The Effect of Religious Beliefs on the Publication Productivity of Countries in Circumcision: A Comprehensive Bibliometric View

Circumcision is one of the most common surgical operations in newborns, babies, and children due to cultural, religious, and medical reasons. Religious beliefs are known to have an important role in circumcision. Although bibliometric analyses have been performed about several topics with a lot of publications in literature, no studies in the literature were found to focus on male circumcision. This study aims to make a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of circumcision and investigate the relationship between publication productivity and religious beliefs of the countries. Web of Science was utilized to obtain the documents needed for bibliometric analyses. "Circumcision" keyword was used for search. The search included studies published between 1980 and 2018. The literature review indicated that there were 3694 publications about circumcision published between 1980 and 2018. Of these publications, 1770 (47.9%) were articles. This study provided a bibliometric summary of 1770 articles. The top five active countries about circumcision were the USA, England, South Africa, Turkey, and Kenya. The present study found that the religious beliefs of a country were directly related to publication productivity about circumcision. The top-cited study was the article entitled "Male circumcision for HIV prevention in young men in Kisumu, Kenya: a randomized controlled trial" written by Bailey et al. and published in the journal of Lancet. The keyword analysis results showed that HIV was the top keyword used in all articles about circumcision. This study is believed to help researchers interested in circumcision topic to access a summary of the literature, see contemporary and more important topics, and discover new ideas about the issue.

The Degenerating Sex: Female Sterilisation, Medical Authority and Racial Purity in Catholic Brazil

This article examines female sterilisation practices in early twentieth-century Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It argues that the medical profession, particularly obstetricians and psychiatrists, used debates over the issue to solidify its moral and political standing during two political moments of Brazilian history: when the Brazilian government separated church and state in the 1890s and when Getúlio Vargas's authoritarian regime of the late 1930s renewed alliances with the Catholic church. Shifting notions of gender, race, and heredity further shaped these debates. In the late nineteenth century, a unified medical profession believed that female sterilisation caused psychiatric degeneration in women. By the 1930s, however, the arrival of eugenics caused a divergence amongst physicians. Psychiatrists began supporting eugenic sterilisation to prevent degeneration - both psychiatric and racial. Obstetricians, while arguing that sterilisation no longer caused mental disturbances in women, rejected it as a eugenic practice in regard to race. For obstetricians, the separation of sex from motherhood was more dangerous than any racial 'impurities', both phenotypical and psychiatric. At the same time, a revitalised Brazilian Catholic church rejected eugenics and sterilisation point blank, and its renewed ties with the Vargas regime blocked the medical implementation of any eugenic sterilisation laws. Brazilian women, nonetheless, continued to access the procedure, regardless of the surrounding legal and medical proscriptions.

The 'Converted Unbelievers': Catholics in Family Planning in French-Speaking Belgium (1947-73)

This paper looks at the journey of eleven counsellors in marital counselling centres in French-speaking Belgium, from the creation of the centres in 1953, to the 1970s, when contraception became legal, and abortion became a public issue. At the time of Humanae Vitae, groups of volunteers, working within Catholic organisations where counselling took place, began to structure their activity around Carl Rogers's ethics of client-centred therapy, placing their religious ideology in a secondary position to focus on the problems experienced by the couples and women they were receiving in the centres. These were often challenges they were experiencing themselves in their own lives. The reiteration of the Catholic orthodox view on contraception through Humanae Vitae marked a gap between the counsellors and the Church. This contribution questions the identity-related tension of Catholics working in conjugal counselling centres and the type of commitments they made to both the conjugal centres and the Church in a moment where family planning was debated both in the Church and politically.

Religious refusals to long-acting reversible contraceptives in Catholic settings: a call for evidence

No-cost contraceptive provisions as in the Affordable Care Act have substantially reduced the financial burdens that patients previously faced with long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) access. Such efforts have contributed to improved LARC uptake and substantial declines in unintended pregnancy and abortion rates. However, governmental protections that allow religious restrictions to care to be implemented at institutional and systemic levels currently limit equitable access by healthcare consumers. A significant proportion of the US healthcare market is controlled by Catholic healthcare systems, which use moral teachings to inform guidelines to care. Many patients do not realize that their healthcare choices will be affected by attendance at a Catholic institution, in part because such facilities do little to inform patients of restrictions to common reproductive services including LARC. Limited data demonstrate that often hormonal intrauterine devices are provided through workarounds, but that implants and copper intrauterine devices are rarely available or approved in Catholic settings. The scarcity of data, particularly on patient outcomes, is in part explained by research barriers within Catholic settings. This Call for Action sets forth the notion that we should no longer remain complicit with allowances for institutional religious refusals of care unless we understand medical and ethical outcomes.

The Contraceptive Pill in Ireland c.1964-79: Activism, Women and Patient-Doctor Relationships

The twentieth-century history of men and women's attempts to gain access to reproductive health services in the Republic of Ireland has been significantly shaped by Ireland's social and religious context. Although contraception was illegal in Ireland from 1935 to 1979, declining family sizes in this period suggest that many Irish men and women were practising fertility control measures. From the mid-1960s, the contraceptive pill was marketed in Ireland as a 'cycle regulator'. In order to obtain a prescription for the pill, Irish women would therefore complain to their doctors that they had heavy periods or irregular cycles. However, doing so could mean going against one's faith, and also depended on finding a sympathetic doctor. The contraceptive pill was heavily prescribed in Ireland during the 1960s and 1970s as it was the only contraceptive available legally, albeit prescribed through 'coded language'. The pill was critiqued by men and women on both sides of the debate over the legalisation of contraception. Anti-contraception activists argued that the contraceptive pill was an abortifacient, while both anti-contraception activists and feminist campaigners alike drew attention to its perceived health risks. As well as outlining these discussions, the paper also illustrates the importance of medical authority in the era prior to legalisation, and the significance of doctors' voices in relation to debates around the contraceptive pill. However, in spite of medical authority, it is clear that Irish women exercised significant agency in gaining access to the pill.

Religion, Spirits, Human Agents and Healing: A Conceptual Understanding from a Sociocultural Study of Tehuledere Community, Northeastern Ethiopia

This paper explores the relationship among religion, spirits and healing in the Tehuledere community in the northeastern part of Ethiopia and focuses on how this knowledge can inform primary healthcare reform. The study employed qualitative ethnographic methods. Participatory observation, over a total of 5 months during the span of 1 year, was supplemented by focus group discussions (96 participants in 10 groups) and in-depth interviews (n = 20) conducted with key informants. Data were analyzed thematically using narrative strategies. The present study revealed that members of the study community perceive health, illness and healing as being given by God. Many of the Tehuledere people attribute illness to the wrath of supernatural forces. Healing is thought to be mitigated by divine assistance obtained through supplication and rituals and through the healing interventions of nature spirit actors. We found that the health, illnesses and healing were inextricably linked to religious and spiritual beliefs. Our findings suggest that religious and spiritual elements should be considered when drafting and implementing primary healthcare strategies for the study communities and similar environments and populations around the globe.

Preserving Human-Nature's Interaction for Sustainability: Quran and Sunnah Perspective

Environmental sustainability is one of the contemporary discourses that has abundant values embedded in the Quran and Sunnah teachings. Islam gives great emphasis on environment as it is preserved and protected under the Maqasid al-Shariah (Objectives of the Islamic Law). The general outlook of Quranic paradigm on utilizing natural environment is based on prohibition of aggression and misuse. It is likewise founded on the construction and sustainable use. Thus, this article attempts to elaborate key concepts of the Quran and Sunnah teachings that reveal imperative values for environmental sustainability. Research method employs in this paper is an analytical study of Quranic verses with special highlights of tafsir bi al-ma'thur (explanation based upon traditions), tafsir bi al-ra'yi (explanation based on reasoning), and historical narrative. In short, this paper brings to light the relevance of classical and contemporary works of Quran and Sunnah studies that have meticulous values for shaping the better world of human-nature's interaction.

The Effect of Religious Intervention Using Prayer for Quality of Life and Psychological Status of Patients with Permanent Pacemaker

The development of heart disease, followed by the pacemaker implantation, has reduced the quality and psychological problems for patients. Thus, the present study was conducted to determine the effect of prayer on the quality of life and the psychological status of patients with permanent pacemaker. This is a quasi-experimental study in which 75 patients were assigned to experimental and control groups. Religious intervention was conducted for the experimental group, including the Tavasol prayer and four recommended (mustahab) remembrances in 7 sessions. Before and after the intervention, the patients were provided with the quality of life questionnaire and psychological status. Then, the questionnaires were analyzed using descriptive and analytical tests. Before intervention, there was no difference between quality of life status and psychological status of patients, but after intervention, their quality of life increased and their psychological status improved significantly. The implementation of religious intervention based on prayer positively affects the quality of life and psychological status of patients; thus, implementing this intervention is necessary for patients.

