Psychiatric Diseases in the Context of the Christian Experience. Part 1

1. Entity type Lemma
2. Original titleПсихические болезни в контексте христианского опыта. Часть 1.
3. Language term Russian
4. lemma author Asliturk, Miriam
5. lemma category Scientific theories and disciplines > Medicine - Scientific theories and disciplines > Psychology-Psychoanalysis
6. Publication date 09-07-2018
7. lemma work Ларше, Жан-Клод [Author]. Психические болезни в контексте христианского опыта. Часть 1.
8. lemma manifestations Церковь и Биоэтика: Церковно-общественный совет по биомедицинской этике при Московской Патриархии.
9. Keywords Christian anthropology - Early Church Fathers - mental health - psychiatry and Christianity - medicine
10. Url Click Here
11. Citations
    1. <p>Ларше, Жан-Клод (2010). Психические болезни в контексте христианского опыта. Часть 1. <em>Церковь и Биоэтика: Церковно-общественный совет по биомедицинской этике при Московской Патриархии.</em> Retrieved from: <a href="http://bioethics.orthodoxy.ru/analitika/eticheskie-problemy-psikhiatrii/301-">http://bioethics.orthodoxy.ru/analitika/eticheskie-problemy-psikhiatrii/301-</a> </p>
12. Lemma body

    1. The author believes that today there is no clear classification of psychiatric diseases and many countries differ in their approach. For example, schizophrenia in France has a clear definition while in the English-speaking world this disease has a very broad description and includes many psychoses and even neuroses. Even the notion of “psychiatric disease” itself is problematic. In the 1960s many theorists proposed the interpretation of psychiatric diseases as being socially constructed and therefore not diseases at all. During this period many started to see the hospitalization of such patients as a form of unnecessary incarceration. Advancement in pharmaceuticals made it possible to replace the straitjacket with a “chemical straitjacket”, i.e. medication. All this made conditions in psychiatric hospitals more humane but it did not attack the root of the problem. The movement of critical psychology proposed to involve patients’ participation in the treatment and share responsibility with doctors (for ex. Ronald Laing 1927-1989). These attempts, unfortunately, remained marginal.

       The author maintains that even today patients with psychiatric diseases are seen as people out of the norm and different from others. Christian thought has a different opinion on this issue. According to Christianity, psychological disease can have three types of origin: bodily, demonic, and spiritual. Treatment of diseases depends on the correct diagnosis of the origin of the disease. This idea contradicts the widespread image of the Church as claiming all patients with psychological diseases as being possessed by evil spirits. The Church Fathers had the necessary sensibility to reveal the triple nature of the human soul: body, psyche, and spirit. For the Church Fathers, the issue is rooted in the attitude of a person toward God; that is seen as the most important. The Church Fathers did recognize, however, that some psychiatric diseases as provoked by a certain disorder in the body, as most doctors suggest today. In conclusion, the author mentions that early Christian thinkers saw roots of psychological diseases not only in physical and bodily disorders but also for spiritual reasons.