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Spiritual pain: origins, nature and management

Abstract Contending the existence of spiritual pain as a discrete and recognisable form of a widely experienced human pain, the author offers a description of the condition. Drawing both on a general familiarity with other forms of pain, and on an holistic, explicitly Christian anthropology, whose goal is increased levels of personal complexity, integration and engagement, leading to theosis, he proposes a model to explain the possible origins, nature and management of spiritual pain within Christian pastoral care. He suggests that principle features of spiritual pain include: either ‘eccentric’ personal development, or ‘disintegration’, within seven dimensions of human being; the disruption of, or failure to establish, adequate interpersonal relationships; incidents of unresolved injury, distortion, or waywardness within one's personal narrative(s); failure to develop or maintain a relationship of personal unity with God, in the Spirit; or sharing in the growing pains of the cosmos through an interconnectedness in the Spirit; and experiences of growth and transition in one's own life. The author suggests that this model represents a distinct contribution to contemporary pastoral theology and pastoral care practices.