(Currently Under Review)
The Guntrip Trust came into being at a time in the late 1980s when, there was evidence in both Scotland and the north east of England of ministers and clergy under stress.
The Trust was formed by Murray Leishman, a Church of Scotland minister who became a psychoanalytic psychotherapist. The Trust was named to honour Harry Guntrip (1901-1975), a Leeds Congregational minister who was a psychoanaytic psychotherapist with an international reputation. He himself had turned to psychotherapy out of personal need. That started off a lifelong search for a deeper understanding of the way in which children develop, or fail to develop into integrated adults. He saw that just as religious ministry needs a dynamic psychology to guide it, so scientific psychotherapy needs what is basically a religious faith in the value and significance of every human being to sustain its endeavour.
Now, almost 40 years later, during a time of accelerating change in both church and society, the Trust continues to reflect on the various ways in which it can set out to meet these continuing needs.
The Trust has been a pioneer in Scotland and Northern England, in modelling an attitude of care and support. In the early years, the Trust was enabled through its close relationship with the former Scottish Institute of Human Relations. Since the closure of the Institute in 2012, the Guntrip Trust has continued the same ethos of psychoanalytically informed psychological support for those working in religious life.
This has been in the following ways:
• the provision of bursaries to support access to psychodynamic/psychoanalytic therapy and training
• the development of work-based learning and application groups, led by a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and a minister
• ongoing research into particular areas of concern in the pastoral field
• lectures and conferences.
Increasingly, the churches in Scotland have recognised the importance of funding such provision themselves, a development for which the Trust feels it can take some credit. Nonetheless, it will continue to provide its own services as long as funds are available, convinced of the importance of this work.
We continue to be grateful to all who have supported the work of the Trust since its inception. You can donate to The Guntrip Trust either through Paypal or by sending a cheque to:
The Revd Kenneth Owens
Treasurer
The Guntrip Trust
77 Falcon Avenue
Edinburgh EH10 4AN
PLEASE NOTE
The Guntrip Trust differs in its aims from The Harry Guntrip Trust
http://www.harryguntriptrust.co.uk