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PASTORAL ADVICE
from a desire to justify the crudest superstitions masquerading
as piety or zeal. A person who has recently become a Christian
may need guidance about questions of personal faith or about
formulations of doctrine, about the assurance of salvation or the
most difficult and delicate problems of personal consecration.
Some enquirers are anxious about the meaning of earthly life.
Others are equally concerned to be well informed about life
beyond the grave.
It goes without saying that the religious adviser must possess
good theological insight and be well acquainted with his Bible.
’The primary religious questions cannot be answered in
psychological terms and formulations. Personal interest in psychology
must never beguile an adviser into the error of assuming that
spiritual problems and dilemmas are to be resolved by mental
training or psychological treatment.
Secondary Religious Problems
In this category are included all those religious difficulties
and dilemmas that arise from the obligations of the Christian
to the community, his relations with his family, adjustment to
his surroundings, problems of conscience and conduct provoked
by his occupation, and so on. Men and women turn to a
spiritual adviser for help in these matters because they realise
that they are more or less intimately connected with religious
realities.
It is within this group that we find many instances of
undeliberate disguise or concealment: behind the questions asked
are others unspoken. Sometimes the inner problem reveals
itself quite clearly in the manner or the form of words employed
by the enquirer to describe the environmental one or in the
nature of the problem itself. Sometimes great acuity of
perception is needed on the part of the spiritual adviser to pierce
through a brilliant rationalisation. Other things being equal,
the higher the intelligence of the enquirer the more difficult
this will be. No deception is more ingenious or complete than
self-deception.
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