The Saint Luke Institute (SLI) comprehensive and multidisciplinary mental health and spiritual care model responds to the needs of each person as an integrated whole. Our quality care is assured by our licensed clinicians and expert spiritual integrators. Recently, Rev. Michael Ritter, Psy.D., M.Div., M.S., from our Silver Spring, Maryland office, provided some background of his vocational journey, both as a priest and as licensed clinicial psychologist.
What inspired you to become a psychologist, and how has that path shaped your understanding of healing?
I am a Catholic priest of the Diocese of Sacramento, ordained in June 2015. Before coming to Saint Luke Institute, I served in a number of pastoral roles in my home diocese, primarily in parish ministry and campus ministry in Newman Centers. My experience of the overlap between spiritual and clinical concerns in pastoral care led me to pursue further studies in psychology.
Before completing my doctorate and joining the Silver Spring office this past September, I spent a year as a predoctoral intern at Saint Luke Center in Louisville, KY, where I primarily conducted candidate assessments and outpatient psychotherapy. My blended pastoral–clinical background also shaped my doctoral research on moral injury, which examined the role of clergy and pastoral care in responding to the moral–emotional wounds that often accompany trauma, betrayal, attachment injury, or experiences that violate one’s moral code or core beliefs about self, others, and the world.
If you could give one message to all healers or caregivers, e.g. therapists, nurses, teachers, social workers, what would it be?
Risk being present with your authentic self; listen with a spirit of curiosity and wonder; commit to telling the truth. The human encounter is the most important aspect of any “treatment.” In an integrated psychospiritual setting, we might also understand this encounter as revealing something of the mystery of the Incarnation. God’s grace often appears right alongside what we fear will bring disgrace. Facing that mystery in the presence of a caring, compassionate other is a central feature of any healing process. For people of faith, this interpersonal milieu can take on a sacramental resonance, as the calm acceptance and honest encouragement of a benevolent therapist allows them to experience, in the human encounter, something of the goodness of God, who chooses to heal in and through the humanity he made his own – however wounded or imperfect that humanity may appear to be.
What does healthy self-care look like for a professional caretaker, beyond the ideas of rest and meditation?
I’m a big believer in the value of supervision and peer-supervision. The team process at SLI has highlighted for me just how essential it is to process my work with professional colleagues who can assist not only with case conceptualization but also with holding up a mirror, checking my instincts and gut reactions and helping me gain insight into my own experience as a therapist.
This kind of collegial reflection not only improves the quality of care; it also builds confidence and peace when accompanying a difficult client or trying to make sense of a challenging exchange or complex clinical dilemma. Having a place to work through the layers of the therapeutic process, in a way that honors our commitment to client confidentiality, has helped me inhabit more fully the role of mental-health provider. It has allowed me to recognize and celebrate growth and healing when they occur, while also lightening the load when confronting the feelings of loss, powerlessness, and challenge that inevitably occur in therapy.
Strong relationships with colleagues are a crucial form of self-care because they remind us that we can only pour out for others if we ourselves are continually being poured into.
Why is it important to you to work at SLI when you have a choice of practicing in different sectors?
There is a growing emphasis in the clinical literature on holistic care and the importance of integrating spirituality into psychotherapy, especially for individuals who are spiritual or religious. This psychospiritual integration is essential for the clients we serve at SLI, who are clergy or professed religious. These are men and women with enormous responsibilities whose inner lives, identities, and conflicts are often deeply intertwined with their external commitments, roles, and expectations. Their faith and their psychological struggles are interconnected, and their vocational aspirations and sense of God’s call are bound up with the demands of ministry and institutional life.
Because they have committed their lives to living for others, they often overlook their own needs. This can lead to significant challenges both for them and for the communities they serve. Our role at SLI involves caring for the caregivers, in order to support their healing, growth, and renewal so that they in turn can minister from a place of greater spiritual, psychological, emotional, and interpersonal freedom.
At SLI, we strive to strengthen and safeguard the shepherds of the Church, who are an often overlooked and highly specialized population, so that the communities entrusted to their care may also thrive and continue to be blessed through them. For me, given my blended pastoral-clinical background and training, SLI makes sense because our work often requires a careful integration of clinical and pastoral care. It is deeply meaningful for me to contribute to the health and healing of those who have dedicated their lives to serving others.
Learn more about other members of our team.