Offering a focus that is lacking (or not clearly evident) in most spirituality books, Dudley addresses specific ways of incorporating spirituality into practice and integrates many of the contributions of other writers into an overall eclectic practice approach. His approach revolves around many of the core competencies of the EPAS accreditation (CSWE, 2008). Most of the core competencies are addressed with an emphasis on professional identity, ethical practice, critical thinking, diversity, practice contexts, and, a major practice framework of the book, the practice stages of engagement, assessment, intervention, and evaluation.

As Spirituality in Social Work: New Directions shows you, there has been an increase of interest among social workers concerning spiritual matters. In response to this collective interest, Edward Canda and several other members of the Society for Spirituality and Social Work have compiled a thorough and timely compendium of social work research, theory, and practice. Their book will guide you in your efforts to meet the needs of your families and clients while still remaining educated and respectful of the many religous and nonreligious views different people have. In Spirituality in Social Work, you'll get an update on the current state of spirituality, social work scholarship, and education. From there, you'll move on to current appraisals of the many specialized ways social work educators are teaching spirituality in MSW programs, and you'll ultimately come full circle to a fuller understanding of the many ways social work and spirituality complement and inform each other in the classroom as well as in the field of practice. Most importantly, you'll get specific guidance on these topics: how to enhance the intuition of social workers when to apply the Transegoic model to a dying adolescent where to engage in conceptions of spirituality in social work literature what Taoist insights can do to enhance social work practice how social work can prosper in future efforts to link spirituality and social work In many ways, Spirituality in Social Work is a spiritual awakening in its own right--for social workers, for individuals, and for communities at large. The demand for social work practitioners, educators, and community officials to be cross-trained in spirituality and social work is on the rise. So, if you're struggling to find new ways to deal with the ever-increasing and ever-diversifying demand for spiritual training in your particular social work setting, pick up this insightful edition and find new hope and direction in the many different ways that social work and spirituality can work together for you.

Social work in modern society requires practitioners to be culturally and spiritually sensitive. This book explores the often challenging relationships between spirituality, religion and social work. It considers the skills, knowledge and values that are required to incorporate a spiritual awareness into social work practice and in doing so explores in greater depth the social worker/service user relationship. By using case studies, reflective exercises and other learning features, students will begin to appreciate and understand the importance of a spiritually sensitive approach to their social work practice.

Book attempts to demonstrate how spirituality and religion can improve an older person's quality of life.

Weaving together interdisciplinary theory and research, as well as the results from a national survey of practitioners, the authors describe a spiritually oriented model for practice that places clients' challenges and goals within the context of their deepest meanings and highest aspirations. Using richly detailed case examples and thought-provoking activities, this highly accessible text illustrates the professional values and ethical principles that guide spiritually sensitive practice. It presents definitions and conceptual models of spirituality and religion; draws connections between spiritual diversity and cultural, gender, and sexual orientation diversity; and offers insights from Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Indigenous religions, Islam, Judaism, Existentialism, and Transpersonal theory. Eminently practical, it guides professionals in understanding and assessing spiritual development and related mental health issues and outlines techniques that support transformation and resilience, such as meditation, mindfulness, ritual, forgiveness, and engagement of individual and community-based spiritual support systems.

Blending material from social work with religious and spiritual sources, this book makes explicit that engaging with spirituality in its broadest sense is an essential aspect of socially just social work practice. Gardner connects shared understandings of spiritual/religious traditions, critically reflective social work, First Nations relational world views, green and relational approaches. Through multiple unique case studies, Embedding Spirituality and Religion in Social Work Practice: A Socially Just Approach outlines the theoretical framework of critical spirituality, which is explored as a way of workers’ understanding their own and others’ sense of meaning, whether it is spiritual and/or religious, and to encourage workers to be mindful, open, humble and energised as workers. Combining the theoretical and practical, this book outlines strategies and processes to ensure social workers embed spirituality in their practice constructively and inclusively across all areas of practice. This book will be of interest to those engaged in the wider field of social work, from direct service to policy development.

