Mental Health Sunday
I am grateful Suntree UMC has designated this coming Sunday, Nov 14, as Mental Health Sunday. As the father of a son who has courageously lived with a serious mental illness since 1977, and as a man of faith who has struggled with grief and other personal challenges, I am proud to be a member of a congregation that sees mental health as a key mission initiative. Mental Health Sunday will be a day devoted to increasing our awareness, as people of faith, about mental health conditions and the mental health needs of our community. It is a day in which Suntree UMC will call attention to the need to talk about mental health in kind and loving ways, and we will seek to break the stigma and shatter the shame that often prevents these much-needed conversations.
Mental Health Sunday is a day when we will have the opportunity to reflect together on Jesus’ relationship to persons with disabilities. Jesus lived in a time when all disabilities, blindness, lameness, those with skin diseases, epilepsy, and what we today call psychoses, were all stigmatized by the religious leaders and ostracized by everyone. But when Jesus came on the scene, his relationship with people with disabilities was not one of avoidance, discrimination, condemnation, or fear. It was, in a word, ‘compassion.’ As followers of Jesus, he is our Exemplar, he is our Model, and we seek to follow “in his steps.”
Mental Health Sunday will also be a day when we explore together the spiritual wisdom of faith traditions for achieving and maintaining mental health wellness. Everyone is invited to register and attend our Interfaith Webinar on Spiritual Wisdom for Mental Health Wellness from 2-4:30pm in the afternoon.
While twenty percent of Americans suffer from a diagnosable mental health condition, a hundred percent of us face mental health challenges as we seek to negotiate the problems of everyday living. Who among us has not experienced profound anxiety as we have struggled through the last two years of the COVID pandemic? Who among us has not felt depressed about some difficulty over which we have no control? Who among us has not longed to return to a place of confidence, serenity, and equilibrium after a loss or a personal trauma. Everyone has mental health problems.
The good news is that there is ancient wisdom in the great faiths of the world for achieving and maintaining mental health wellness. I have found myself reflecting a lot these days on the wisdom of Scripture for our Mental Health. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is one of the major therapeutic methods in our time. I have come to believe the Biblical writers also understood the basic principles of this kind of therapy. The presupposition of CBT is – “Thinking precedes behavior.” In other words, in order to cope with our living situations better, we sometimes need to change the subjects in our minds. The Psalmists, for example, often begin with a lament of some kind, even a complaint to God, but then they changed the subject to one of praise to God for God’s amazing works. In a similar way, the Apostle Paul says in Philippians 4, “Be anxious for nothing.” He then goes on to counsel Christians to think positive thoughts (true, beautiful, etc.). In other words, when we are ruminating over our anxieties, it is good for us to change the subject in our minds.
I hope you will join us on Sunday for worship and for our Interfaith Webinar. Don’t you think we could all use a little spiritual wisdom these days to help us cope with and adapt to our personal and shared challenges of living?
Rev. Dr. John Baggett
Chair: SUMC Mental Health Task Force