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RESUMOA vida humana não é imune à adversidade. Todos os indivíduos enfrentam em algum momento da sua existência, situações de desamparo, de incapacidade e de falta de recursos (internos e externos) para lidar com eventos potencialmente nefastos. Perante as circunstâncias difíceis da sua vida, os sujeitos acionam um conjunto de recursos e estratégias que os ajudam a compreender e a lidar com essas situações críticas. No atual momento histórico, caracterizado pelas crises económica e social, a religião, enquanto elemento fundamental no sistema de orientação de muitos indivíduos, pode desempenhar um papel facilitador no confronto com as dificuldades. Este artigo pretende focar-se num aspecto particular do funcionamento espiritual dos indivíduos – coping religioso/espiritual- fazendo uma revisão teórica do mesmo e realçando o seu potencial como mais uma ferramenta de adaptação e desenvolvimento psicológico, promotora de bem-estar e saúde física e mental, ao dispor dos indivíduos, principalmente em situações agudas de stress, onde a percepção de controlo é limitada, e muitas vezes requerem soluções para além do humano.PALAVRAS –CHAVE: stress; coping; coping religioso; saúde; bem-estar

This article is part of an international study on meaning-making coping aimed at understanding the role of culture in coping in different cultural settings. The international study was conducted among cancer patients in 10 countries. This article contains the results obtained in the study in Portugal. The main aim is to investigate the impact of culture on the meaning-making coping methods used by cancer patients. In this article, only religious/spiritual coping methods are in focus. Thirty-one participants with various kinds of cancer (e.g., breast, testicular, lymphoma) were interviewed. Nine different kinds of coping methods related to religion and spirituality emerged from analysis of the interviews. These methods, which are categorized on the basis of religious coping’s five basic religious functions, are as follows: seeking spiritual support, spiritual connection, spiritual discontent, benevolent religious reappraisal, punishing god reappraisal, God’s trust in personal strength, support from clergy or members, self-directing religious coping, and active religious surrender. The study confirms the notion that the strategies people employ when they are stricken by disease, accidents, misfortune, and so on are cultural and temporal constructions. As such, they are valid in concrete contexts and time periods. It is, thus, important that cultural context be taken into consideration when exploring the use of meaning-making coping strategies in different countries.

For understanding the role of culture in coping in different cultural settings, we have conducted studies among cancer patients in 10 countries, within the framework of an international study on meaning-making coping. This article reports on part of the results we obtained from a study in Portugal; specifically, the reported findings are restricted to nonreligious/spiritual coping methods, methods we call secular existential meaning-making coping. The main aim is to identify the diversity of coping methods using a cultural lens. Thirty-one participants with various kinds of cancer were interviewed. Six different kinds of coping methods related to secular existential coping emerged from thematic analyses of the interviews: discourse of the self, positive solitude, nature, positive transformational orientation, body-mind relationship, and working. Findings revealed that these six methods facilitated patients' psychological adaptation to the oncological disease. The findings suggest the importance

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