Preaching on Mental Illness
When is the last time you heard a sermon on depression? Or for that matter heard anything about depression or other mental illnesses even mentioned in a sermon?
I ask because I read this morning of the death of Rick and Kay Warren’s son Matthew of an apparent suicide. Matthew, 27 years old, had long suffered from bi-polar disorder and, as part of that, suffered from intense periods of depression that included suicidal impulses. The Warrens’ response to this heart-breaking tragedy has been forthright and faithful at a time when most of us would want only to huddle together in grief. My heart breaks for them even as I admire their grace and faith in such circumstances.
Because of their tragedy, the question of mental illness is again before the public and, in particular, before the Church. I raised the question about mental illness and preaching because the sermon is the most regular, public, and communal witness of the Church and if depression isn’t being mentioned there then whatever else the church may be saying, it probably isn’t reaching most of its members.
As a culture, we are not comfortable talking about mental illness. Even in 2013 there is a stigma about admitting you struggle with depression or any other mental illness. We’ve come along way in not verbalizing that stigma, but I know too many people who are embarrassed, or even ashamed, to admit they struggled with mental illness to believe for a moment that we’ve overcome our biases. All too often we think of mental illness as a character flaw or as a weakness, a sign that something is deeply wrong with the person suffering.
Recent discussions of mental illness in relation to the mass shootings of the last year haven’t always helped. Yes, they have raised the issue of the profoundly inadequate resources available to persons suffering from mental illness. But they have also connected mental illness to violent behavior, potentially deepening the cultural dread of mental illness.
So I’ll come back to the question: when was the last time you heard a sermon that took up the issue of mental illness in any detail? Odds are such a sermon would help us view a pervasive condition from the perspective of faith. A study from the National Institute of Mental Health suggests that 1 in 4 adults suffers from a diagnosable form of mental illness in any given year, while a report by ABC News says that 1 in 20 adults suffers severely enough that it regularly disrupts their work and relationships. Which means that most of us, even if we haven’t suffered ourselves, know and love someone who has.
Why do I think a sermon that dealt with mental illness would help? Actually, I don’t want just one sermon, I want mental illness to be a part of our regular congregational conversation. And so I hope that preaching that regularly names mental illness along with other challenges we face will do two things in particular.
1) Normalize mental illness. Depression, bi-polar disorder, substance abuse, post-traumatic stress disorder, bulimia and other eating disorders – these and other struggles are not things to be ashamed of but rather are elements of our human condition. The more we can talk about these things in the everyday venues of our congregational life the less peculiar or aberrant or dangerous they will seem.
2) Address faith to life. One of the leading reasons I hear people give to explain why they have stopped going to church is that they describe the Bible and faith as irrelevant. They don’t say this to be harsh or to make excuses. Rather, they just don’t see how the time they spend in church – and what they hear or talk about there – relates to the everyday issues of work, home, family and all the rest. So the more we can view the challenges of life in our world from the perspective of faith the better.
Here I should be clear. I’m not looking for “application” sermons that teach us how to apply principles from the Bible to managing stress or having a better marriage or dealing with depression. Such sermons are all too often superficial and turn the gospel into good advice and render the Christian faith as merely a recipe for “your best life now.” Rather, I want sermons that help me look at, think about, respond to, talk about, and in general make sense of…my life – all of my life, including the hard and challenging parts as well as the beautiful and wonderful parts – from within the framework of the Christian story.
Do I know how to do that? Not yet, but I’m trying. Moreover, I know lots of good folks are already working at this and I want to learn from them. Which is why I’m suggestion that more and more of us give some thought to how our life in church – including the sermon – helps us not only hear that God loves us – the message of central importance – but also how that love shapes and guides our living in the world. If we can do that then we will, I believe, help to create an environment that surrounds people like the Warrens and all of those who suffer from, or love someone who suffers from, mental illness with a community of faith that believes that Jesus came “to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18-19).
Note: No doubt there are lots of resources for those interested in reading further. Please feel free to suggest one’s you’ve found helpful in the comments below.
