Faith and psychiatry

Worldviews, spirituality, existentialism, and even religion, atheism and the transcendental, are making a comeback in the language of both the users and the providers of mental health services. The liveliness of correspondence in recent issues of the College’s journals and their polarised opinions, the growth of national and international interest groups and the thoughtful papers in this issue of International Psychiatry suggest more widespread interest in these topics than was apparent two decades ago (Bhugra, 1996; Cox, 1994). The then anticipated rampant secularism, the predicted death of God and the growth of ‘religionless Christianity’ have not happened. Instead, multifaith issues, new mainstream churches in Asia and Africa, the wider understanding of Islam and the search for new ‘meaning-making rituals’ in secular countries have each prompted a renewed interest in transcultural psychiatry, in comparative religion and in psychospirituality (Verhagen et al, 2010; Cox & Verhagen, 2011).