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A Christian worldview that takes seriously the idea of personhood as a holistic unity presents an ideal perspective from which to explore human behavior as an expression of biological, psychological, and social influences (the "biopsychosocial" perspective now common in psychology) as well as an expression of spiritual realities that, while often expressed through biopsychosocial media, are not simply 'explained away' by them. A Christian worldview that holds that human beings are a unity of biological, psychological, social, and spiritual realities creates an opportunity for theoretical integration and holistic practice, but it also creates practical tensions regarding how to discern the root causes of behavior (e.g., biological, psychological, social, or spiritual etiology) and attempting to discover the best way to intervene when impairment of functioning is noted (e.g., whether biological therapy, psychotherapy, social intervention, or religiously-based interventions are called for). Additionally, there are ethical and legal issues that must be taken into consideration by Christians who are licensed mental health practitioners, especially when hypothesized causes or proposed interventions stand somewhere between recognized secular interventions and specifically religious interventions. In this article, these topics are addressed both as theoretical issues about how best to conceptualize human behavior and the causes of impairment, as well as practically in regard to how to proceed in evaluating and using religiously-based interventions.
Many perspectives about what role spirituality may play in mental and physical health and illness have been offered throughout history, ranging from the view that religious belief inevitably leads to mental illness, on one extreme, to the view which claims that there are only religious solutions for psychological or medical problems on the opposite extreme. The perspective that sees religion and psychological health as incompatible was common in psychology several decades ago, as illustrated by the following quotations from Albert Ellis, one from early in his career and one shortly before his death:
In most respects religion seriously sabotages mental health. (Ellis, 1980, p. 5) Try to avoid a doctrinal system through which you are dogmatically convinced that you absolutely must devote yourself to the one, only, right, and unerring deity.... Otherwise, in my view as a psychotherapist, you most probably are headed for emotional trouble. (Ellis, 2002, p. 365)
Although Ellis modified his perspective somewhat in later...