Amphiaraos, the Healer and Protector of Attika

Amphiaraos was an important and popular healing hero/god in Athens from the end of the fifth century BC, however, not much has been studied. This paper investigates the figure in various ways by examining different sources. In the sixth century BC and in to the fifth, Amphiaraos was an Argive warrior hero that came into war against Thebes. He then seems to have acquired a sanctuary in the Theban territory being a mantic hero. In the end of the fifth century BC, however, he is said to have swallowed up by the earth and sprang up again in a spring at Oropos. Between 420-414 BC, his sanctuary was set up by the Athenians at Oropos. But this time, he was venerated as a healing hero. In 420 BC, Asklepios was introduced to Athens in order to cure plague that went around from 430s BC. It seems that the Athenians benchmarked Asklepios to promote one more healing hero/god at their north eastern border. When Oropos was taken by their enemies, a substitute Amphiareion was established in Rhamnous, a deme close to Oropos. The Athenians also promoted a patriotic hero through the words of Euripides. Illustrated as having gone through the same process of sacrifice - death - commemoration, Amphiaraos was put in parallel with the Athenian mythical king Erechtheus. Through this parallel, Amphiaraos became a political figure that protected Athens from outside threats. Healing was, by the ancient Athenians, understood in a wide spectrum and was considered as a way to protect the polis.

The Use of Prayer in the Management of Pain: A Systematic Review

The availability of safe and effective non-pharmacological therapies for pain is an important unmet medical need. Prayer may be considered as an effective adjunctive therapy for pain and this systematic review aims to clarify this association. Pertinent databases were searched for English language publications, dated 2000-2019. Inclusion criteria involved prayer as an on-site or personal intervention and at least one pre-specified pain-related outcome. We evaluated 411 abstracts. Nine studies met criteria. Active prayer to God emerged as a preferred beneficial intervention for religious patients undergoing surgery or a painful procedure. Prayer effect does not seem to be opioid mediated. Improved trial design will facilitate the study of prayer as an adjuvant therapy for pain.

The Effect of Religious Beliefs on the Attitude of Aesthetic Surgery Operation in Islam

This study aims to investigate the relationship between individuals' attitudes about acceptance of aesthetic surgery (e.g. rhinoplasty, autoplasty, blepharoplasty, and mammaplasty) and some of the worship practices in Islamic religion such as performing prayer, fasting, and going to pilgrimage. Although many people think that aesthetic surgery is inappropriate in Islamic religion, no studies in the literature were found to have investigated this issue. This study collected data through a questionnaire administered to 96 patients who applied to our Plastic Surgery Clinic and underwent various surgical operations and 96 patients who were recommended plastic surgery but rejected to have one; the questionnaire aimed to identify the participants' frequency of religious worship practices and appropriateness of aesthetic surgery to their beliefs. The participants responded on the frequency of religious worship levels according to the options in the questionnaire. The "Acceptance of Cosmetic Surgery Scale" was utilized in order to identify their attitudes towards aesthetic surgery. Levels of performing prayers, fasting, and going to pilgrimage in the groups that accepted surgery and in the groups that rejected surgery were significantly different (p < 0.001, p = 0.008, p < 0.001). In two different groups, the Acceptance of Aesthetic Surgery Scale scores were significantly different within the prayer groups and fasting groups (p < 0.001, p < 0.001, p = 0.001, p < 0.001). While the group that accepted surgery indicated no significant differences between those who thought about going to pilgrimage and who did not (p = 0.650), there was a significant difference in the group that rejected surgery (p < 0.001). While 14.6% of the participants in the group that accepted surgery considered aesthetic surgery a sin, this proportion was 56.3% in the group that rejected surgery, and this difference was significant (p < 0.001). In both surgery groups, there were differences in the scale scores of those who considered aesthetic surgery a sin and those who did not (p < 0.001, p < 0.001). There was a significant relationship between worship practices, one of the biggest indicators of the level of belief in Islamic religion, and aesthetic surgery attitudes. However, despite the fact that belief levels affect the decision of having an operation in plastic surgery, in case of serious health problems, the decision of having an operation becomes more important religious beliefs.

