An Encounter of Two Worlds: The Intercultural Aspects of Helping Relationships (Merle, K., Hrsg. (2013) Kulturwelten: Zum Problem des Fremdverstehens in der Seelsorge)

The book edited by the German theologian Kristin Merle highlights the complicated structure of interpersonal understanding. The editor of the book, who represents the empirical renewal of pastoral theology and also authored part of the volume, care fully chose her co-authors, each from a different applied field. The book revolves around the subject of interculturality, and the authors make it clear that the meeting of two people really means an encounter between two different worlds. In the 1970s a new question arose (Carter 1991): what is the role of cultural values in a certain group concerning the success of a helping relationship between two people? Four factors were found significant when studying the impact on inter personal relationships: the values represented by the client, the values the counsellor was driven by, their assumptions about the problem, and the institutional possibil ities and limitations of the helping relationship. That means that counsellors living in a culturally closed, ‘encapsulated’ environment can only understand their client if they have a clear selfunderstanding and know well their own social and cultural background, the source of their experiences and the reasons why they belong to a group with certain values. It is important that they are aware of the patterns and stereo types that determine their view. More than ten years ago sChneider-harppreCht (2002) raised the question about the adequate way of helping someone from a different culture, religion, or with special living conditions. According to him, special intercultural competence is needed to achieve that goal. Without such intercultural competence, we cannot even fully understand the person living next to us. In order to achieve this empathic attitude, we need to handle consciously the other person’s unfamiliar, different per sonality, characteristics and situation. The volume offers contributions written in that conceptual framework and illustrated by case studies, stemming from the Christian tradition, of personcentred pastoral counselling. European Journal of Mental Health 11 (2016) 173–179 DOI: 10.5708/EJMH.11.2016.1-2.Rev.6