Helping the Good Shepherd: Pastoral Counselors in a Psychotherapeutic Culture, 1925-1975

316 Pages·2009·3.06 MB·English

by  Susan E. Myers-Shirk

Helping the Good Shepherd
Medicine, Science, and Religion in Historical Context
Ronald L. Numbers, Consulting Editor
Helping the Good Shepherd
Pastoral Counselors in a Psychotherapeutic Culture
1925–1975
SUSAN E. MYERS-SHIRK
The Johns Hopkins University Press
Baltimore
©2009 The Johns Hopkins University Press
All rights reserved. Published 2009
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Much of chapter 8 appeared in “To Be Fully Human: U.S. Protestant Psychotherapeutic
Culture and the Subversion of the Domestic Ideal, 1945–1965,” Journal of Women’s
History12, no. 1 (2000):112–136, © Indiana University Press, and is reprinted, in
slightly altered form, by permission of The Johns Hopkins University Press.
Library of Congress C ata loging-i n-P ublication Data
Myers- Shirk, Susan E., 1958–
Helping the Good Shepherd : pastoral counselors in a psychotherapeutic culture,
1925–1975 / Susan E. Myers- Shirk.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13:978-0-8018-9047-5 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-10:0-8018-9047-0 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Pastoral c ounseling—United S tates—History—20th century.
2. Liberalism—Religious aspects—Protestant churches—History—
20th century. 3. United States—Church history—20th century. i. Title.
BV4012.2.M94 2009
253.50973'0904—dc22 2008021240
A cata log record for this book is available from the British Library.
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For
Stephanie Jo Myers, 1968–1990
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contents
Ac knowl edg ments ix
Introduction 1
1 Anton Boisen and the Scientifi c Study of Religion 16
2 The Methodology of Clinical Pastoral Education 40
3 The Minds of Moralists 62
4 From Adjustment to Autonomy 86
5 Democracy and the Psychologically Autonomous
Individual 102
6 An Ethic of Relationships 122
7 Gendered Moral Discourse 142
8 The Language of Rights and the Challenge to the
Domestic Ideal 162
9 Resurrection of the Shepherd 180
10 Christian Counseling and the Conservative
Moral Sensibility 206
Epilogue 234
Notes 241
Index 293
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ac know ledgments
As the setting for one of her Peter Wimsey mysteries, Gaudy Night, Dor-
othy Sayers chose an imaginary women’s college at Oxford University.
Sayers was familiar with the scholarly life and created a character named
Miss Lydgate who had spent a good bit of her academic life writing
a history of prosody—repeatedly revising and editing her prose and
checking—and rechecking—her facts. Her colleagues fi nally wrested
the manuscript from her and carried it off to the publisher, despite Miss
Lydgate’s protest “about a footnote on page 97.” I am somewhat in Miss
Lydgate’s situation; only through the intervention of friends, family, and
colleagues has this work made its way to the light of publication. As a
result, I have a rather long list of people to thank and acknowledge.
In its original incarnation, this book was a dissertation, and so I want
to acknowledge the help and direction given me early in my career by
my dissertation director, Sally McMurry, my committee chair, Isabel F.
Knight, and committee members Anne Rose and Judith Van Herik, all
at Penn State University. My fellow graduate students and dear friends
Su-Ya Chang and Bill Blair, and Bill’s wife, Mary Anne, played a criti-
cal role in those early years. Once I arrived at Middle Tennessee State
University, the Women’s Work Group in the History Department took
up where my graduate school mentors and friends had left off. I owe a
deep debt of gratitude to Yuan- ling Chao, Martha Harroun Foster, Gina
Hames, Mary Hoffschwelle, Jan Leone, Rebecca Cawood McIntyre, and
Amy Sayward, who have challenged me intellectually and encouraged
and prodded me at various points along the way.
I have also been extremely fortunate in the funding I have received for
this project. First, while the manuscript was still a dissertation, I received
a fellowship from the University of Chicago Divinity School Congrega-
tional History Project. Two grants, an MTSU Faculty Research and Cre-
ativity Activity Grant and assistance from the Louisville Institute for the
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