LGBTQ adolescents and young adults raised within a Christian religious context: Positive and negative outcomes

Religious contexts have traditionally been understood as protective for a variety of psychosocial health outcomes. However, the generalizability of these findings to youth who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer (LGBTQ) is questioned due to denominational teachings on same-sex attractions and sexual behavior. Eight adolescents (15–17 years) and 11 young adults (19–24 years) who identify as LGBTQ raised in Christian religious affiliations (16 participants raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, 2 participants raised Catholic and 1 participant raised Presbyterian) participated in individual in-depth interviews, journal writings, and focus groups to provide greater insight into the lived experiences of LGBTQ individuals raised within a Christian religious environment. Findings suggest the religious context is related to both positive and negative outcomes. Eight themes are explored using participant's own words and experiences. Directions for future research and implications are discussed.     

Religious experiences in epileptic patients with a focus on ictus-related episodes

Two hundred thirty-four epileptic patients were examined for ictus-related religious experiences. Of the 234 cases, three (1.3%) were found to have had such religious experiences. All three cases had temporal lobe epilepsy with post-ictal psychosis, while one exhibited a simple partial seizure. At the same time, interictal experiences with hyperreligiosity were recognized in all three cases. The incidence of religious experiences while in a state of post-ictal psychosis was 27.3%, which is regarded as high, indicating some influence by the religions that the patients had faith in. Patients who had ictus-related or interictal religious experiences did not believe solely in Buddhism, a traditional religion in Japan, but rather in a combination of Buddhism and Shintoism, new Christian sect, contemporary Japanese religions and/or other folk beliefs. This indicates that these experiences had some connection not only with the personality characteristic of temporal lobe epilepsy, but also with the general lack of religious conviction and activity in Japan. In addition, the cases having ictus-related religious experiences also had interictal religious experiences and an interaction was seen between them. In this paper, the importance of taking bio-psycho-social aspects into consideration is pointed out in the discussion of epilepsy and religion.     

C.G. Jung et le problème du religieux

C.G.Jung's work is crossed from start to finish by religious issues. From childhood's dreams to maturity's writings, everyone will encounter that basic question. This text is a reflection about Jung's thoughts on religious experience. Thanks to his biography we will emphasize how he personally experiences religious issues and develops an original look on this crucial question for our time. Jung will be empirical all along his life and will always refuse a philosophical as well as a theological position. Actually, he experiences that religious attitude is a fundamental component of the human soul and there is no human reality without this point of view. It's the experience of the Self, the central archetype of the unconscious, which will be active in everyone of us, that creates religious experience. “Religiosity” is a deferential attention to the “numen” (defined in 1917 by Rudolf Otto) that is stimulated by the Self. The Self-archetype has a quaternary structure. Through his reflection about the Holy Trinity symbol and his “Answer to Job”, Jung emphasizes how this major, ternary symbol of Christianity will be enlarged to a quaternary structure that includes evil and femininity. We suppose that the Mary Magdalena symbol will be a collective, unconscious and vital enlargement of our major Christian symbol that joins two aspects of femininity, the mother and the wife.     

Transgender people’s reflections on identity,faith, and Christian faith communities in the U.S.

Abstract

Relational therapists have limited access to resources and information about transgender people’s faith beliefs and experiences in Christian communities of faith, which is largely absent from the professional literature. The purpose of this article is to examine the Christian religious and spiritual experiences of transgender people located in the U.S. Seven self-identified transgender people participated in in-depth interviews. Results of the study indicated that participants had various experiences in faith communities, with both supportive and discriminatory responses from others. The results also suggest that participants maintained their faith beliefs even when they experience rejection from faith communities. Moreover, participants reported feeling a connection with a higher power, and specifically viewed themselves as made transgender by God. Findings from this study may be particularly relevant for relational therapists who work within Christian faith communities and organizations. Implications for transgender inclusive and supportive therapy are discussed.     

“God has sent me to you”: Right temporal epilepsy,left prefrontal psychosis

Religious experiences have long been documented in patients with epilepsy, though their exact underlying neural mechanisms are still unclear. Here, we had the rare opportunity to record a delusional religious conversion in real time in a patient with right temporal lobe epilepsy undergoing continuous video-EEG. In this patient, a messianic revelation experience occurred several hours after a complex partial seizure of temporal origin, compatible with postictal psychosis (PIP). We analyzed the recorded resting-state EEG epochs separately for each of the conventional frequency bands. Topographical analysis of the bandpass filtered EEG epochs revealed increased activity in the low-gamma range (30–40 Hz) during religious conversion compared with activity during the patient's habitual state. The brain generator underlying this activity was localized to the left prefrontal cortex. This suggests that religious conversion in PIP is related to control mechanisms in the prefrontal lobe-related processes rather than medial temporal lobe-related processes.     

