Originally published July 10 2005
Links between religion and health
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Nearly 30 medical schools include courses on religion and spirituality, based on the belief that these activities positively impact mental, emotional and physical well-being.
Nearly 30 medical schools include courses on religion and spirituality, based on the belief that these activities positively impact mental, emotional and physical well-being.
Recent evidence challenges this premise, citing lack of concrete evidence.
How are we to understand this contradiction?
Religion, spirituality and health are multidimensional constructs that can help one develop self-awareness, identity and meaning.
Religion can be inspiring or depleting, expanding or limiting, depending upon the leaders, traditions, beliefs and options it offers regarding the universal concerns: suffering, healing and health.
In terms of my professional specialty, mental health, I have had patients who are comforted and calmed by their religious beliefs; I have patients who are terrified - and made sick - by what they hear from the pulpit and from their religious teachers.
With God at the center of our lives, we develop healthy attitudes, values and priorities in order that we can truly experience healthy love and wholeness.
Without the ability to live life believing in a power greater than ourselves - without this love we were created to know and experience - we miss our purpose.
That was recently affirmed by news in the Harvard Mental Health Letter that meditation is being used in the treatment of mental illness.
Buddha understood everyone suffers from disturbed minds, and mental disturbances affect your health.
Stress is responsible for many of our health problems, and much of our stress comes from our mind.
First, the spiritual, which is universal and neutral, and the other, dogmatic and ritualistic, which often is divisive.
This latter can also add to the anguish of individuals by interpreting ill health as a punishment for one's sins or wrongdoings.
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