The Religious and Spiritual Dimensions of Bowen Family Therapy

Author/s: Özlem Acar Bulut

DOI: 10.37898/spc.2020.5.1.098 

Year: 2020 Vol: 5 Number: 1

Abstract

The topic of spirituality stands out in recent years as being heavily addressed in the field of psychological counseling and guidance. A similar picture also stands out when looked at from the angle of family therapies. When looking at studies made in the field of family therapy, studies addressing the aspect of family spirituality are seen to continue increasing. Bowen’s Family Systems Theory is one of these approaches. Bowen Family Theory handles the family as a system and attempts to solve the individuals’ problems by considering the environment within which they are found. The individual’s surroundings contain many situations, from family to culture, siblings to religious beliefs, from traditions to customs, and from relationships to spirituality. According to Bowen, spirituality is the reflection of the topic of God in relationships, and located foremost within the theory, a spiritual aspect is found in all important concepts, including ego differentiation and triangulations. Encountering religious and spiritual elements is possible in many of the concepts of Bowen Family Systems. This study handles the perspective of spirituality in the Bowen Family Systems Theory as one of the theories of family systems and the place of spirituality within Bowen Family Systems. In this context, first the Bowen Family Systems Theory is briefly introduced, then the study attempts to explain the spiritual dimension of the theory in light of some of its basic concepts. In addition, the Bowen approach is addressed from the Islamic perspective, and a case sample has been presented related to the intervention methods that can be used in this situation.

Keywords
Family Systems, Bowen, Spirituality, Religious Dimension, Triangulation, Ego Differentiation