As it is valuable for practitioners to understand the meaning systems of clients and to identify both potential resources and strains in the lives of clients, the goal of this book is to help social workers and other counselors become culturally competent in the area of religious traditions.

Integrating Spirituality in Clinical Social Work Practice: Walking the Labyrinth focuses on the inclusion of spiritual issues in the clinical social work process using the metaphor of the labyrinth to discuss the implementation of spiritual issues in the various phases of the treatment process - engagement, assessment, intervention, endings, and more.It makes the clear distinction between the concepts of "spirituality" and "religion" and addresses sensitive issues such as guilt, shame, forgiveness, death & dying, trauma, gender and social justice--from publisher's website.

Learn how to make a more positive impact with your social work with the aged Religion is an important coping mechanism for many aging adults. Religion, Spirituality, and Aging: A Social Work Perspective presents the latest research that shows how religion and spirituality can improve quality of life for elders. Respected social work researchers and scholars provide insight and practical methods for fostering positive aging while also considering how spirituality and religion can affect practitioners themselves. The full range of advantages and ethical implications are discussed in clear detail from a social work viewpoint. Case studies plainly illustrate the positive impact that the inclusion of spirituality and religion in an aging person’s life may have on their physical and mental welfare. Organized social work in the early twentieth century actively tried to distance itself from its roots as a form of religious charity in favor of becoming a scientific and professional endeavor. Religion, Spirituality, and Aging once again bridges the gap between social work and spiritual matters by presenting penetrating articles that discusses the issues of the aging soul while examining ways to improve care. Creative strategies are offered to contribute to the spiritual side of aging while considering every implication and ethical question. The compilation is extensively referenced and includes helpful figures and tables to clearly illustrate data and ideas. Religion, Spirituality, and Aging discusses: the latest social work trends and attitudes toward spirituality prayer, meditation, and acts of altruism as interventions an empirical study of how social workers use religion and spirituality as an intervention ethical considerations and best practices religion and spirituality during long-term care the “Postcards to God” project dreams and their relationship to the search for meaning in later life a spiritual approach to positive aging through autobiography dementia and spirituality creating new rituals for sacred aging spiritual master Henri Nouwen’s principles of aging—and his approaches to caring for older people an interview study on elders’ spirituality and the changes manifested in their views of religion Religion, Spirituality, and Aging is a remarkable reminder that elders are our future selves. This erudite, well-reasoned examination of aging and spirituality from a social work perspective is crucial reading for social workers, human service professionals who work with the aged, and gerontology scholars.

Sacred Matters explores the multi-disciplinary literature about the role of religion in family life and provides new research and a new theory about ways various aspects of the sacred are helpful and harmful. The authors hope that their new conceptual framework will stimulate new research and encourage the creation of new intervention programs designed to help families. Sacred Matters features: a new conceptual framework and theory about how, when, and why sacred matters influence family processes and outcomes new qualitative and quantitative research collected in a variety of ways from people with different religious perspectives in different geographical areas an expansion in theory and research about the role of forgiveness, sacrifice, prayer, and sanctification in family life the integration of studies and issues from psychology, sociology, family studies, anthropology, and religion. This book raises the bar in creating new theories about family processes and in the integration of theory, research, and application. It begins with a review of the previous literature and then expands the research about sanctification to create a new general theory (or model) about ways sacred processes help and hinder families. Next the authors expand the theory and research about the role of forgiveness, sacrifice, and prayer in families. New theory and research are then added about loving, coping with conflict, dealing with undesirable behavior, generational relationships, morality, and the psychosocial aspects of religion. The authors then describe ways sacred theory can be integrated with other theories and ways it provides new explanations about broader social problems. The book concludes with new quantitative research and suggestions for future research. Researchers, practitioners, and advanced students in several disciplines will find this volume valuable. It will expand and enrich the reading in graduate and advanced undergraduate courses in areas such as family studies, human development, marriage and family therapy, the psychology of the family and the psychology of religion, the sociology of the family and the sociology of religion, pastoral counseling, anthropology, and social work.