Journal Article Summary of Christian Clients' Preferences Regarding Prayer as a Counseling Intervention

Journal Article Summary of Christian Clients' Preferences Regarding Prayer as a Counseling Intervention

Introduction

The purpose of this paper is to provide a summary of an reflect on the journal article; Christian Clients' Preferences Regarding Prayer as a Counseling Intervention by Chet Weld and Karen Eriksen. The initial part of the paper presents the brief summary of the journal article, which entails brief overview of the hypotheses, methods, results, discussion, and implications presented in the article. The subsequent part of the paper is a reflection on the regarding the study's design or methodology, insights gained from reading the article, the reasons for being interested in this particular article, any other readings that may be planned based upon having read the article, and other thoughts that might further enhance the discussion of the article. The last part of the paper is an application of the information that has been acquired from this article to a potential counseling setting.

Summary

Spirituality has progressively turned into contemplation for the practitioners of mental health. Led by this, the spiritual interventions, counting in prayer, are currently employed on a more frequent basis in counseling. Nevertheless, there is no research present which has analyzed and investigated on the expectations of the Christian clients about prayer in counseling. The study carried out in this article, “Christian Clients' Preferences Regarding Prayer as a Counseling Intervention”, includes a survey of the first-visit Christian clients along with their therapists for ascertaining the expectations of the clients as well as the practices and beliefs of the therapists. The analysis is done using two sample t-tests having unequal variances, Pearson correlations, simple linear regression, one-way analysis of variance, and Fisher's exact tests. The analysis points out the following results;

In counseling, eighty two percent of the clients preferred audible prayer;

Clients desired that the therapists bring in the subject of prayer;

The clients had a lot of expectations about the prayer to be a part of counseling;

The clients desired that the counselors would pray for them outside the session;

The religiously conservative individuals had more expectations for prayer compared to the liberals;

The clients having prior Christian counseling had more expectations regarding prayer compared to those without Christian counseling;

After the analysis section, the implications of the research are discussed. For a long time, the sessions of therapy and counseling have been preferred by the individuals belonging to all denominations for helping them manage the physical and emotional distress. It has been determined through the research that counseling has incorporated the employment of prayers prior to the sessions, in between them or later. Nevertheless, still, several clients and counselors do not appear to adopt the novel approach to therapy. The use of prayers, from time to time, has been discredited, and has at times been considered as worthless as well. It has been reported by the research that the secular as well as Christian counselors have been experienced by the clients who suggested or demanded the prayer must be ...