Response Bias in Research on Religion, Spirituality and Mental Health: A Critical Review of the Literature and Methodological Recommendations

Although a significant body of research supports the psychological benefits of religion and spirituality, more investigations are needed to understand the mechanisms by which they impact mental health. While some studies suggest a causal direct influence, the findings may still be subject to unmeasured factors and confounders. Despite compelling empirical support for the dangers of response bias, this has been a widely neglected topic in mental health research. The aim of this essay is to critically examine the literature addressing the role of response bias in the relationship between religion, spirituality and mental health. A survey of the diverse types of bias in this research area is presented, and methodological and theoretical issues are outlined. The validity and generalizability of the evidence are discussed, as well as the implications for mental health practice. A list of methodological remedies to reduce bias is suggested. The article is then concluded with a summary of the studies reviewed and directions for future research.

Family Planning Advice in State-Socialist Poland, 1950s-80s: Local and Transnational Exchanges

This paper scrutinises the relations between different models of family planning advice and their evolution in Poland between the mid-1950s and the late 1980s, focusing on their similarities and dissimilarities, conflicts and concordances. From 1956 onwards, the delivery of family planning advice became a priority for both the Polish Catholic Church and the party-state, especially its health authorities, which supported the foundation of the Society of Conscious Motherhood and aspired to mainstream birth control advice through the network of public well-woman clinics. As a consequence, two systems of family planning counselling emerged: the professional, secular family planning movement and Catholic pre-marital and marital counselling. We argue that reciprocal influence and emulation existed between state-sponsored and Catholic family planning in state-socialist Poland, and that both models used transnational organisations and debates relating to contraception for their construction and legitimisation. By evaluating the extent to which the strategies and practices for the delivery of birth control advice utilised by transnational birth control movements were employed in a 'second world' context such as Poland, we reveal unexpected supranational links that complicate and problematise historiographical and popular understandings of the Iron Curtain and Cold War Europe.

Spiritual and Religious Healing Practices: Some Reflections from Saudi National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Riyadh

Traditional practices constituting spiritual and religious (S/R) healing are an important component of the holistic healthcare model and are used in health, well-being, and treating a variety of diseases around the world. The main focus of this review is to summarize the Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) studies that especially target S/R healing practices in Saudi Arabia (SA) and discuss the results in light of relevant international literature. From year 2013-2017, electronic searches of PubMed, OvidSP, Google Scholar, and two publishing housing Web sites (Sciencedomain.com and Dove Medical Press.com) were made using key words and Boolean operators and retrieved thousands of published papers from peer-reviewed journals. Two independent reviewers decided to include a total of 108 articles: 48 from SA and 60 from other international literature. The sociodemographic variables of the participants varied in local studies and were comparable with international data. The frequency and types of religious and spiritual practices reported in local and international zones varied in accordance with religious belief, gender, age, education, and prevalent chronic diseases. Most of professionals and practitioners showed fairly good knowledge and positive attitude toward spiritual and religious practices used in diverse clinical and non-clinical situations across the world. Furthermore, it was observed that in the international scenario, S/R researches using specific religious screening tools have been conducted on different aspects of clinical application including self-care, social cohesion, negative impact, and child development, whereas regional studies targeting varied participants mainly focused on the epidemiological trends of S/R therapies in Saudi Arabia. CAM practitioners and public tend to show great interest in prescribed and self-use of religious and spiritual therapies across the world because of multiple dynamic forces, including positive effects on health, sense of well-being and disease control, cost-effectiveness, easy access to services, and improvement in quality of life. Further studies are needed to assess the effectiveness of different types of religious and spiritual therapies and practices used in specific diseases, their role in promotion of health and well-being, and prevention of diseases nationwide and across the world. Besides integration of S/R into mainstream treatment modalities, medical education curriculum, continuous medical education, and training programs are needed for bridging the knowledge, attitude, and practice gaps concerning CAM in targeted population groups such as medical professionals, CAM practitioners, medical students, public and traditional healers, not only in SA but also around the world.

