ABSTRACT
From the 1970s onwards there has been an impressive growth in the number of community and voluntary counselling services that has been plausibly explained in terms of the general shift from a religious to a therapeutic climate which happened in the 1960s (Lasch 1979). The churches had lost their monopoly as providers of pastoral care as people turned away from them and the world became increasingly secularised. In their place arose the professions of counselling and psychotherapy which were spearheaded by clergymen and social workers who realised that people’s spiritual and emotional needs could no longer be met by traditional methods of preaching, praying and confessing. They adapted theories and methodologies of psychoanalysis, social casework and the humanist gospel of self-help into a form of talking cure in order to assist people with their problems of living (Halmos 1965). The women’s movement, sexual and gay liberation and increasing awareness of alcohol and drug addiction among the population led to a gradual specialisation of these services which attracted volunteers and professionals and have since been springing up everywhere in response to widespread demand and need.