Spirituality and religion in epilepsy

Revered in some cultures but persecuted by most others, epilepsy patients have, throughout history, been linked with the divine, demonic, and supernatural. Clinical observations during the past 150 years support an association between religious experiences during (ictal), after (postictal), and in between (interictal) seizures. In addition, epileptic seizures may increase, alter, or decrease religious experience especially in a small group of patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE). Literature surveys have revealed that between .4% and 3.1% of partial epilepsy patients had ictal religious experiences; higher frequencies are found in systematic questionnaires versus spontaneous patient reports. Religious premonitory symptoms or auras were reported by 3.9% of epilepsy patients. Among patients with ictal religious experiences, there is a predominance of patients with right TLE. Postictal and interictal religious experiences occur most often in TLE patients with bilateral seizure foci. Postictal religious experiences occurred in 1.3% of all epilepsy patients and 2.2% of TLE patients. Many of the epilepsy-related religious conversion experiences occurred postictally. Interictal religiosity is more controversial with less consensus among studies. Patients with postictal psychosis may also experience interictal hyper-religiosity, supporting a "pathological" increase in interictal religiosity in some patients. Although psychologic and social factors such as stigma may contribute to religious experiences with epilepsy, a neurologic mechanism most likely plays a large role. The limbic system is also often suggested as the critical site of religious experience due to the association with temporal lobe epilepsy and the emotional nature of the experiences. Neocortical areas also may be involved, suggested by the presence of visual and auditory hallucinations, complex ideation during many religious experiences, and the large expanse of temporal neocortex. In contrast to the role of the temporal lobe in evoking religious experiences, alterations in frontal functions may contribute to increased religious interests as a personality trait. The two main forms of religious experience, the ongoing belief pattern and set of convictions (the religion of the everyday man) versus the ecstatic religious experience, may be predominantly localized to the frontal and temporal regions, respectively, of the right hemisphere.     

Christian Psychiatry: the impact of evangelical belief on clinical practice

OBJECTIVE: The authors surveyed psychiatrists in the Christian Psychiatry movement to assess the role of religious belief in their practices. METHOD: The psychiatrists were members of the Christian Medical and Dental Society; questionnaires were sent to 260, and usable responses were received from 193. The subjects were asked about demographic and practice variables, "born again" religious experiences, group cohesion, and beliefs about using the Bible and prayer in treatment. RESULTS: The respondents were somewhat more religious than Americans overall, who are themselves more religious than most psychiatrists. Nearly all reported having been "born again," after which they generally experienced a decrease in emotional distress. There was a significant difference in the respondents' affiliative feelings toward psychiatrists in the Christian Psychiatry movement and other psychiatrists. For acute schizophrenic or manic episodes, the respondents considered psychotropic medication the most effective treatment, but they rated the Bible and prayer more highly for suicidal intent, grief reaction, sociopathy, and alcoholism. Whether or not a patient was "committed to Christian beliefs" made a significant difference in whether the respondents would recommend prayer to the patient as treatment. About one-half said they would discourage strongly religious patients from an abortion, homosexual acts, or premarital sex, and about one-third said they would discourage other patients from these activities. CONCLUSIONS: Many studies have suggested a need for more sensitivity to religious issues by psychiatrists, and this study provides systematic findings on one approach. It remains important to evaluate ways in which a religious perspective can be related to clinical practice and what benefits and problems may derive from such a relationship.     

The Protestant child, adolescent, and family

This article addresses Protestant Christianity as an often-overlooked but significant factor in clinical work with children and adolescents. Noting the wide range of beliefs and practices among Protestants, the article identifies key tenets of Protestant faith that shape the worldviews of children, adolescents, and their families. Clinical implications of these beliefs are explored, with particular attention to three potentially psychopathologic features: the religious legitimation of child maltreatment; paranormal, direct experiences of the divine through unusual perceptions such as trance states or visions deemed normal within their religious context but that may also evidence serious pathology; and sexuality issues of particular significance for adolescents. Research suggests that Protestant beliefs also constitute resources for clinical work because they appear to be protective factors in relation to depression, avoidance of high-risk behaviors, and other measures of resiliency among adolescents. Clinicians who do not take the Protestant Christian family's religious/spiritual worldview into consideration in case formulation risk misunderstanding or alienating them from treatment. The article concludes with suggestions for collaboration.     

