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When Hearts Become Flame: An Eastern Orthodox Approach to the Dia-Logos of Pastoral Counseling
This book is about the spirituality of personal encounter in and through Christ. Pastoral dialogue involves an integrated mindful personal presence and interested unknowing that engages the other with the same vulnerability and alertness that one brings to God in prayer. Inner discernment and ascetical struggle along with existential engagement with and for others in working for a just and humane world are equally important in response to God's love given for all. For an interview with the author on COEH TV at Columbus State University go to university vimeo.com/m/38325238
344 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2011
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47 people want to read
About the author
Stephen Muse
16 books14 followersStephen Muse, Ph.D., LMFT, LPC, B.C.E.T.S is Co-Director responsible for the Pastoral Counselor Training program and Clinical Services for the D.A & Elizabeth Turner Ministry Resource Center of the Pastoral Institute, Inc. in Columbus, Georgia and teaches and supervises in the U.S. Army Family Life Chaplain Training program at Fort Benning. He has served as a part time instructor in the graduate counseling program of Columbus State University, as a clinical field supervisor for Auburn University counseling psychology program and as adjunct faculty with the doctoral programs of Garrett Evangelical Seminary in Illinois and Union Graduate Institute in Ohio.
Dr. Muse has taught and led professional workshops throughout the U.S. and Internationally in the civilian sector as well as for the U.S. Army Chaplains in the areas of his specialties which include healing combat trauma & abuse, training clergy as pastoral counselors, stress and burn-out of clergy and helping professionals, Orthodox Christian life and spiritual formation, and Orthodox Christianity and marriage.
He has contributed chapters in eight books and more than 30 articles, book reviews and poetry for professional journals and trade magazines, including national award winning research in the area of religious integration and clinical empathy of therapists. His work has been translated into Russian, Greek, Swedish and Serbian. He served as Managing Editor of The Pastoral Forum from 1993 to 2002. Previous books include Beside Still Waters: Restoring the Souls of Shepherds in the Market Place (2000); Raising Lazarus: Integral Healing in Orthodox Christianity (2004), and When Hearts Become Flame: An Eastern Orthodox Approach to the 'Dia-Logos' of Pastoral Counseling (2010).
Dr. Muse holds a bachelors degree in philosophy from Davidson College, an M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary emphasizing Greek New Testament exegesis and early church spirituality, M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Loyola University of Maryland in Pastoral Counseling and has completed post graduate work in marriage and family studies through the University of Georgia. He holds Diplomate certification in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors; in Professional Psychotherapy with the International Academy of Behavioral Medicine, Counseling and Psychotherapy, and is an AAMFT Approved supervisor, Board certified in Traumatic Stress and in clinical hypnotherapy. He is licensed in the state of Georgia as both a Professional Counselor and a Marriage and Family Therapist and board certified as a life and clergy coach.
Prior to his reception into the Greek Orthodox Church where he is ordained as a Subdeacon and set apart for ministry as a pastoral counselor, Dr. Muse pastored a Presbyterian congregation for 11 years and helped begin an outpatient psychiatric clinic in Delta, PA. He is past president of the Orthodox Christian Association of Medicine, Psychology and Religion and a founding member and first parish council President of Holy Transfiguration Greek Orthodox Mission Church in Columbus. He and his wife Claudia have four children: a daughter killed in 1982, a daughter 34, a son 30, a daughter 29 and a grand-daughter, 5 with another on the way.
Dr. Muse can be contacted at smuse@pilink.org.
Dr. Muse has taught and led professional workshops throughout the U.S. and Internationally in the civilian sector as well as for the U.S. Army Chaplains in the areas of his specialties which include healing combat trauma & abuse, training clergy as pastoral counselors, stress and burn-out of clergy and helping professionals, Orthodox Christian life and spiritual formation, and Orthodox Christianity and marriage.
He has contributed chapters in eight books and more than 30 articles, book reviews and poetry for professional journals and trade magazines, including national award winning research in the area of religious integration and clinical empathy of therapists. His work has been translated into Russian, Greek, Swedish and Serbian. He served as Managing Editor of The Pastoral Forum from 1993 to 2002. Previous books include Beside Still Waters: Restoring the Souls of Shepherds in the Market Place (2000); Raising Lazarus: Integral Healing in Orthodox Christianity (2004), and When Hearts Become Flame: An Eastern Orthodox Approach to the 'Dia-Logos' of Pastoral Counseling (2010).
Dr. Muse holds a bachelors degree in philosophy from Davidson College, an M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary emphasizing Greek New Testament exegesis and early church spirituality, M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Loyola University of Maryland in Pastoral Counseling and has completed post graduate work in marriage and family studies through the University of Georgia. He holds Diplomate certification in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors; in Professional Psychotherapy with the International Academy of Behavioral Medicine, Counseling and Psychotherapy, and is an AAMFT Approved supervisor, Board certified in Traumatic Stress and in clinical hypnotherapy. He is licensed in the state of Georgia as both a Professional Counselor and a Marriage and Family Therapist and board certified as a life and clergy coach.
Prior to his reception into the Greek Orthodox Church where he is ordained as a Subdeacon and set apart for ministry as a pastoral counselor, Dr. Muse pastored a Presbyterian congregation for 11 years and helped begin an outpatient psychiatric clinic in Delta, PA. He is past president of the Orthodox Christian Association of Medicine, Psychology and Religion and a founding member and first parish council President of Holy Transfiguration Greek Orthodox Mission Church in Columbus. He and his wife Claudia have four children: a daughter killed in 1982, a daughter 34, a son 30, a daughter 29 and a grand-daughter, 5 with another on the way.
Dr. Muse can be contacted at smuse@pilink.org.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
June 15, 2021
Not many books have spoken to me like this one has. I felt that he was reading my heart - hitting me right where I was at. His love for Christ, the Church and the Saints of the Church permeate this book. He is wise and has great insight and discernment into the human heart and how it might be healed. I cannot recommend this book more highly.
July 12, 2017
Muse has a lot more training and experience in pastoral counseling then I have. I found parts of the book totally fascinating, but other parts outside of/beyond my experience and so learn from him but cannot really comment on the content. The book is an unusual mix of psychotherapy, modern Orthodox ascetical monasticism, and in the end the politics of justice.
November 8, 2021
This is a hard book because it challenges you to get out of your comfort zone, pick up your cross, and follow The Logos.
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If you read until the end, Father Deacon Muse makes a very personal confession, which can also be a foundational prayer for a hypothetical WASAMA (White Anglo-Saxon American Male Anonymous) movement.
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If you read until the end, Father Deacon Muse makes a very personal confession, which can also be a foundational prayer for a hypothetical WASAMA (White Anglo-Saxon American Male Anonymous) movement.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 12, 2020
Orthodox theology as the fulfilment of psychology. Fr Muse focuses on the key motif of trialogue to describe true counselling and honest conversations.
Contrary to much psychology today, Muse shows how humane personal knowledge comes through not-saying as much as saying and by resisting simplistic reductionism.
He includes the usual areas of psychology within his sights, but goes beyond it to reveal Orthodoxy's more comprehensive methodology. Plus, he recognises that the medium is the message and calls the clinical practitioner to a full spiritual life of prayer, fasting, etc.
Contrary to much psychology today, Muse shows how humane personal knowledge comes through not-saying as much as saying and by resisting simplistic reductionism.
He includes the usual areas of psychology within his sights, but goes beyond it to reveal Orthodoxy's more comprehensive methodology. Plus, he recognises that the medium is the message and calls the clinical practitioner to a full spiritual life of prayer, fasting, etc.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews