Religiosity in the psychoterapeutic office: conceptions and experiences Of jungian psychologists

Abstract

The article describes the results of a qualitative research, with a phenomenological basis, carried out with three psychotherapists with Jungian training, which aims to know their perceptions, conceptions and experiences with the theme of religiosity in the context of psychotherapeutic care in a private practice of Brasilia/DF and Cuiabá/MT. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with the three participants, addressing the following axes-themes: 1) context of performance and activities developed; 2) forms of manifestation of users' religiosity; 3) relationship between religiosity and mental health; 4) way of dealing with religiosity in the context of action; 5) what they consider good and bad practices in dealing with religiosity; 6) connection and distinction between religious experience and psychopathology; 7) personal religiosity and its influence at work; 8) theme approach throughout the training; recommendations for young professionals. All interviews were recorded, transcribed, revised and analyzed based on the method proposed by Amadeu Giorgi. We sought to identify the convergences and specificities of the participants' experiences, also contextualizing them according to the characteristics of the population served. The results show that professionals respectfully and ethically accept the diversity of religious/spiritual experiences of their patients; identify both pathological and therapeutic relationships between religiosity and mental health; consider good practices to be religious experiences that contribute to the individuation process and bad practices to promote discrimination, alienation and mental illness; recognize the influence of personal religion in the work environment but act in accordance with the psychologist's code of ethics without inducing political, philosophical, moral, ideological or religious convictions; finally, they recognize the importance of in-depth study of the psychology of religion, especially Jungian psychology, and recommend the same to young professionals to practice their profession.