Thank you for your words. There are several resources I would highly recommend:
Musings of a Christian Psychologist: http://wisecounsel.wordpress.com/
Resources from the American Association of Christian Counselors (http://www.aacc.net/)
The Anxious Christian (http://www.amazon.com/Anxious-Christian-Your-Anxiety-Good/dp/0802404448)
I always prickle and get suspicious when the church tries to address mental illness–even though I know it’s needed– because I believe it’s easy to go into dangerous/hurtful territory unintentionally. Being told how many times God says “do not be anxious” isn’t comforting to someone with an anxiety disorder; Having Psalm 23 quoted ad infinitum to people with a variety of mental illnesses isn’t reassuring. And (from experience, from observation, and from my training to become a therapist), I’ve noticed people are very uncomfortable/afraid of mental illness. Bringing it up at a time when people aren’t ready to hear it can cause more harm than good.
But enough with the doom and gloom! I’ve found the resources I’ve mentioned very helpful. I’ve also found empathy activities–with youth and adults–help us to get a very real sense of Christ’s love for all and ways that we can reflect that love for others.
Rachel, thanks for the plug! I heartily agree that we need more preaching on this topic. In 2007 I wrote a rather bland post about this topic. It says almost nothing. But what is amazing about this post are the comments. You get a first had look at the struggle to be mentally ill (self or family member) in the church and receive good pastoral and community care. http://wisecounsel.wordpress.com/2007/06/26/serious-mental-illness-and-faith-what-to-do/
Thank you!
I happened to be online when this story broke. A few of the first comments in social media were very unkind and made some broad assumptions of why the son of a conservative preacher would take his own life.
As a Christian, I often judge other Christians with different approaches to the bible, their faith, their politics. My way is after all the right way to be faithful to God… but seeing this social media attack… I guess it has helped me understand what it is to be one in the spirit with all Christians…
We must be known for our love, even when we disagree with one another. If we try to understand and describe the beliefs and acts of our fellow Christians in the best possible light… if we can find compassion for one another, courage to stand by one another, maybe we can find the courage and compassion needed to bring God’s love and grace to the mentally ill.
Amen
Perhaps the problem is “life in church”. Too many of us living “in church”, instead of “as church”. I respect and appreciate the attempt to get a dialogue going in church. Ideally, if you should be able to admit your brokenness and hope for new life anywhere, it should be with brothers and sisters in the presence of the baptismal font and the Lord’s table. But that hasn’t been my experience.
It seems it must start with ensuring that all messages from greetings to sermons truly say that all are welcome. If any are excluded (subtly or openly) for any reason, someone with the shame of mental illness in the family certainly has reason to hide being in crisis.
In the last year I’ve spent more time at my local homeless shelter than at my very nice ELCA congregation. In this life “as church”, I have little difficulty admitting my own struggles with depression. “In church”, it’s been my experience that I’m not alone in sanitizing my reality. When I became known for working at the mission, church people with “shameful” issues that the mission addresses started seeking me out. (Homeless family members, addiction, etc.)
Can we leave and never return to being the unrealistically sanitized “in church”? Or if you must visit such a utopian spot, at least, never LIVE “in church”. Just “be the church” where you live.
A sermon on love or study of Jesus’ healing ministry educated by becoming informed and being involved in the dialogue on the developing ELCA social statement on mental illness might be a progressive set of actions. But then apply it by being the church where mental illness is openly an issue. When we go where others also have the pain, we can’t help have conversations about mental illness, addiction, anger, all forms of hunger, incarceration, recovery, failure, and hopes of new life. All interrelated complex issues that keep us from prejudices and proof-texting. And it’s an encounter of a Matthew 25 nature, so it just might be life changing.
I’ve been a Bible study leader, worship leader, and Council member, so I know “in church”, but I’m more at home with, and have been more transformed by, the homeless, “as church”. ALL are welcome. Our purpose in following Jesus is clear – feed, shelter, love, heal. We don’t have time or energy for fights about colors or worship styles. We’re happy when the walls are painted and a brother plays piano. The folks in our diverse community are not pretending to need to appear better than anyone else. (That’s also a lot less depressing!)
Consider getting out of the church. Don’t ever stop being the church.
Well said and well thought out. Thanks for being in the trenches Marilyn.
