Home Resourse materials Know-how Newsletter ACT mission Notice board

Newsletter, January 2021

V. G. Kaleda. Fundamentals of Pastoral Psychiatry:
A Guide for Clergy

The Publishing House of the Moscow Patriarchate published a book by V. G. Kaleda "Fundamentals of Pastoral Psychiatry: A Guide for Clergy".

The book by a psychiatrist, doctor of medical sciences, professor V.G. Kaleda is the first practical guide for clergy on pastoral psychiatry, which examines the main symptoms of mental disorders in comparison with some spiritual states. The publication outlines the features of the pastoral and medical approaches to the mentally ill people, outlines the principles of the clergy's approach to certain specific manifestations of mental pathology. The Guide to Pastoral Psychiatry will be useful both for priests and for the clergy to be who need to prepare for the fact that parishioners may have not only spiritual, but also mental problems.

Reviewers:

Archpriest Vladimir Vorobyov - Professor, Rector of the Orthodox St. Tikhon's Humanitarian University.

N.G. Neznanov - Professor, President of the Russian Society of Psychiatrists, President of the World Association for Dynamic Psychiatry, Director of the V. M. Bekhterev National Medical Research Center for Psychiatry and Neurology.

Foreword

People with mental illness often baffle others with their behavior, cause people communicating with them to feel confused and helpless from not knowing the reasons for their suffering, how to behave with them and how to help them. Around such patients, various prejudices (social, moral, pedagogical) are formed, which interfere with the understanding of both the disease itself and the person who suffers from it.

Currently, psychiatry is able to answer many questions related to mental illness. More and more accurate knowledge about the genetic, neurobiological, psychological and social prerequisites for the development of mental diseases, new effective methods of diagnosis and treatment are emerging. However, these issues are covered mainly in special literature for professional community.

This book makes the current knowledge of mental illness and behavioral disorders more accessible, thereby contributing to reducing the social stigmatization of mentally ill people. This publication will help to better understand patients suffering from mental disorders, removing many negative aspects of various manifestations of mental illnesses, which will undoubtedly facilitate communication with such people, give them adequate support, and make their life in society more harmonious.

The need to develop criteria for the correct relationship with patients suffering from mental disorders, taking into account the spiritual dimension of their personality, religious experience, is an urgent need for the entire environment of the patient: family members, social and educational workers, many social institutions. This is especially significant for the Church and the clergy.

Indeed, often the appeal of a patient suffering from a mental disorder to a specialist psychiatrist depends on the opinion of those people whom he trusts. It is a priest who can turn out to be the kind of person whose spiritual authority will help eliminate the sometimes difficult distance between the patient and the psychiatrist. However, the idea of the need for joint work of clergy and psychiatrists in helping the mentally ill is still not always supported, both among clergy and among doctors, patients and their families. One of the main problems is that social stereotypes, myths and prejudices regarding psychiatry and mental patients lead to the fact that the latter, turning to the help of the Church, mistakenly try to substitute the psychiatrist for a priest.

The relevance of the book, written specifically for clergy, is also associated with the fact that the distinction between signs of spiritual immaturity of a person and mental disorders is not an easy task. In pastoral practice, it is not always easy to distinguish the symptoms of mental illness from the manifestations of the characteristics of religious piety, or to clearly separate the manifestations of mental illness from the sinful state of the soul.

The book describes the symptoms of mental illness, provides methods for recognizing the main signs of mental disorders, demonstrates the features of the pastoral and medical approaches to the mentally ill, and outlines the principles of pastoral tactics for certain manifestations of mental pathology. However, this book is not a curriculum on psychiatry. Helping to understand the essence of mental illness, the author gives advice to readers who are not experts in the field of psychopathology (clergy, relatives, friends and anyone interested in this topic) on how to properly handle people in a state of mental illness. For situations, when this is possible, on the basis of modern scientific data, the author proposes guidelines for the spiritual life of patients, shows the mutual influence of mental illness and the spiritual life of a person, not limiting himself only to considering specific chapters of psychiatry. The book helps to understand how to help patients live in a state of mental illness, respecting and supporting their freedom and Christian views, which will undoubtedly be useful not only for clergy, but also for those who live with such people and are responsible for their mental and social well-being.

Another purpose of this book is to help preserve the mental health of parishioners, including through the prevention and early detection of mental disorders. These intentions are generated not only by the classical medical aphorism: "It is easier to prevent than to cure", but also by the requirement of Christian mercy: to prevent what can be avoided, based on a respectful attitude towards the person and the way of his being, on knowledge of the experience of Christian ethics and asceticism, on the achievements of medicine.

A person with a mental illness should not be blamed or judged for his actions when influenced by the illness. The dignity of a person, as the image of God, cannot be diminished by the fact of a mental or physical illness. On the contrary, such a person deserves a special attitude, because mental pathology imposes serious restrictions on a person's freedom, creativity and love, - restrictions, which he courageously tries to overcome.

In recent years, with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and all Russia, issues of pastoral psychiatry have been discussed more than once. Worth mentioning are the international conferences "Church care for mentally ill people" (2018) and " Church care for mentally ill people: religious mystical experience and mental health" (2019). Taking into account the existing need, the Commission of the Inter-Council Presence on Church Education and Diakonia has developed a document "Pastoral care in the Russian Orthodox Church for the mentally ill people".

This book, written by a psychiatrist with extensive professional experience, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor V.G.Kaleda, is part of a large work carried out by the Russian Orthodox Church on interaction with medicine. The publication is completely based on the modern achievements of psychiatric scienc This book, written by a psychiatrist with extensive professional experience, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor V.G.Kaleda, is part of a large work carried out by the Russian Orthodox Church on interaction with medicine. The publication is completely based on the modern achievements of psychiatric science, therefore it cannot be regarded as an exposition of only some special "church point of view" on psychiatry, rooted in religious teaching. Nevertheless, this work clearly reflects the Orthodox understanding of the existence of a person who, despite a mental disorder, has dignity and freedom, the ability to love and be loved, prayerfully communicate with God.

This view of man has two consequences. First, the understanding of mental health as a desirable good that needs to be preserved and increased in order to grow spiritually as a person and be able to fulfill the Divine purpose. Secondly, the awareness of suffering that accompanies any illness as a providential path of salvation, a special path to holiness both for the patient himself and for those around him.

In the accomplished work we see the author's desire to emphasize the incomprehensible greatness of human life, its spiritual dimension, which does not disappear in a person with mental illness and which often remains outside the scope of consideration in modern psychiatric practice.

Given the widespread increase in the number of mental illnesses and behavioral disorders, the practical issues of pastoral counseling of mentally ill people are becoming more and more urgent. In this regard, the publication of V.G. Kaleda's book seems to be a timely event, making a significant contribution to the development of interaction between the Church and medicine.

Metropolitan Sergiy of Voronezh and Lisky,
Chairman of the Expert Council on Pastoral
care for mentally ill people
Commission of the Inter-Council Presence for church education and diakonia.

Information for purchasing the book can be found at: https://rop.ru/shop/product/osnovy-pastyrskoy-psihiatrii-rukovodstvo-dlya-svyaschennosluzhiteley-1

Based on materials from the site https://rop.ru/

Top of the page
Home Resource
materials
Know-how
(in Russian)
Newsletter ACT mission Notice board

Copyright (c) Round Table "Education for change and diaconia", 1996-2021. All rigths reserved.