ONTARIO — Pastor Andrew Anderson stood at the front of the chapel, his head bowed, along with about a dozen visitors in the pews.
But the leader of Crossroads Church wasn’t preaching a sermon. He was consecrating the church’s former offices for something new.
The church is preparing to open City Care Counseling Center. The center will provide evidence-based mental health care, psychiatric services and community education, according to its website.
“I have been the benefactor of quality Christian counseling and getting the help that I needed in a really important time in my life,” Anderson said during a dedication ceremony Wednesday.
“There are substantial needs that are going to be met through City Care Christian counseling. I am grateful that we have the opportunity to do this.”
Director Jeremy Smith has seen those needs firsthand. Before joining the City Care Counseling Center team, he spent nine years a program coordinator at Appleseed Community Mental Health Center in Ashland.
“My case load is full and we don’t open for another two weeks,” he said Wednesday night. “The need is not hypothetical. The need is already sitting in our pews. The need is in our backyard and on our streets.”
Smith also cited a 2023 report from Richland Public Health, which found 17 percent of adults in Richland County experienced frequent mental distress. The report also states that Richland County has a higher suicide rate than the state average.
City Care will offer counseling for individuals, teens, couples and families. The center will also offer specialized treatment for people with substance use and gambling addictions.
Nurse practitioner Becca Granger will provide psychiatric services to assist clients who may benefit from medication.
“Not everybody needs medication,” Granger said. “But sometimes, whether it’s just chemical imbalance or symptoms are severe enough, it can be completely appropriate and healthy and beneficial to add medication in.”
Granger said she encourages her clients to ask questions.
“We are really trying to provide the patient with good information about what they’re taking, why they’re taking it and inviting them to be part of their own care.”
City Care will offer Christian counseling for those who want it
Anderson said City Care Counseling Center will be “autonomous” from Crossroads and have its own board of directors.
Nevertheless, the center will receive support from the church. It will operate from Crossroads’ Ontario campus at 636 Lexington-Springmill Road. City Care Counseling Center opens Sept. 14. It will be open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
It’s a similar model to one Anderson started at his previous church in rural Nebraska. Anderson said he provided pastoral counseling to his parishioners, but realized some of them needed mental health support as well.
So he partnered with a licensed mental health professional to start Upper Room Counseling Center due to a lack of services in the area.
“Taking the experience that I had garnered from being in Nebraska and doing this, it was a natural fit to create something like that here,” he said.
Smith said he believes City Care will become a place where clients can experience quality mental health care and, if they want it, spiritual formation.
“It’s a wonderful way to gain perspective and just learn. It’s more than just talking about feelings. It’s developing strategies and tools to navigate the ups and downs.”
State ethics regulations prohibit professional counselors from trying to convert clients or persuade them to follow a certain religious practice. But counselors are allowed to take client’s existing cultural and religious beliefs into account and discuss them in a way that aligns with the client’s values.
“If they’re not Christian, or maybe they are Christian, but they say, ‘I just want mental health counseling. I don’t want to bring my faith into it,’ we’ll fully respect that,” Smith said.
Mental health treatment is sometimes stigmatized in certain religious communities, but Granger said she believes the two can work together for clients who want a faith-based experience.
“It doesn’t matter to your background or your current faith beliefs. You’re welcome here. We’re going to love on you. We’re going to treat you well. We’re going to do things the right way,” she said.
“But for those individuals that identify as Christians, that really opens a wonderful door for us to be able to do things like point them back to Scripture.”
She said there are plenty of examples of overlap between biblical teachings and evidence-based psychotherapy practices.
“Cognitive behavioral therapy, a tried and true evidence-based practice model, is based on the idea that if we can identify faulty thinking and change how we think, it will influence how we feel, and then it will influence and change our behaviors and our actions,” she said.
“Then we look at the Bible, and we’ve got Proverbs 23:7 that says, ‘As a man thinketh in his heart, so he is.'”
Smith and Anderson said another goal is for the center is to educate the faith community on mental health issues.
“We have a lot of hurting people, a lot of broken people in church, and sometimes people don’t understand what mental illness is,” Smith said.
Anderson, who spent eight years as a police officer, said he’d also like to see the center work with law enforcement on deescalation training and mental health support.
“The trauma that you experience and that you’re a part of (as a police officer)….mental health is a is a real problem in law enforcement as well,” he said.
Smith said the center will accept most insurance plans and the church is working on starting a benevolence fund for clients without coverage may need financial assistance.
