The religious and spiritual teachings of religions and their moral teachings are treasures and sources of spiritual health.
The scientific meeting "Necessity of using spiritual therapies with an emphasis on the spiritual therapy of God-oriented" and the closing ceremony of the training course for spiritual psychotherapists with the attendance of Dr. Masoud Janbazari, the faculty member of the University and Seminary Research Institute, Hojjat al-Islam Dr. Masoud Azarbaijani, the faculty member of University and Seminary Research Institute, and Hojjat al-Islam Dr. Abbas Pasandideh, the faculty member of Quran and Hadith University, was held on February 24, 2023 in the hall of the Research Institute of Islamic Studies in Human Sciences of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad face-to-face and virtually.
At the beginning of this meeting, Dr. Hossein Afkhami Rouhani, the head of the Research Institute of Islamic Studies in Humanities in Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, referring to the difficulties and challenges of Islamic studies in the field of humanities, said: "One of the fields in which the role and effect of Islamic studies and approaches are more visible and tangible is of psychology.
He stated: Considering this impact, the Working Group of Islamic Psychology was established in the Research Institute of Islamic Studies, and via the coordination and efforts that were made, the spiritual psychotherapist training course was also planned and implemented.
Next, Dr. Salil Ziaei, the faculty member of the Research Institute of Islamic Studies in Humanities, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, presented a report on holding a training course for spiritual psychotherapists with the approach of God-oriented multidimensional spiritual therapy.
He said: The topics of this course included the concept of spiritual therapy, the theory of multidimensional spiritual therapy, the methodology and validity of the protocol of multidimensional spiritual therapy, psycho-spiritual evaluation and pathology, and treatment stages, which were held for 60 hours theoretically and practically.
He also declared that 103 counselors, psychologists, clinicians, and educational science and psychology graduates participated in this course.
Then, Dr. Masoud Azarbaijani, the faculty member of the Seminary Research Institute and University, addressed the topic of spiritual treatments and said: According to professor Shahid Motahari, spirituality is a kind of feeling and an innate human tendency towards unusual things such as knowledge and wisdom, moral goodness, beauty is holiness and worship, which is the distinguishing feature of human beings and other creatures.
He added: So spirituality is a voluntary and existential transcendence of materiality, egoism and situation in the dimensions of insight, tendency and action which is the direction of God's movement, as the origin, center and destination of the universe, and provides the context of deeper inner lived experience.
Pointing out that spiritual health is one of the four dimensions of physical, mental, social and spiritual health, he said spiritual health is a spirituality that is healthy, normal and acceptable based on the desired values and principles.
Dr. Azarbaijani also added that religious and spiritual teachings of religions and their moral teachings are like treasures and sources of spiritual health.
This member faculty of University and Seminary Research Institute named mental health (balance) and spiritual improvement (transcendence) as the goals of spiritual treatments and said: treatment of mental disorders, psychological adjustment, improvement of interpersonal relationships, attention to extraneous needs, attention to divine communication and activation of spiritual mechanisms are placed under these two goals.
While explaining the basic principles of God-oriented spiritual treatment, he said: the activation of the natural mind (internal skilled diagnostic system) and God-oriented mind (wise use of revelation teachings), treatment in the field of self-perception by negation of self-concept and attention to oneself (inner mission) and treatment in the area of existence (the world and others) realized by insight and action management are among these principles.
In the following, Dr. Masoud Janbozuri, the member faculty of University and Seminary Research Institute, referring to the God-oriented psychotherapy method, emphasized the role of God and spirituality as the main factor in connecting a person with himself in clinical treatments.
He added that it is a fact that not only humans, but no other phenomenon cannot be known without God, and every knowledge is a part of reality.
At the end of this meeting, question-answer session was held with the audience virtually.