ABSTRACT
In the eleventh chapter, a variety of methods of healing are explored, both secular and Christian. According to Christianity, Christ is the savior and redeemer of the world (1 John 4:14) because he provided a way of reconciliation to God and made possible a new life of greater human flourishing. So, Christ is at the center of a distinctly Christian psychotherapy, for it is based, ultimately, on Christ and his story. A key aspect of Christian psychotherapy, then, is helping Christian clients reorganize and recalibrate their values, so that God is supreme and everything else is interpreted in relation to him and his purposes. Such a transfer of perspective, away from ourselves and on to God, can help move Christians towards an objectivity necessary to every kind of effective therapy. In fact, many therapy models aim at cultivating the capacities of clients to relate differently to a disordered psychic element (a belief, emotion scheme, relational perception, defense, or part) by experiencing it, maintaining it in their consciousness, and “distancing” themselves from it. Christian detachment, along with other important mechanisms of change in Christian psychotherapy, is discussed in this chapter in the context of redemption and union with Christ.
