Religion and Spirituality in Psychiatry

The Bible: Relevant Issues for Clinicians 45the elders of the church to pray at their bedsideand anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord.They should confess their sins and pray for oneanother and “they will be healed.” Jerome madea mistake and translated the phrase as “they willbe saved.” Thus, spiritual salvation displaced thehealing of illness.Another major factor in the church’s neglectof healing was the increasing importance givento the biblical writings of Paul, who basicallyreclaimed the old Jewish concept that sick personsare sinners. Sickness itself was a consequenceof demons, idols, false gods, and all thehosts of wickedness in the universe. Paul himselfhad a sickness (probably epilepsy). He askedGod to cure him three times but God refused.According to Paul, God then said, “My grace issufficient for you, for my power is made perfectin weakness.” This was truly a brilliant, new idea:a handicap was transformed into an asset by perceivingit so. Instead of regarding an infirmitymerely as a defect or liability, declare it an opportunityto receive the power of Christ and makethe most of it. The upside of this reformulation isthe enhanced sense of self-worth that it providesto the disabled and chronically ill. The downsideis the potential for persons to accept their infirmitieswith passivity or even to harm themselvesdeliberately in pursuit of a higher, spiritual goal.The glorification of suffering has influencedChristian attitudes toward illness for almost twothousand years, and medical treatment was devalueduntil the eighteenth century. However, thechurch did encourage devotion to sacred relicssuch as the bones of saints and ascribed healingpowers to them. Specific saints were associatedwith differing body organs and diseases. St. Lucy,for example, supposedly enucleated her eyes tocalm the ardor of a suitor who had praised theirbeauty and, thus, became the patron saint of personswith eye diseases. St. Dymphna of Belgiumwas the patron saint of the mentally ill. Churcheswere built to display these relics and becamehealing shrines that attracted pilgrims.Relics lost their power to heal as medical practicebecame more scientific and effective. The onlymajor healing shrine today is in Lourdes, France.It was established in 1858 when a young girl hadvisions of a lady subsequently identified as theVirgin Mary. Several million pilgrims each yeartravel to Lourdes in search of healing, althoughthe Catholic Church has certified only about 100miraculous cures. Sick visitors to Lourdes returnhome uncured but usually feeling better. Patientsbenefit from the support of the family memberswho accompany them on their pilgrimage; fromsharing expectations for improvement with thousandsof like-minded patients; from participationin emotionally charged and spiritually upliftingceremonies that include fervent praying, hymnsinging, and a formal parade of children, priests,nuns, bishops, nurses, and physicians; and froma sense of expectant excitement. In the words ofJerome and Julia Frank (1991), (13) “The improvementprobably reflects heightened morale,enabling a person to function better in the faceof an unchanged organic handicap. Fully documentedcures of unquestionable and gross organicdisease are extremely infrequent – probably nomore frequent than similar ones occurring insecular settings.” Improvement seems to belinked with the intensity of the faith of patients.According to Cranston (1995), (14) those who feelbetter are “almost invariably simple people – thepoor and the humble; people who do not interposea strong intellect between themselves and theHigher Power.”The rebirth of interest in healing began in NewEngland at the end of the nineteenth century withthe development of the mind-cure movement. In1875, Mary Baker Eddy founded the Church ofChristian Science, which preached that sicknessis only a belief that can be destroyed by the divineMind, and that disease is simply fear made manifeston the human body. She considered medications,surgery, and hypnotism to be examplesof false beliefs and mortal illusions. Harvardpsychologist William James published his masterpiece,The Variety of Religious Experience , in1902.(15) He noted that mind-cures replacedmorbid beliefs with healthy-minded attitudes.“The whole matter can be summed up by onesentence: God is well and so are you. You mustawake to the knowledge of your real being.”