One helpful resource is the story that Bill and Lucy Hulme share in their book entitled ,Wrestling With Depression, with Bill (a retired pastoral counselor and professor of pastoral theology and ministry) telling the story of his depression and Lucy’s struggles as his caregiver. they optimistically say that depression is the most curable of mental illnesses.
I appreciate your willingness to address this topic, as well as your positive approach, which can support healing and wholeness. As a long-time church employee and as a writer on the topic of depression and other disorders, I pay a lot of attention to matters of faith and mental illness. Sadly, I find that too many people hold archaic and damaging beliefs around these issues. We need as many people as possible crying out in the wilderness, “Mental illness is not related to faith or lack of faith.” Thank you for being willing to take up this cry.
https://www.facebook.com/notes/elise-tweten/for-rory/10152443157168538
My best friend, Rory, killed himself a few weeks ago and I was shocked by it. Rory was the kind of person who would do anything for anyone. The pastor at the service said that a funeral like Rory’s wouldn’t have been held in a church not too long ago. And that if any other young adults were feeling depressed they should “just stop it.” Needless to say, I was heartbroken over the funeral sermon because it didn’t say anything about Rory. There was no talk about the darkness that mental illness causes in people’s lives.
This is just a little something I wrote about Rory.
I was told of Matthew Warren’s death in the Choir room as we gathered to pray before worship last week. A choir member’s son took his life a year before I began to serve at this Church. It seems to me that we all do preach on illness – I’m not sure making a distinction between physical and mental illnesses helps – whether by commission or omission; and the people who hear us are living with illness and understand by what we say or don’t. Being clear that suicide is most often a symptom of a disease – just as a “heart attack” is a symptom of heart disease – is crucial to proclaiming God’s Realm. Our finitude and frailty of our bodies are not punishments but opportunities to care for and love (and here I have to use your words David) those who God loves so much…
David, and all those who commented
Thanks for this. I am a priest in the Anglican Church of Canada. About 14 years ago, I made a “suicide plan”. Thankfully, I didn’t have the chance to carry it out, and I received the help I needed. The parish I was serving at the time found it very difficult to deal with my mental illness, and I had to leave there. It was a good decision, both for me and for the parish.
I moved to this parish 9 years ago, and from the very beginning (well, after I was installed as the priest here, not during the interviews ;-)), I have been open about my clinical depression. I have spoken about it in small groups, with individuals, as well as from the pulpit. Recently, in a weekly column I write for the local newspaper, I wrote about it there as well.
I mention all of this to affirm what you have written here … that in being open, and in making myself vulnerable like this, I have allowed others to do the same. Some of them have opened themselves to me in confidence; others more publicly. But it remains a wonder to me how strong a community can be built around this kind of appropriate vulnerability (and may I also say here, thank you Brene Brown).
We need not hide our failures or our struggles from one another. If we are to be a community of God’s life, we ought to be able as well to face death in other to receive the amazing gift of resurrection. As I’m preaching during this Easter season, we are being called to practice resurrection, and identifying those places where we need to be revived is but the first step in such a practice.
Again David, thank you for your words and your continuing commitment to being a servant of all the servants of God.
Yme
Thank you, Yme, for your courage, vulnerability, and powerful incarnational ministry and witness.
Blessings to you!
David
Hi there.. I listen to Saddleback church from my phone app almost everyday to keep me going and the passing of Mathew Warren was a shocker to me because I didn’t know pastor Rick had a son who was mentally ill and it resonated inside me also cause I too struggle with mental illness (bipolar). And when I heard pastor Rick has done everything possible to cure his mental illness, that robbed a lot of my hope as well. I’ve listened to the messages where he would spend numerous amount of time praying, finding the best doctors, medication etc.. and seems like it didn’t work. I can’t imagine struggling with mental illness and also be the son of a world renown pastor, seems like it must have been much more pressure and expectations from others who didn’t even know he struggled with it. But I’m still having faith and continue to fight to the end. I hope there will be more messages on mental illness at churches to remove the stigma and also educate and help people who suffer. I also believe God will take this tragedy and bless millions of people out there because there are many people struggling at this moment.