‘Mad, bad, or possessed’? Perceptions of Self-Harm and Mental Illness in Evangelical Christian Communities

Abstract

Mental illness within evangelical Christian communities is frequently stigmatised, with many attributing it exclusively to demonic possession, lack of faith, personal sin, or other negative spiritual influences. This study explores perceptions of self-harm in the context of evangelical Christian faith communities using the novel qualitative story completion task. A convenience sample of 101 UK-based evangelical Christians completed a third-person fictional story stem featuring a devout female Christian who self-harms. A contextualist informed thematic analysis was carried out focusing on perceptions of cause, cure, and treatment. Most stories positioned spiritual causes of mental illness (that is, demonic possession or personal sin) as harmful to the individual by rendering individuals as stigmatised objects or as socially displaced. The stories also provided insight into negative perceptions of females experiencing mental illness within evangelical communities. The stories suggested that these views often led to stigma and shame, which ultimately exacerbated illness and led to reduced help-seeking. Conversely, stories depicting the integration of relational care alongside spiritual resources frequently led to recovery. That the stories represented the need for relational support, within a spiritually syntonic framework, for recovery from mental illness highlights the limitations of a dichotomised approach to pastoral care. Methodologically, the study demonstrates the usefulness of a seldom-used tool within the pastoral psychology context – the story completion task – for accessing sociocultural discourses and wider representations surrounding stigmatised topics or populations.

“His Main Problem Was Not Being in a Relationship With God”: Perceptions of Depression, Help-Seeking, and Treatment in Evangelical Christianity

“…In a social constructionist lens, stories are not framed as capturing any singular psychological reality but rather are believed to reflect a discursive or relativist reality ( Kitzinger and Powell, 1995 ; Burr, 2015 ). And in a contextualist epistemology, which lies somewhere between essentialist and social constructionist, stories are thought to reflect individual and social perceptions that are socially mediated and embedded ( Moller et al, 2021 ; Lloyd and Panagopoulos, 2022 ). This study adopts a contextualist epistemology.…”

“…For example, research has suggested that in some Christian circles mental ill-health may be understood as the outworking of one’s inner spiritual condition ( Webb, 2017 ). Indeed, there is some indication that for Evangelical Christians, discourse surrounding mental health may situate distress as emblematic of sin, demonic activity, or personal sinful behaviour ( Dein, 2020 ; Lloyd and Waller, 2020 ; Lloyd, 2021a ; Lloyd and Panagopoulos, 2022 ). With over 600 million global followers in which over 2 million are in the United Kingdom ( Pew Research Centre, 2015 ; Evangelical Alliance, 2020 ), evangelicalism can be thought of as a Protestant transdenominational movement, which places an emphasis on the literal interpretation of biblical texts; the need for a personal saving relationship with Jesus Christ; and the expectation of spiritual health and wellbeing for believers ( Bebbington, 1989 ; Stackhouse, 2007 ).…”

Stories Matter: A Novel Approach to Exploring Perceptions, Discourses, and the Symbolic Social Order in Pastoral Psychology

“…More recently, a group of critical social psychologists, Braun et al (2019), have developed formal guidelines for the use of SC in critical social psychology and qualitative research. As such, SC is currently undergoing renewed development as a methodology in qualitative psychology yet remains seldom explored in pastoral psychology, with only two publications using this method to date within the field of religion and spirituality (see Lloyd & Panagopoulos, 2022a;.…”

“…This approach has the advantage of focusing on the micro level of participant perceptions about a given topic; however, it also enables researchers to explore the particular discourses participants draw upon to construct or make sense of certain phenomena through their narratives. Lloyd and Panagopoulos (2022a) used SC to explore social perceptions of self-harm within a large sample of evangelical Christians. Instead of asking participants outright about their experiences or views of self-harm, they were asked to respond to a gendered story cue in which a fictional devout Christian character, who had experienced some form of selfharm, visited their local church.…”

“…Stories may also opt not to include comparison but may generate a story stem which draws out participants' assumptions and perspectives about such differences. A key published example of this approach is by Lloyd and Panagopoulos (2022a), who created a story stem designed to elicit responses to female self-harm in the evangelical Christian church. They found that the female characters were frequently portrayed as emotionally volatile and immature -a critical finding which helps to address stigma in this area.…”