Contraception and Catholicism in the Twentieth Century: Transnational Perspectives on Expert, Activist and Intimate Practices

This special issue uses Catholicism as a thread to bring together five contributions to the transnational history of contraception. The articles, which cover examples from Western and East-Central Europe, East Africa and Latin America, all explore the complex interplay between users and providers of birth control in contexts marked by prevalence of the Catholic religion and/or strong political position of the Catholic Church. In the countries examined here, Brazil, Belgium, Poland, Ireland and Rwanda, Catholicism was the majority religion during the different moments of the long twentieth century the authors of this special issue focus on. Using transnationalism as a perspective to examine the social history of the entanglements between Catholicism and contraception, this special issue seeks to underscore the ways in which individuals and organisations used, adapted and contested local and transnational ideas and debate around family planning. It also examines the role of experts and activist groups in the promotion of family planning, while paying attention to national nuances in Catholic understandings of birth control. The contributions shed light on the motivations behind involvement in birth control activism and expertise, its modus operandi, networking strategies and interactions with men and women demanding contraceptive information and technology. Moreover, through the use of oral history, as well as other print sources such as women's magazines, this collection of articles seeks to illustrate 'ordinary' men and women's practices in the realm of reproductive health.

'There Are No Other Options?': Rwandan Gender Norms and Family Planning in Historical Perspective

This article surveys the evolution of Rwandan family planning practices from the nation's mythico-historical origins to the present. Rwanda is typically regarded as a patriarchal society in which Rwandan women have, throughout history, endured limited rights and opportunities. However, oral traditions narrated by twentieth-century Rwandan historians, storytellers and related experts, and interpreted by the scholars and missionaries who lived in Rwanda during the nation's colonial period, suggest that gender norms in Rwanda were more complicated. Shifting practices related to family planning - particularly access to contraception, abortion, vasectomies and related strategies - are but one arena in which this becomes evident, suggesting that women's roles within their families and communities could be more diverse than the historiography's narrow focus on women as wives and mothers currently allows. Drawing upon a range of colonial-era oral traditions and interviews conducted with Rwandans since 2007, I argue that Rwandan women - while under significant social pressure to become wives and mothers throughout the nation's past - did find ways to exert agency within and beyond these roles. I further maintain that understanding historical approaches to family planning in Rwanda is essential for informing present-day policy debates in Rwanda aimed at promoting gender equality, and in particular for ensuring women's rights and access to adequate healthcare are being upheld.

Belief in God's Help During Hepatitis C: A Qualitative Study on Muslim Patients in Pakistan

Religious/spiritual beliefs play an important role in nursing of patients during chronic condition. Religion comprises an institutionalized set of transcendent ideas, while spirituality is personal and subjective dimension of religious experience in search of sacred (Hill and Pargament in Psychol Relig Spiritual S(1):3-17, 2008). The prevailing literature describes the influential impact of religiosity/spirituality on coping with chronic disease, but specifically patients with chronic liver disease (CLD) have not been studied in Pakistani context. This study examined the patients' belief in religious/spiritual coping, role of religious/spiritual beliefs and prayer as coping strategy. Furthermore, it explored the importance of religious/spiritual beliefs in diverting attention from pain and other needs of CLD patient. A total of 20 patients with chronic liver disease were selected through an appropriate screening process. Subsequently, in-depth detailed interviews were conducted to gather experiences of the hepatitis patients. Religious/spiritual beliefs put forth multiple positive effects that help in coping with chronic hepatitis C. It has been found that patients of hepatitis C use prayer as a coping strategy. Religious/spiritual beliefs have been found as source of diverting attention from pain for the patients suffering from chronic hepatitis C.

Causes and Means of Healing: An Islamic Ontological Perspective

Healthcare practitioners are increasingly aware that patients may utilize faith-based healing practices in place of conventional medicine based on their spiritual and/or religious understandings of health and illness. Therefore, elucidating the ontological understandings of patients utilizing such religion-based treatments may clarify why patients and clinicians have differing understandings of 'who' heals and 'what' are means for healing. This paper describes an Islamic ontological schema that includes the following realms: Divine existence; spirits/celestial beings; non-physical forms/similitudes; and physical bodies. Ontological schema-based means of healing include conventional medicine, religion-based means (e.g., supplication, charity, prescribed incantations/amulets), and active adoption of Islamic virtues (e.g., reliance on God [tawakkul] and patience [sabr]). An ontological schema-based description of causes and means of healing can service a more holistic model of healthcare by integrating the overlapping worlds of religion and medicine and can support clinicians seeking to further understand and assess patient responses and attitudes toward illness and healing.

