Towards a Franciscan model of Clinical pastoral supervision is a study of interaction between two movements: Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) and Franciscan Spirituality. Francis and Clare were the primary founders of the Franciscan movement and Franciscan spirituality arose from their reflections on their unique response of following Christ. From the early Franciscan sources, essential elements are retrieved. Compassion is illustrated as a key quality of this model through textual analysis of four stories of Francis and his early followers. Clinical Pastoral Education is a result of the contributions of three founders: Keller, Cabot and Boisen. Clinical pastoral supervision (CPS) is a distinguishing concept of CPE. Various models of CPS are categorised according to three paradigms of western society: classical, modern and postmodern. The study concludes by framing a Franciscan model of clinical pastoral supervision. Contemplation and compassion are the two Franciscan characteristics which give this model a unique Franciscan dimension. / New Testament / M.Th.

Either relational contact with God is seen to be existentially attainable or God will become increasingly irrelevant to contemporary society. For Church identity and effectiveness as she serves the world, it is vital that God's initiating power can be seen to impact on this world. As response to fourteen symptoms the Church faces as 'crises,' an inclusive hermeneutic seeks fresh categories for a foundational spirituality capable of catalysing reform and transformation. This comprehensive foundational hermeneutic hypothesised is grounded on three foundational categories of experience, relationality and spiritual intuition. Any reception of such transcendence has to occur subjectively ‘in experience.’ Evasive as it is, experience is posited as a foundational category that needs to be rehabilitated through fundamental philosophy and theology, as well as interdisciplinary explorations. It will be shown that the challenges facing the contemporary Church are rooted in lost experience of transcendence. However the entry point experience provides is never to become narcissistically selfreferential but aims to establish a reciprocal relationship in faith. As an overarching category, dynamic relationality will need to be socially transformative. The deep 'God-person' relational mode, as it synthesises both human capacities and spiritual faculties, is experienced interiorly and as such is called spiritual intuition. It is argued that the notion of, and capacity for, intuition has been widely ignored and eroded. It is demonstrated that a 'reasonable intuition' is a more synthetic faculty 'naturally' open to illumination and infusion by the Spirit than an excessive traditional Church reliance on the workings of reason-intellect. Here the witness of the life of St Francis of Assisi allows simpler and accessible entry into the categories of affective experience and spiritual intuition under overarching relationality. Francis as model, when compared to other Saints, substantiates the three foundational categories. The conclusion chapter tests the foundational theory as it is applied to the fourteen challenges the Church faces. The results of this study, and its applications, offer a promising, fruitful humble metaphysic as 'solution' for the ‘Church in the world’ much in line with Pope Francis' recent approaches. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / D. Th. (Christian Spirituality)