It is because pastoral care and counseling facilitate person agency and efficacy (personal, social, and political empowerment and transformation) that African American pastoral care and counseling are inherently political processes, contends Edward Wimberly. In African American Pastoral Care and Counseling: The Politics of Oppression and Empowerment, Wimberly outlines the theological anthropology that undergirds the practices of care and the practices of self as holistic processes. Wimberly shows those who engage in pastoral counseling with African Americans how to navigate around the negative self-images, identities, and stories into which they have been recruited in order to liberate themselves to discern how to best make use of their personal and political agency and efficacy.