Psychotherapists' spiritual,religious, atheist or agnostic identity and their practice of psychotherapy: A grounded theory study

Abstract

In this present grounded theory study, 16 experienced psychologists, who practiced from varied theoretical orientations and came from diverse religious/spiritual/nonreligious backgrounds, explored their personal religious/spiritual/nonreligious identity development journeys, their experiences with clients' religious/spiritual content in psychotherapy sessions, and how their identity may have influenced the way they interacted with religious/spiritual material during sessions. Results revealed that psychologists' spiritual/religious/nonreligious identity is conflicted and complex and that their academic and clinical training did not provide sufficient opportunity to examine how this may affect their therapeutic work. A tentative grounded theory emerged suggesting that psychologists both identified with and were activated by clients' spiritual/religious conflicts and their internal experiences about the spiritual/religious content, both of which presented significant challenges to therapeutic work.     

The appreciation of the spiritual in mental illness: a qualitative study of beliefs among clergy in the UK

Clergy in the UK continue to provide health and social care services. However, collaboration between mental health services and clergy may be problematic, particularly in the resolution of conflicting beliefs and therapeutic modalities. For example, belief in demonic possession and other supernatural causes of mental illness, which are contentious among secular medical practitioners, remain prevalent in many ethnoreligious communities. Thus, interpretations of illness by clergy within health systems may be crucial to appropriate intervention for people with mental illness. However, clergy conceptualizations of suffering also reveal something about the secularization within religious institutions through the despiritualization of particular phenomena. This paper on Christian clergy beliefs and attitudes to supernatural explanations, describes how the negotiation of such beliefs are complex and often equivocal among mainstream clergy but integral to the Pentecostal churches and evangelical clergy in the mainstream, institutional churches. These beliefs and their implications for collaboration with psychiatry are discussed in the context of a rapidly changing religious and cultural landscape.     

Unkind Cutting Back and its Navigation

Tennes offers the “transpersonal” as a dimension that explains the origins of a variety of puzzling events and experiences that we encounter as therapists (and people). I suggest that Tennes's “mysterious ground of being” in which we are all rooted is not the only plausible explanation for such phenomena and that the notion of a purposeful, “superordinate field” is a religious rather than a psychological construct. I note my experiences of a dissonance between Tennes's attuned, experience-near clinical presentation and the highly generalized, experience-distant nature of the “Transpersonal Dimension,” and I offer a speculative framework for understanding this dissonance.     

Perceptions about intellectual disability: a qualitative study from Vellore,South India

Background Cultural and religious beliefs influence perceptions about health and illness. Data, from India, on perceptions about intellectual disability are scant. This study explored people's cultural beliefs and attitudes about intellectual disability, perceived needs and burden associated with care in Vellore, south India. Method A qualitative methodology using focus groups was employed. Eight focus groups were conducted in three settings and included the mothers of children and adolescents with intellectual disability (four groups, n = 29), community health workers (two groups, n = 17) and schoolteachers (two groups, n = 16). Results Our results suggest that cultural and religious beliefs perpetuated negative attitudes towards disability. This meant that caregivers bore a high burden of care with little support from family or society. The study confirmed the presence of diverse, multiple and contradictory models of disability drawing from biomedical and local religious, social and cultural constructs. Conclusions Public awareness, education and community‐level interventions for reducing the misconceptions and stigma related to intellectual disability are needed in addition to culturally sensitive treatment methods to improve the attitude towards and management of intellectual disability.     

Judeo-Christian religious experience and psychopathology: the legacy of William James

This article examines the relationship between Judeo-Christian religious experience and psychopathology. It builds on William James's Varieties of Religious Experience and more specifically his discussions of self, agency and the subliminal. Contemporary research on Christian conversion, mysticism, and its relationship to psychosis and mental health and healing are discussed. Future themes for research are proposed.     

L’antinomie entre thaumaturgie religieuse et thérapies médicales : le cas « Catholicisme et Psychiatrie » en Italie

