The Challenge of Spiritual Diversity: Can Social Work Facilitate an Inclusive Environment?

Social workers' growing interest in spirituality implicitly raises the issue of spiritual diversity. Demographic data indicate that the profession is not reflective of the larger society, with theistic populations such as Evangelical Christians being significantly underrepresented. As social workers wrestle with how to integrate spirituality and religion into social work, the lack of theistic voices may hinder their ability to understand the unique worldviews of Evangelicals and other theists. Indeed, the nontheistic majority may inadvertently shape the profession's emerging spirituality paradigm in such a manner that actually impairs social workers' ability to work with spiritual minorities. The author concludes by examining how the underrepresentation affects clients and suggests a number of steps to facilitate a more diverse profession that fosters respect for spiritual minorities.