Ethics And Cultural Assessments: A Case Study

Summary The Word of God is powerful and has the ability to help those who are hurting, heal. Counselors need to have an understanding of how the Bible applies to their profession. They need to research the different therapeutic methods they could use, such as scriptural interventions. According to Garzon (2005), “Christian counseling is a diverse profession and within this diversity exists a wide variety of perspectives on if, when, and how to use Scripture in psychological treatment” (p 113). The article utilizes a case study to highlight the different “interventions that might incorporate Scripture has a resource” (Garzon, 2005, p. 113). Different methods are applied to the subject in the case study.

Case Study The case study describes

According to Garzon (2005), some of the “ethical areas to consider are dual relationships, imposing religious values on clients, violating work-setting boundaries, informed consent issues, and clinician competency issues” (p. 114). Counselors must assess their clients and build a relationship with them. Clients come from a variety of backgrounds and “will have a mixture of experiences with the Bible based on their particular religio-cultural background, which needs to be assessed carefully, and any Biblical interventions incorporated into treatment should be done in a highly ethical manner” (Garzon, 2005, p. 115). Therefore, counselors have to consider whether or not using Scripture is ethical and appropriate for each client’s individual

The first reason is because of my interest in utilizing scripture in counseling others. The second reason is because it gives examples of different intervention methods that could be used. The author demonstrated how to apply each one of the methods utilizing a case study. I would definitely research this topic more to learn about the different interventions used. I would also research this topic because it’s encouraging to know scripture can be utilized in counseling others.

Application

Kara is a 23-year old Caucasian young woman who has been married for three years. She came to me for counseling because her husband noticed she was depressed and struggled with low self-esteem. Her husband encouraged her to seek counseling to get to the bottom of what was causing her depression and low self-esteem. She agreed to come see me for counseling. In our first session, Kara told me she was a Christian and attended church on a regular basis. Even though she attended church, she still struggled with depression and low self-esteem. As we talked I noticed her eyes would well up with tears and she would wipe them away. I didn’t question her about it, but decided to wait for her to tell me what was wrong when the time came. I disclosed to her the different treatment interventions with her and she consented to scriptural interventions being incorporated into her treatment (Garzon, 2005, p.