Program of Priestly Formation (Ascension)

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Human Dimension

to the decision concerning admission. It can also be the case that the necessity for such extensive therapy emerges after admission. In the latter case the seminarian is to withdraw from the program and pursue the therapy before being considered for readmission to the seminary and resuming his advancement to Holy Orders. Those who provide these psychological services may not be voting members of the formation team in discerning the admission, continuance, or ordination of a man. 252 Normally, any in-depth assessment regarding the admission or continuance of a man in formation should be made by an outside mental health professional to avoid dual relationships. If the psychologist or other representative of the psychological sciences is a member of the seminary community, their roles are confined to training, teaching, and consulting for therapeutic issues that do not involve serious psychopathology. There should be a very clear agreement of understanding that limits the role and boundaries of such persons in seminary formation, under the purview of the rector. A psychologist might be offered for a seminarian who is asked to explore some issue in formation. Voluntary appointments initiated by seminarians with a psychologist must include a clear discussion of the limits of confidentiality and the need to integrate—implicitly or explicitly—the work of counseling with the priest formator and/or spiritual director. It is advisable for each seminary to develop “benchmarks of human formation” and to identify them clearly for the seminary community and seminarians. 253 It is both possible and necessary to integrate human formation with the other three dimensions of formation—the spiritual, the intellectual, and the pastoral. Human formation is integrated with spiritual formation by the Incarnate Word and by the fact that grace builds 252 See Ratio Fundamentalis , no. 192. 253 The benchmarks for the initial stages of formation are presented for each dimension in this document and may be useful for seminaries in developing this list.

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