This foundational training in Christian worldview, theology, and soul care is designed to frame therapy within the redemptive story of Scripture and Christian tradition. These courses provide the theological and philosophical foundation for Christ-centered therapy with a special focus on theology for mental health care professionals and psychology for pastoral counselors.
Current courses.
Examines how secular and Christian worldviews shape counseling models, ethics, and goals for therapy.
Session 1 – Worldviews as Eyeglasses, Loves, & Possibilities
Session 2 – Worldviews & Therapies: Christian, Secular, or Mixed
Session 3 – Revolutions that Shaped Modern Therapy
Session 4 – Therapy Needs All Kinds of Knowledge – Not Just Empirical
Session 5 – The Ethics of Therapy: Being a WV Minority in a Secular Therapy World
Session 6 – Christ-Centered Ethics and the Very-Good Life
Explores a Christian framework for understanding human complexity, psychopathology, and healing, based on Foundations for Soul Care.
Session 1 – Four Dimensions of Human Beings, Part 1
Session 2 – Four Dimensions of Human Beings, Part 2
Session 3 – Christian Psychopathology and the Four Dimensions
Session 4 – The Origins of Christian Inwardness & Self-Examination
Session 5 – Christian Inwardness, Internalization, & Manifestation
Session 6 – Therapy Models vs. Modalities
Presents a theological foundation for therapy rooted in the Trinity, the Christian story, Created Goodness and the realities of sin and suffering, based on God and Soul Care.
Session 1 – The Glory of the Trinity and Christian Therapy
Session 2 – Christ and the Holy Spirit, the Goal and Ultimate Means of Wellbeing
Session 3 – The Healing Story of Christianity
Session 4 – Created Good
Session 5 – Sin, Suffering, & a Christian Psychopathology
Session 6 – Weakness, Fault, and Fallenness & a Christian Psychopathology
Explores themes of union with Christ and his story, redemptive living, and transformation through Christ’s life, death, resurrection, and ascension, based on God and Soul Care.
Session 1 – Christ, the Center of Christian Therapy and Christ’s Life
Session 2 – Christ’s Death & Resurrection & Christian Therapy
Session 3 – Christ’s Ascension & the Church & Christian Therapy
Session 4 – The Old and the New
Session 5 – Redemptive Differentiation
Session 6 – Redemptive Integration
Beginning in 2027.
An overview of lifespan development according to the Bible and the Christian tradition(s) and the most important, relevant empirical research (including emotional, cognitive, social, self, and religious development and the main features of each age period), the emergence of personhood and virtue formation, and adult stages of spiritual development.
A summary of research on the soul’s embodied, neurological development and the lifelong impact of attachment, examined in light of the Bible and the Christian tradition(s), differences in the two hemispheres, and polyvagal theory.
An overview and critique of the major secular schools of therapy, highlighting Attachment Therapy, Emotion-Focused Therapy, EMDR, and Internal Family Systems, concluding with a discussion of the unique value of distinctly Christian models of therapy.
An overview of various psychological disorders, with a consideration of the role of the body, trauma, medication, agency, sin, and spiritual abuse.
Allender, D. (2006). To be told. Waterbrook.
Brown, D., & Elliott, D. S. (2016). Attachment disturbances in adults: Treatment for comprehensive repair. W. W. Norton.
Charry, E. T. (1997). By the renewing of your minds: The pastoral function of Christian doctrine. Oxford University Press.
Chrysostomos, A. (2007). A guide to Orthodox psychotherapy: The science, theology, and spiritual practice behind it and its clinical application. University Press of America.
Cloitre, M., Cohen, L. R., Ortigo, K. M., Jackson, C., & Koenen, K. C. (2020). Treating survivors of childhood abuse and interpersonal trauma: STAIR narrative therapy (2nd ed.). Guilford.
Coe, J., & Hall, T. (2007). Psychology in the Spirit. InterVarsity.
DeYoung, P. (2003). Relational psychotherapy: A primer. Brunner-Routledge.
Ecker, B., Ticic, R., & Hulley, L. (2012). Unlocking the emotional brain. Routledge.
Fosha, D. (Ed.). (2021). Undoing aloneness and the transformation of suffering into flourishing. AEDP 2.0. American Psychological Association.
Greenberg, L., & Paivio, S. (1997). Working with emotions in psychotherapy. Guilford.
Hermans, H. J. M., & Dimaggio, G. (Eds.). (2003). The dialogical self in psychotherapy. Brunner-Routledge.
Johnson, E. L. (2007). Foundations for soul care: A Christian psychology proposal. InterVarsity.
Johnson, E. L. (2017). God and soul care: The therapeutic resources of the Christian faith. InterVarsity.
Johnson, E. L. (2024). Counseling and worldviews: Negotiating conflict ethically in a pluralistic world. [Unpublished manuscript]. Christian Psychology Institute.
Lopez, A. (2016). Gift and the unity of being. Cascade Books.
McCullough, L., et al. (2003). Treating affect phobia: A manual for short-term dynamic psychotherapy. Guilford.
Moreland, J. P., & Craig, W. L. (2003). Philosophical foundations for a Christian worldview. InterVarsity.
Knabb, J. J., Johnson, E. L., Sisemore, T., & Bates, T. (2018). Psychotherapy in Christian context. Routledge.
Paivio, S. C., & Angus, L. (2017). Narrative processes in emotion-focused therapy for trauma. American Psychological Association.
Payne, L. (1995). The healing presence. Baker.
Porges, S. W. (2009). The polyvagal theory: New insights into adaptive reactions of the autonomic nervous system. Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine. 76(Supplement 2): 86–90. doi:10.3949/ccjm.76.s2.17
Schwartz, R., & Sweezy, M. (2019). Internal family systems therapy (2nd ed.). Guilford.
Shapiro, F. (2018). Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy (3rd ed.). Guilford.
Siegel, D. (2020). The developing mind (3rd ed.). Guilford.
Tanquery, A. (1930). The spiritual life. Society of St. John the Evangelist, Desclee & Co.
Vitz, P. C., Nordling, W. J., & Titus, C. S. (Eds.). (2020). A Catholic, Christian meta-model of the person. Divine Mercy University Press.