, counselor, teacher, and confidante. Again, youth rallies and fun activities are only a small portion of a youth minister’s job. Christian distance education may enable an individual to enter the ministry and benefit the community, without uprooting a family, or losing a means of support.

Laymen may also seek distance education, thus benefiting the community through Christian psychology and counseling. Many people are more comfortable seeking help, if the counselor or psychologist shares a foundation in Christian principles and ideals. Also, Christian counselors and psychologists want to practice according to personal moral and religious beliefs and not by worldly standards. Therefore, Christian distance education answers the needs of both patients and doctors.

In summary, in answer to the growing problem of violence, drugs, and alcohol in the public schools, parents are opting to enroll children in Christian distance education. Many graduates may also seek a post-secondary education in the ministry or Christian-based careers in psychology or counseling. Whether a student signs up for a correspondence course in a particular subject, or a degree program, accredited Christian distance learning is now a reality.

Dana Stephens is a freelance writer for several online publications and websites. For more information on distance learning programs please visit http://www.eLearningTips.com today.

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What does that mean for homeschoolers? Some Christian homeschoolers accept psychology wholesale, some reject it entirely, and some wrestle with which aspects to accept and which to reject. This article suggests that whatever you believe about psychology, the time to address academic psychology is BEFORE your student leaves home for college.

If your student goes to college, there is an excellent chance he/she will take an introductory (at least) psychology course. Most medical schools, liberal arts colleges, seminaries, and teacher’s colleges require students to have some exposure to psychology. Psychology is one of the most popular undergraduate majors at public and Christian colleges and universities. College enrollment in psychology courses outpaces every other scientific discipline. Christian students are often ill prepared to confront the criticisms of Christianity and the anti-Christian worldview presented by modern psychology. The material taught in introductory psychology courses WILL challenge their worldview. University level instruction in modern psychology is generally atheistic and humanistic. Psychology departments often are home to the most anti-Christian intellectuals on college campuses. As a group, psychology professors have high levels of agnosticism, skepticism, and atheism. The psychology professor is unlikely to be sympathetic to your child’s Christian worldview and may attack their faith as unscientific, irrational, prudish, exploitive, controlling, inhibitive, oppressive, and naïve.

If psychology is fraught with such danger, shouldn’t Christian homeschoolers reject it completely? Maybe. But isn’t the humble investigation of all of God’s creation part of what it means to love God with one’s mind? Do Christians, and by extension Christian homeschoolers, have a duty to explore all of God’s creation? Does that duty to explore extend to His grandest creation; Mankind? Does that duty extend to Mankind’s mind? Though the conflicts between modern psychology and a Christian worldview are many and perilous, it may be a mistake for Christians to completely reject the study of psychology.

The bottom line is this. Beginning with Darwin’s Origin of Species, all sciences, including psychology, underwent a transformation. Scientific data were interpreted in ways to exclude supernatural beliefs. Darwinian evolution imposed itself on the Christian understanding of life (biology) and then tried to exclude anything Christian. Darwinian evolution imposed itself on the Christian understanding of Man (psychology) and then tried to exclude anything Christian.

The study of the soul, the mind, the brain, and behavior (psychology) are right and proper for Christian homeschoolers. The goal of Christian education, in biology, physics, theology, chemistry, and in psychology, is to understand God’s creation and, in the words of Johannes Kepler, to “think God’s thoughts after Him.” Christians have a duty to assert the Christian worldview in academia and Christian homeschoolers have an opportunity to lead that effort. The involvement of homeschoolers in the study of psychology is an integral part of that effort.

Now browse your favorite homeschool catalogue. Count the number of biology, physics, history, and chemistry texts (and every other academic discipline) written from a Christian perspective. Lots right? Now count the number of psychology texts. Zero right? This article suggests that the absence of material for Christian homeschoolers to study psychology is a function of those critics referenced in the opening paragraph.

Those who condemn psychology cast their nets too wide. Those on the web and in Christendom who criticize psychology are generally critical of “counseling” psychology. The criticisms may be correct, but psychology is much more than counseling. It is not the purpose of this article to evaluate the criticisms of counseling psychology. Many critics seem to be thoughtful God-fearing Christians. But painting the entire discipline with the same brush used to paint counseling psychology causes many Christians to shy-away from the whole field. The study of the mind, memory, emotions, learning, development, sensation, neurons, and all the other topics that comprise psychology, is right, proper, and important for Christian homeschoolers.

Want to use this article in your website? You have my permission, as long as you include this complete blurb with it: Tim Rice, D. Min. is the author of Homeschool Psych: Preparing Christian Homeschool Students for Psych 101 available at http://www.homeschoolpsych.com

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