NOT A JOKE . . .

             Initially, I thought it a bad April Fool's joke when I read about it yesterday.  Then I learned that it was for real.  There is apparently a Bill pending in the Tennessee State Legislature that would allow mental health counselors to refuse to treat persons with belief systems different from their own.

     One Tennessee legislator reportedly told a television station that "the bill is aiming to reinforce the First Amendment by protecting the religious rights of counselors, allowing them to refer a patient elsewhere."

     As a professional mental health counselor, I know that such a practice violates the American Counseling Association's Code of Ethics that stipulates that professional counselors may not refuse clients based on "age, culture, disability, ethnicity, race, religion/spirituality, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, marital/partnership status, language preference, socioeconomic status, immigration status, or any basis proscribed by law."

    And, the American Association of Pastoral Counselors (of which I have been a Clinical Fellow) asserted that "we avoid imposing our beliefs on others, although we may express them when appropriate in the pastoral counseling process."

    I am in practice with an organization that offers 'faith-integrated' therapy. . . rather different  from 'faith-based'.  When meeting with a new client, I indicate that I consider myself a 'pastoral counselor' (as a retired United Methodist minister).  What that means for them is that if matters of belief and practice are topics that they want to include in our conversations, then I am 'at home' with the vocabulary and experience without our having to agree on matters of interpretation and that their positions are treated with respect.
However, if matters of faith, etc. are peripheral or irrelevant to them, then I am a Licensed Professional Counselor Supervisor and able to "walk in both worlds".  Currently, my clients span a broad religious ( and political) spectrum :  Pentecostal,  Black Muslim, Protestant ministers of several denominations and theological viewpoints, Roman Catholics, a former cloistered monk, as well as agnostics, 'nominals' and 'indifferents'.  Because our sessions are not for theological debate, I work with clients' own belief systems as a resource to help them gain clarity on their therapeutic 'issues'.  If pressed to define/describe my faith perspective, I doubt that many of my clients would be able to do so.

    'Evangelism' (some might say 'proselytizing') as a process to bring someone else to one's own faith perspectives and interpretations is a long practiced form of 'ministering'.  But not, I believe, in the counseling relationship.  Stated plainly, evangelism is not my ministry.  And, many of these  so-called' religious freedom' bills carry a huge agenda of discrimination and mean-spiritedness.

     I looked up the definition of 'minister' in an on-line dictionary. Among the meanings that I found, I particularly liked this one: "You don't have to be religious to minister.  When you minister to someone, you take care of them."

    Fred Craddock died recently. He was a Protestant teacher/preacher extraordinaire.  He told the story of when Rear Admiral Thornton Miller came to his college when he was a freshman.  Miller had been a military chaplain at D-Day in Normandy.  He told Craddock and some of his friends about how he had gone from soldier to soldier --- some screaming, crying, dying --- attempting to offer comfort and prayers.  As Craddock told the story: "Someone asked . . . 'Why did you do that?'
  His answer: 'I'm a minister.'
  And the person began again, 'But didn't you ask if they were Catholic or Protestant or Jew?  Did you just . . . I mean, if you're a minister . . .'
  Now get this. Rear Admiral Miller said, 'If you're a minister, the only question you ask is, 'Can I help you?' "  (Craddock Stories, p.137)

    Satchel