BJSW Advance Access originally published online on March 20, 2006
British Journal of Social Work 2007 37(2):265-280; doi:10.1093/bjsw/bcl014
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Spiritual Need and the Core Business of Social Work
Margaret Holloway is Professor of Social Work at the University of Hull. As a practitioner, she worked in a range of social work settings and has taught in social work education at Manchester Polytechnic, Manchester University and Sheffield University, before moving to Hull. Her research interests are death, dying and bereavement, especially the associated spiritual and philosophical issues, and service delivery at the health and social care interface, especially for older people and those with degenerative conditions.
Correspondence to Margaret Holloway, Department of Social Work, Faculty of Health and Social Care, University of Hull, Dearne Building, Hull HU6 7RX, UK. E-mail: m.l.holloway{at}hull.ac.uk
This paper examines the development of social work practice in spiritual care and the attitudes towards spirituality and religion demonstrated by social workers in the UK, through reflection on key findings from two empirical studies conducted ten years apart. Fieldwork for the first study, conducted by the author, was undertaken from 1990 to 1992 and was the first of its kind to examine the treatment of spirituality in social work practice in the UK. The second study reported in 2004. Comparison of the findings from these two studies showed that the increased sympathy towards ‘spiritual practice’ is not as great in social work as is demonstrated amongst other human services professions, and that there is continuing inhibition and resistance in the UK in social work education in particular. The paper argues that much of the problem for practitioners, even where they identify spiritual need as an issue, lies in the inadequate theorizing and lack of practice guidance developed in the context of UK social work. It concludes by discussing the particular context of mainstream social work practice in the UK and examines how assessment of spiritual need and spiritual interventions might connect with social work’s core business.
Keywords: spirituality, religion, needs assessment, spiritual care, ethnic minorities
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