An Overview of Integral Congregational Ministry

AQAL perspectives provide a uniquely comprehensive holding environment for investigating the various approaches of Christian “confessional theologies”—those understandings of the Divine that are lived within; and “comparative theologies”—those inquiries into the ultimate spiritual values and goals of all human life as perceived and expressed in a variety of religions and wisdom traditions. The authors use the AQAL analytical framework to unite the interior, exterior, individual, and collective dimensions, and to explore aspects of specific lines, levels, states, and types associated with Christian ministry.

REVEREND GREGORY JOHANSON has served as an ordained United Methodist Clergyperson in a number of full and part-time church appointments in urban, suburban, and rural areas, including five years on a Native American reservation, and a year in Mexico as chaplain at a holistic health hospital. His ministry led him to Clinical Pastoral Education (Clinical Member), Pastoral Counseling (AAPC Member), and Psychotherapy (Licensed Professional Counselor). He is a Certified Therapist and Founding Trainer of the Hakomi Institute with over twenty- five years of clinical, teaching, and training experience in mental health clinic, parish, college, and hospital settings, and has led workshops and trainings throughout the United States, Canada, Germany, and Australia. He is Clinical Associate Professor of Marriage and Family Therapy at Central Connecticut State University where he teaches Internal Family Systems Therapy (IFS), and Adjunct Professor of Pastoral Counseling at Drew University.

Gregory has edited and contributed to two volumes of sermons on pastoral care themes, Feed My Sheep and Pastoral Care Issues in the Pulpit. His book, Grace Unfolding: Psychotherapy in the Spirit of the Tao-te ching (with Ron Kurtz) was published in 1991 and subsequently translated into German, Spanish, and Chinese.

JOHN FORMAN, OblSB, is a Benedictine oblate of Mt. Angel Abbey, a Eucharistic minister and healing minister in the Anglican Communion. He is currently in a discernment process toward ordination in the Anglican Communion. John has served on church vestries and in monastic advisory positions, and also as a spiritual and organizational counselor to numerous religious organizations, as well as to individual ordained, professed, and lay men and women. He has led multiple retreats and workshops focused on Integral Theory and methodology, Benedictine spirituality, Christian meditation, developmental approaches to faith and ministry, and discernment.

John has published several articles on these topics and presented papers at the New England Complex Systems Institute and the International Society of Systems Sciences, and has published articles in numerous publications. John has lectured on Integral Theory at a number of organizations, including the National Defense University, the University of Washington, the International Leadership Association, St. Martin’s College and the Diocese of Olympia’s School of Theology.