Study guide “
bout one in four adults has a mental illness in any given year,” according to the Mayo Clinic. “About half of U.S. adults will develop a mental illness sometime in their
lives.” They are our family members, co-workers and friends. Not only those who live with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, dementia or major depression, they are all of us who cope with less debilitating issues, such as phobias, eating disorders, obsessive-compulsion, anxiety or panic. Mental illness is part of the human condition that challenges us in our desire to ful- fill Christ’s command to love one another as ourselves.
Exercise 1: Definitions Ask members of your study group to define mental illness. When all have shared, explore this definition from the Mayo Clinic website (
www.mayoclinic.org): “Mental illness refers to a wide range of mental health
conditions—disorders that affect your mood, thinking and behavior. Examples of mental illness include depres- sion, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorders and addictive behaviors. Many people have mental health concerns from time to time. But a mental health concern becomes a mental illness when ongoing signs and symptoms cause frequent stress and affect your ability to function.” • How does the group’s definition differ from the Mayo Clin- ic’s? What did you learn? Is the threshold for what consti- tutes mental illness higher or lower than you thought? • Since most people have mental health concerns at some point, are we all potentially susceptible to mental illness? • What’s the “line” that crosses from a mental health concern into mental illness? How would you describe it?
Exercise 2: In our midst • Are you shocked by the Mayo Clinic’s appraisal (quoted above) of how widespread mental illness is? • Have you, a close friend or relative experienced mental ill- ness? If you can share, what was (or is) the illness? • How did the illness make everyday life harder? • What therapies or medications made it possible to cope? • What were the responses of others? • What do you wish other people knew about the condition?
By Robert C. Blezard
Mental health: Coping with illness A
• How can you or others help? How can the church help?
Exercise 3: Stigma Make a list of the words that come to mind when you think of mental illness. Discuss: • Do you have the same associations with other illnesses, such as cancer, heart disease, arthritis or pneumonia? • Why is mental illness different? • Describe the stigma. How much of the stigma is rooted in ignorance or misconceptions about mental illness? • Is there a link between fear and ignorance? • How can you help break down barriers of fear and igno- rance in your congregation?
Exercise 4: Shame Many individuals and families living with mental illness experience a nonmedical side effect: shame. • Have you witnessed this? What is it based on? • What are the consequences of shame on someone’s willing- ness to seek treatment; on informing or educating others so they can help; on participation in church (and other activi- ties); on relationships with family and friends? • What are the consequences of social isolation? • How does shame help perpetuate stigmas? • How can you help? How can the church help?
Exercise 5: Hard to love • Consider this statement: People are easier to love when they look like us, think like us, behave as we do, have the same lifestyle and share the same values. Why is this true? • Why is it sometimes harder for us to love someone with a mental illness? • When Jesus commands us to love our neighbors as our- selves (Mark 12:31 and elsewhere), does he exempt hard-to- love neighbors? • How can the church more ful ly love the mentally ill and their families?
This study guide is offered as one example of the more than 390 that are currently available on The Lutheran’s website. Download guides (includ- ing a longer version of this one)—free to print and Web subscribers—at
www.thelutheran.org (click “study guides”).
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www.thelutheran.org
Author bio: Blezard is an assistant to the bishop of the Lower Susquehanna Synod. He has a master of divinity degree from Boston Uni-
versity and did subsequent study at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg (Pa.) and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia.
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