Religion and Spirituality in Psychiatry

Psychotherapy from a Christian Perspective 293who has a name, behaves in a manner compatiblewith his name, and has supernatural knowledgeand power.Oppression causes the afflicted to be in a statethat is similar to depression. There is a grayness(gloom) that surrounds the person. One patientadmitted because she was suicidal that she hadbeen a witch, but kept her witch’s paraphernaliaafter she had renounced witchcraft and becamea Christian. The oppression occurred while inher apartment. Every time she entered, a graynesswould descend on her. It lifted when sheexited. When she disposed of the satanic bible,her cauldron, her cookbook for brews, and theingredients for brews, she no longer experiencedthe gloom surrounding her. Another patientwho had been oppressed for years had thegloom disappear when he was delivered fromthe oppression.Mature Christians have spiritual immunityfrom all forms of demonization, but especiallypossession. They must, however, maintain anadequate level of piety. In doing so, they maintainspiritual immunity. Spiritual immunity ismaintained by practicing regular prayer, Biblereading, and worship.Obsession is to be abnormally preoccupiedwith some thing. It is almost universally one ofideology. There were many communist leaderswho were obsessed. We see it among Christians,Muslims, and Hindus and, in our day, amongthe extreme animal rights people and environmentalists.Finally, there is fanaticism. It can be anextreme form of demonic obsession, although itis usually a psychological state. We see it amongChristians, Muslims, and Hindus and, duringWorld War II, among the Japanese. Fanaticismalso occurs in mental illness. This is especiallytrue of some forms of schizophrenia and occasionallyin mania where it occurs as one of thesymptoms.In completing this section, I must say thatall spiritual disease is psychospiritual. It has todo with beliefs that we call cognitions, but haveemotions connected to them. The behaviors thatarise out of these beliefs are then good or evil,correct or erroneous, constructive or deleterious,and pleasant or painful. They will then determinethe degree of happiness a person will experiencein his life.Spiritual disease can be both primary andsecondary. There is no question that to be unregenerateis a primary disease. It gives rise to asecondary disease of sin. But sin may occur as aprimary disease in the regenerate. Demonizationis usually a primary disease occurring mostlyin the unregenerate, but under certain circumstancesit also occurs in the regenerate. Fanaticismcan occur in the regenerate or the unregenerate.Psychospiritual problems almost alwaysoccur in psychiatric diseases described in theDiagnostic and Statistical Manual of MentalDisorders, Fourth Edition ( DSM-IV ). The writersof the Bible saw man as a unity, and one must usea systems approach to recognize that if one partof the system is not functioning correctly thenit will affect all other parts of the system. VonBertanlanffy,( 31) who was the great proponentof General Systems Theory, said that psychiatryand psychology needed to consider it in its diagnosisand treatment of mental problems. In thelight of his ideas, we can say that all illness has apsychospiritual component. We must recognizethat to treat one aspect of illness and neglect theother two is an omission.5. CHRISTIAN INTERVENTIONS5.1. EvangelismJust as the Muslim therapist feels the patientmust be correct in his Islamic faith before therapycan be carried out, the Christian therapistmust ascertain the spiritual state of the patientand determine whether the patient would benefitfrom Christian psychotherapy. Schizophrenicsand some bipolar disorders (manic phase) shouldbe treated without reference to Christianity.If a patient is unregenerate and is not opposedto Christian therapy, they should be offered thechoice of what form of therapy they desire. Thetherapist must always remember that the humanwill does not tolerate the imposition of another