The psychological climate of the Italian context has favoured a syncretism between the mundane and extramundane dimensions, triggering conflict and debate. During the 1990's for example, the Vatican launched a debate on Science and Faith. In this article, the Authors expand on the Science and Faith issue by analysing the influence exercised by the Christian faith on psychiatric sciences. The fact that the Christian religion is characterised by a theological corpus whereby the Deus otiosus was made flesh and crucified has fostered a mundane contraction of sacred thought thus enabling a dialogue that would have been otherwise impossible in theologies grounded on strict transcendental and fundamentalist dogmatism. Moreover, the considerable interest for human suffering- including physical ailments- which is intrinsic to the Christian faith, has enabled the Vatican hierarchies to not only promote the theology of devotion, but also to develop a strategic imbrication of numerous practical activities: universities, hospitals, the immigrant shelters run by Caritas and several NGOs operating in Developing Countries, which represent the Confessional Power embedded within the medical cultural fabric, thus exercising a particular influence on the theory and practice of medicine and, in our case, of psychiatry. Concomitantly said, the context has induced several non-confessional scientific organisations to offset the postsecularist vision of mental disorders by proposing scientific theories capable of analysing both the complex anthropological phenomenon represented by subjective religious experiences and the circumstances issuing from the establishment of religious thinking as a hierarchically strong cultural factor. This article sets forth some guidelines for a correct biopsychocultural approach to the study of religious experiences and highlights the evident contradiction underlying the coexistence of the practice of exorcism and of conventional medical treatments.     

Neurocognitive processes of the religious leader in Christians

Our recent work suggests that trait judgment of the self in Christians, relative to nonreligious subjects, is characterized by weakened neural coding of stimulus self‐relatedness in the ventral medial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) but enhanced evaluative processes of self‐referential stimuli in the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC). The current study tested the hypothesis that Christian belief and practice produce a trait summary about the religious leader (Jesus) in the believers and thus episodic memory retrieval is involved to the minimum degree when making trait judgment of Jesus. Experiment 1 showed that to recall a specific incident to exemplify Jesus' trait facilitated behavioral performances associated with the following trait judgment of Jesus in nonreligious subjects but not in Christians. Experiment 2 showed that, for nonreligious subjects, trait judgments of both government and religious leaders resulted in enhanced functional connectivity between MPFC and posterior parietal cortex (PPC)/precuneus compared with self judgment. For Christian subjects, however, the functional connectivity between MPFC and PPC/precuneus differentiated between trait judgments of the government leader and the self but not between trait judgments of Jesus and the self. Our findings suggest that Christian belief and practice modulate the neurocognitive processes of the religious leader so that trait judgment of Jesus engages increased employment of semantic trait summary but decreased memory retrieval of behavioral episodes. Hum Brain Mapp, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Consumers as Staff in Assertive Community Treatment Programs

The last decade has witnessed the increasing importance of consumers as providers of mental health services. Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) teams and ACT variants, with their emphasis on rehabilitation and support in the client's natural environment, have hosted consumer-professional collaborations. The authors discuss one such program in which an ACT program for homeless mentally ill adults employed consumer advocates (CAs). Consumer advocates were found to have a service profile similar to other staff. Further, there is suggestive evidence that the employment of CAs created a more positive attitude toward persons with mental illness. Issues of role definition, boundaries, support with supervision and the importance of CAs' experiences with mental illness are discussed.     

Religiosity,internalized homonegativity and outness in Christian men who have sex with men

When exposed to their congregations' negative views of homosexuality, Christian men who have sex with men frequently struggle to reconcile their religious and sexual identities, possibly contributing to negative emotional states and behaviors associated with HIV/STI infection. To examine the influence of religiousity on internalized homonegativity and outness among Christian men who have sex with men, we used survey data from 1165 men who answered questions about their religious beliefs and sexual behavior. We stratified participants based on religious affiliation groupings: Catholic, Mainline Protestant and Evangelical Protestant. After using confirmatory factor analysis to verify that the selected measures of religiosity were equivalent between groups, we used structural equation modeling to examine the relationship between religiosity, internalized homonegativity and outness. Among Catholics and Mainline Protestants, religiosity was not associated with internalized homonegativy or outness. However, among Evangelical Protestants – a group more likely to ascribe to religious fundamentalism – increased religiosity was associated with increased internalized homonegativity, which contributed to decreased outness. Our findings suggest that mental health providers and sexuality educators should be more concerned about the influence of religiosity on internalized homonegativity and outness when clients have a history of affiliation with Evangelical Protestant faiths more so than Catholic or Mainline Protestant faiths.

     

A retrospective look at the internal help-seeking process in young women with eating disorders

This qualitative study retrospectively explored the help-seeking process in women with eating disorders. Interviews were conducted with 14 college-age women suffering from anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, or eating disorder NOS. Grounded theory was utilized to develop a preliminary model of the help-seeking process. Participants described a gradual shift from denial to increased awareness of self and the impact of the illness. This core process was transient in nature and influenced by interpersonal feedback, critical incidents, the women's general attitude toward help- seeking, and prior treatment experiences. Implications for clinicians include an increased focus on the transient awareness of self and the illness.