Psychospiritual Assistance of Social Suffering. Perspectives of Social Work
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18662/rrem/17.4/1052Keywords:
social suffering, psychospiritual assistance, social workAbstract
The concept of social suffering is relatively recent, and has been debated in the specialized literature especially in the last 15-20 years. In Romania, the phenomenon is not quite acknowledged in scientific research environments, much less among the political community, and, therefore, no measures are taken to combat the phenomenon. The Romanian Orthodox Church has drawn attention in multiple ways to a state of pronounced suffering of individuals. This suffering, once accumulated at the level of a large percentage of the population, leads to a broader phenomenon, called social suffering. However, scientific research on social suffering in Romania is only in its debut stage. The purpose of this article is to make an analysis of the psychospiritual assistance of social suffering from the perspective of social work. We started our scientific approach by enlisting a series of clarifications to the concept of social suffering. Then, we analyzed the mechanisms of psychospiritual assistance through the lens of specific intervention methods in social work. In the final part of the paper, we discussed the opportunity to apply psychospiritual social work mechanisms to combat the phenomenon of social suffering.
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