Relationship Between Spiritual Health and Pain Self-Efficacy in patients with Chronic Pain: A Cross-Sectional Study in West of Iran

In recent years, the prevalence of chronic diseases has had a growing trend, which has resulted in many health problems. Level of belief in God is effective on people's attitudes to life concepts, social deviations and psychological disorders, and improves them. Therefore, the present research was conducted with the aim of determining the relationship between spiritual health (SH) and pain self-efficacy (PSE) in Ilam City in 2018. This study was a descriptive cross-sectional study in the group of patients with chronic pain (CP). In this study, the study population was patients with CP in Ilam City and the study sample was 150 patients with CP referring to public and private health centers in Ilam, which had all the criteria for participation in the study. The findings showed mean (SD) of the total score of SH variables was 65.16 (9.88), and PSE was 34.48 (4.08). According to Pearson statistical analysis, there is a significant relationship between SH and PSE (r = 0.442, P = 0.000). Also, the standard beta and non-standard beta coefficients for SH variables in PSE show that the non-standard beta coefficient in SH is equal to 0.183. The results of this study showed that SH is a predictor of pain acceptance, so that patients who were more religious were more likely to tolerate CP. For this reason, it is suggested that religious interventions be performed to reduce pain in patients with CP, in order to provide the necessary context for pain reduction in this group of patients.

Conscientious Objection in Medicine: Making it Public

The literature on conscientious objection in medicine presents two key problems that remain unresolved: (a) Which conscientious objections in medicine are justified, if it is not feasible for individual medical practitioners to conclusively demonstrate the genuineness or reasonableness of their objections ("the justification problem")? (b) How does one respect both medical practitioners' claims of conscience and patients' interests, without leaving practitioners complicit in perceived or actual wrongdoing ("the complicity problem")? My aim in this paper is to offer a new framework for conscientious objections in medicine, which, by bringing medical professionals' conscientious objection into the public realm, solves the justification and complicity problems. In particular, I will argue that: (a) an "Uber Conscientious Objection in Medicine Committee" ("UCOM Committee")-which includes representatives from the medical community and from other professions, as well as from various religions and from the patient population-should assess various well-known conscientious objections in medicine in terms of public reason and decide which conscientious objections should be permitted, without hearing out individual conscientious objectors; (b) medical practitioners should advertise their (UCOM Committee preapproved) conscientious objections, ahead of time, in an online database that would be easily accessible to the public, without being required, in most cases, to refer patients to non-objecting practitioners.

An Australian study on the benefits of pastoral care to aged care residents in Christian affiliated homes

This study aimed to understand the experience of pastoral care (PC), that is, the provision of support, comfort and spiritual counselling, from the perspective of Australian aged care residents. A survey research design captured feedback on participants' PC experience. Outcomes were reported by 575 residents (aged 53-102) across 41 sites. The majority perceived that they received a high quality of care (92%) and benefited from their meeting with the pastoral practitioner (80%), 'often' or 'all of the time'. A few significant differences were found based on participants' gender, spirituality (i.e. connection and meaning), religiosity (i.e. faith beliefs and religious practices) and well-being. Females and participants who identified as both religious and spiritual were more likely to feel that their faiths/beliefs were valued. Those with greater psychological well-being, as defined by the World Health Organisation (1998), were more likely to report receiving a high quality of care and greater benefits from receiving PC than those with poorer well-being. Three overarching themes and eight subthemes were identified from the open-ended responses: 1) personal qualities of the pastoral practitioner; caring, supportive, understanding and empathetic; 2) pastoral practitioner met specific needs; spiritual and religious, friendship and company and assistance, advice and help; and 3) positive impact on the participant; feeling listened to, peaceful and valued, accepted and respected. The qualitative findings resonate with Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, to feel safe, belong and have self-esteem. There was a synergy between what participants desire in the care they receive, as expressed in the open-ended questions, and what the pastoral practitioners provide, as indicated in the quantitative findings. A study strength was its mixed-method, multi-site and cross-organisational context, enabling PC to be explored across a diverse sample. Future research should consider a pre- and post-test survey to more comprehensively capture the impact and benefits of PC.

What's the Point of Clinical Pastoral Education and Pastoral Counselling Education? Political, Developmental, and Professional Considerations

Further clarity is needed regarding the uniqueness of spiritual care and psycho-spiritual therapy. In this article, this uniqueness is described as the relative spiritual health of spiritual health professionals. Drawing upon political philosophy, spiritual development theories, and studies in spiritual health, three traits of spiritual health are revealed that spiritual health professionals need to function effectively in their work environments. The article ends with four recommendations for both clinical pastoral education and pastoral counselling education.