Religion and Mental Illness – A Misunderstood Pair

Photo by Isabella Fischer

In the popular imagination, the mental asylum is a popular setting for horror films, ghost stories, and psychological thrillers. Any story of abuse torture corruption and murder would find itself quite at home in places that have historically lived up to their dread reputation.

However, this same supernatural air can also bring to mind the troubled relationship between mental health and religious faith. In the series, American Horror Story: Asylum, members of the clergy are among its lead cast of characters as they grapple with the boundaries of mental illness and the paranormal reality surrounding them. This hearkens back to the Middle Ages, where mentally disturbed behavior was attributed to demonic influence. And in the book Asylum Scandals, one of the two prominent institutions featured is named after St. Peter.

Much like the other sciences since at least the 19th century, the relationship between religious authorities and the psychiatric profession has always been fraught with tension. However, this isn’t simply a matter of one side being more right than the other. While abuse and maltreatment can be inflicted by charlatans styling themselves as exorcists, the history of America’s mental institutions also shows they can be the result of misguided programs and fatally flawed theories.

There is plenty of blame to go around, and the pointing of fingers hardly helps the modern discourse on mental health.

As a healthier alternative, it’s better to impartially dig deep into the relationship between religion and psychology while identifying where the real quacks and cracks are (regardless of which side they claim to be on).

How Religion Harms Mental Health

Page from Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus Maleficarum via Wikimedia Commons.

Now, history is certainly packed with examples of religion being used to justify abuse against people who would be diagnosed with mental illnesses today. One need only look up the infamous Salem Witch Trials for a particularly shameful example here in America.

Such events are the unfortunate consequence of institutional religion and authority having almost a monopoly on the sciences. This was a problem even in pre-Christian antiquity. When the great philosopher Socrates was sentenced to death, impiety against the Athenian pantheon was one of the major charges.

For many centuries, religion has continued to be a primary source of explanation for the natural world as well as the supernatural. The secularism experienced by many today is recent in comparison to the millennia when humans saw the world through the lenses of churches, cults, and superstitions.

And even today, there remain plenty of examples of religious fraudsters exploiting the mental illnesses and gullibility of their followers. It is hardly surprising that the recent scandals of moral panics incited by religious groups have contributed to the declining religiosity in various parts of the world. Threats of eternal damnation and church community ostracism are recipes for trauma and mental illness. In turn, there has been increasing demand for licensed psychiatric care as well as mental health awareness, adding lots of pressure on many practitioners who still struggle with limited resources.

How Religion Helps Mental Health

Photo by Rod Long.

Of course, the paradox here is that plenty of research also validates the importance of religion in the mental health of the millions who still practice their faith (regardless of what particular faith that may be).

From a purely academic perspective, a healthy practice of religion has served as a source of positive motivation, optimism, and hope. It’s understandable that many therapists and psychiatrists today are wary of just writing it off by default. And in the bigger scheme of things, even the largest and oldest religious institutions are admitting their shortcomings in their relationship with psychiatry. There are also examples of religious believers calling out members of even their own clergy when they are found guilty of proliferating grave misinformation on mental health (such as this Catholic journalist calling out a celebrity exorcist for his erroneous views on bipolar disorder).

So, in other words, the factors that allow religion to become a cause of mental illness can also be reformed so that faith becomes a source of mental healing instead. The challenge then becomes not merely one of reparation but also collaboration and integration. There remains plenty of hope that all the world’s religious authorities, laypersons, and clergy can root out bad actors and be more open to the latest psychiatric research. It may lead to a world where there are fewer exorcisms and more therapy sessions, but it’s at least a more desirable world for all parties involved.

The Way Forward for Faith and Mental Health

Regardless of one’s own personal attitudes towards faith, there is no denying that religion remains an active part of society in many places around America and the world. Its involvement in people’s beliefs in the supernatural constantly ties (and clashes) with established knowledge of mental health.

Yet rather than maintain divisions, where one is sacrificed for the other, it might be better to see faith as still a component in people’s mental health experiences and not be like the abusive asylums who were quick to jump to conclusions about a person’s sanity.

Want to see more examples of just how poor the processes and diagnosis were in some of America’s oldest asylums? Asylum Scandals has plenty. You can find it readily available on Amazon.