Mental Health, Faith, and Compassion

Mental Health Myths in the Church

“Just pray more.”

“Just ask God for healing.”

“If you had more faith, you’d get better.”

Why Mental Health Is Not a Faith Failure

These trite statements are common responses within the church to mental health challenges. Such perspectives fail to understand that our mental health, like our physical health, is often not within our control. We cannot simply will ourselves into health.

How God Works Through Mental Health Care

These words also fail to take into account the fullness of who God is and how God works.

Mental Health, Medicine, and God’s Creation

God is not limited by our human ability to believe or pray. The Lord can work at any time through any part of his creation, including other people, medicine, science, and the arts.

Such phrases cast blame and judgment, causing great pain to those already suffering. But God’s first response to human suffering is always compassion. As followers of Jesus, we also are called to be compassionate and loving toward those who are struggling or unwell, welcoming them into our communities and sincerely seeking their whole restoration. . . .

Mental Health, Science, and the Church

Why is there such a lack of understanding of mental health within the church?

Why the Church Distrusts Mental Health Science

Pastor and former social worker Sanghoon Yoo argues that one key reason is a longstanding distrust of science. But science and scientific knowledge are gifts from God for his people to use.

“Treating Mental Health Requires Science and the Church” by Sanghoon Yoo.

In the United States, it takes an average of eleven years for a person to receive mental health treatment after the first appearance of symptoms. The stigma and lack of effective health care systems for those with mental health challenges contribute to this significant delay in treatment.

Long-Held Tensions Between the Church and Science

. . . in the last three decades, I have not witnessed widespread church engagement in mental health awareness and treatment. I actually left the field of social work to become a pastor in hopes of serving as a bridge between the church and the mental health field. But I have been frustrated by the antagonism between the two sectors and their ideologies.

In the mental health field, I have seen a prevailing ideology of secular humanism, which denies the existence of God and divine intervention in human lives (Zuckerman, Psychology Today, 2020). The field tends to exclusively emphasize therapies and medications. In ministry, I have often found a lack of understanding of the social sciences, and resistance to the valuable insights provided by psychology, sociology, anthropology, and other fields. The church heavily prioritizes relying on prayer and reading Scripture to overcome mental and emotional hardships. Those who continue struggling are condemned for being weak in faith and mind. . . .

An Integrated Mental Health Approach

As a pastor, I tried to connect faith and science by engaging my church in community projects related to mental health and advocacy. During this same time, however, I experienced my own traumatic season. I was suicidal, experiencing panic attacks and depression, and wanted to give up all relationships and work.

Trauma-Informed Mental Health Care and Faith

I was then introduced to the trauma-informed care movement, which rescued my life and rejuvenated my ministerial career. I was surprised when a movement leader said, “One of the most powerful factors for recovery from trauma is unconditional love and one person with constant care.” Unconditional love and one person with constant care. These were not medical terms or psychological jargon. This was faith-community language that I used all the time.

The trauma-informed care movement has been greatly informed by the study of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and neuroscience development (www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/aces). But the movement has also embraced spiritual practices for healing and recovery (Mallon, Paces Connection, 2021). The discovery of such an integrated approach was a huge yet hopeful surprise for me. I am beginning to see more Christian leaders embracing this approach, and I hope many more will.

In trauma-informed care, effective healing and recovery require a safe, consistently caring relationship, and a community that provides belonging and connection. The behaviors triggered by re-traumatization, chemical imbalance, and other mental health struggles need to be understood and accepted by empathetic and compassionate people. This helps those who are suffering to feel safe, understood, accepted, and comforted, accelerating the healing process alongside medication and therapy.

The Church’s Role in Mental Health Healing

Who can provide such unconditionally loving, caring, and non-judgmental relationships and community? I believe that followers of Jesus can. In the Gospels, we see how Jesus formed empathetic relationships with those who needed compassion and healing. Jesus approached the blind, the tax collector, and the Samaritan (foreign and despised) woman, bringing safety with his unconditional love.

Building Trauma-Informed Churches for Mental Health

I continue to work in the trauma-informed movement, convinced that it can help the church fight the stigma of mental illness and increase resilience through training, biblical truth, and scientific research. The church can be a trauma-informed community, strengthened with these tools and values: safety, trustworthiness and transparency, peer support, collaboration and mutuality, empowerment with choice and voice, and sensitivity to cultural, historical, and gender issues. Through this movement, we can be agents of Christ’s love, compassion, and healing to those struggling with their mental health.

Reflecting on Mental Health and Faith

PAUSE & REFLECT

How do you see the long history of mistrust between Christianity and science manifesting today?
What barriers would Christian communities need to overcome in order to provide meaningful support to people struggling with their mental health?
What messages about mental health have you heard from your family, culture, or church? What do you think is at the root of these beliefs?

A Prayer for Mental Health and Wisdom

BENEDICTION

The ways in which science, genetics, faith, culture, societal norms, and personal experience all intersect with mental health can feel complex and overwhelming. But faithful people have been asking hard questions of God since ancient times, and we know that God loves to impart wisdom upon those who seek it.

We conclude with this prayer from St. Augustine.

Look upon us, O Lord,

and let all the darkness of our souls

vanish before the beams of thy brightness.

Fill us with holy love,

and open to us the treasures of thy wisdom.

All our desire is known unto thee,

therefore perfect what thou hast begun,

and what thy Spirit has awakened us to ask in

prayer.

We seek thy face,

turn thy face unto us and show us thy glory.

Then shall our longing be satisfied,

and our peace shall be perfect.

Amen.