Mental Health and Christianity
Guest Speaker: Christina Fletcher
Introduction
Christina Fletcher, 28, 2w3 on the Enneagram, Married to my Husband Zach, 2 cats and a dog,
we live here in CoMo in our house we bought, Director of Youth Ministries and NextGen
Coordinator here at MUMC
Please ask as many questions as you want! I’m an open book (as you’ll soon discover!) so no
question is off limits, I may choose not to answer, but I’d rather you ask!
Faith Background
Born and raised in the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) in Indianapolis, Indiana. During youth I went
on many mission trips and conferences and went on to stay in the same church for 18 years
before moving to Columbia for college at Mizzou. While in college I was a part of multiple
Christian ministries including The Well, The Rock, and Sigma Phi Lambda Christian Sorority. But I
never really felt at home due to differing opinions on faith and affirmation. I had grown up in a
church that was open and affirming, and there didn’t seem to be any orgs on campus that were.
So, after some major issues stemming from the 2016 presidential election, I left Sigma Phi
Lambda and helped form a new Christian Sorority on campus Sigma Alpha Omega and started
as the Interim Director of Youth Ministries as First Presbyterian Church in downtown CoMo.
After this I went on to graduate from Mizzou and start working in Sales at a Recruitment Firm,
but in just a few months I realized I was not called into that role and needed to go back to
working for the church. Since then, I have worked at 2 other Presbyterian Churches and now
work here at MUMC!
Trigger Warnings
I’ll be discussing a variety of mental health topics and want you all to be aware before I do so. I’ll
be sharing my personal journey with Major Chronic Depression, Generalized Anxiety Disorder,
Social Anxiety, ADHD, Binge Eating Disorder, ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder),
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Seasonal Affective Disorder, Suicide Ideation, Self-Harm,
Emotional Abuse and Sexual Assault. I’ll also be covering general topics of Psychological
Disorders such as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Bipolar Disorder, Major Grief Disorder,
Substance Abuse, Suicidality, and Schizophrenia. If at any point this conversation becomes too
much, please do not be afraid to get up and take a break or leave. If you have questions,
comments, or concerns at any time, please let me know!
Mental Health Background
I started showing signs of problems with my mental health when I was around 8 years old. I was
always an anxious child and isolated when I felt out of control or alone. It was also around this
time that I started having issues with my body and food. I was a competitive softball player and
was told at a young age (like 6 or 7) that my body was too big. I started dieting and doing Weight
Watchers around 8 or 9 and was weighed pretty consistently from that point on. During the
midst of all this I was also living with my parents and brother. All of whom I have a wonderful
relationship with now, but at the time my brother and I fought like siblings do, and my father
and I fought horrendously. My body was nitpicked as well as my food intake, I was told I was too
much, too emotional, and too busy all while being told to keep going and do more.
By middle and high school, I was incredibly busy with my sport, church, and friends. But, despite
all of this, I had a terrible relationship with my mental health. I started going to therapy around
8th grade and it was here where I received my first two diagnoses: depression and anxiety. Over
the next few years, things just became worse for me mentally. I was sexually assaulted between
8th and 9th grade and began self-harming as a way to cope with it. By mid-high school I had
attempted suicide twice and was going further down a deep hole I was digging for myself all
while experiencing severe bullying. I had always known I wanted to get away for college, to
escape the world I had always known, but my parents had a condition. I had to see a psychiatrist
before I could leave. It was then that I was finally put on medication. I was diagnosed further
with Social Anxiety and Seasonal Affective Disorder.
I managed my medication from home and then moved here to Columbia, MO. While in college I
received my diagnosis of PTSD, ADHD and Binge Eating Disorder. I continued medications and
made the most of my time at Mizzou. However, shortly after starting my career in 2017, I
plunged into darkness that wrapped me up in so much pain. I wasn’t sure I would be able to
come out. I entered an eating disorder treatment program and really learned about my mental
illnesses for the first time. It was shocking, difficult, and exhausting... but I came out of that
program significantly healthier. Since then, I’ve been in two other programs to help with my
mental health and was diagnosed with ARFID (avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder) as a
secondary reaction to my ADHD.
So, to put it simply, my mental health journey has been long, exhaustive, and extensive... but,
amid all of that, I’ve been forced to tackle my faith as someone with significant mental illness
and ask, “what does this mean for me?”. This question of balancing mental illness and faith is
what I’m really here to talk to you today about.
Statistics
How many of you know someone personally who suffers from mental illness?
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), approximately 1 in 5 adults in the
U.S.—43.8 million, or 18.5 percent—experiences mental illness in a given year.
Approximately 1 in 25 adults in the U.S.—9.8 million, or 4 percent—experiences a serious mental
illness in a given year that substantially interferes with or limits one or more major life activities.
18.1 percent of adults in the U.S. experienced an anxiety disorder such as posttraumatic stress
disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and specific phobias.
According to ANAD, 9% of the U.S. population will have an eating disorder in their life time and
eating disorders are the second deadliest mental illness, second to opioid overdose. Someone
dies from an eating disorder in the world every 52 minutes.
Theology and Mental Illness
First off, mental illness is not the fault of the one who experiences it. Mental illness, just like any
other illness, disorder, syndrome, or ailment is from the body, from science. It is a chemical
imbalance that is real and often chronic, meaning it will last a long time, not just go away
because we want it to. In Christian circles, for many years, mental illness has been seen as a
problem on the part of the individual. That they have not prayed hard enough, that they have
done unfaithful acts, that they are inhabited by demons, that they are sinful, or that their
relationship with Christ is faltering... but none of this is true. The church should be a place of
refuge for all, including those living with mental illness, a place of light, love, acceptance, and
hope. But, we know that this has not been the focus or at the center of church life before.
Mental illness has been hush, hush and seen as taboo. But your generation won’t continue to
ignore this reality. You continue to bring light to this topic, including in the church, and because
of that strength, the church is changing.
Mental Illness is not sin and is not your fault.
Here is how I like to describe sin and have come to understand it over time. There are other
views or ideas in this room and beyond. Sin is this physical separation between God and us.
Before the “fall of man” God walked the earth with us, living among us and experiencing life right
there with us. But after, this separation occurred. God exists beyond our understanding, some
would say in heaven, but physically is not with us in the way God was before, God is more
distanced from humanity. This separation is the state of existence for sin. In this understanding
everything we do on earth is inherently sinful because it is separated by God. Nothing is free
from that sin because of this. This does not mean that everything we do is bad or evil, rather it’s
separate from God, it happens as a result of turning away from God and looking elsewhere.
Some actions we look away from God, and others we look towards God. Upon our death, we
cross this space separating us from God and become one with God, pulling sin away from us. If
we look at sin this way rather than individual acts or experiences, mental illness and so many
other “sins” are dispelled from reality. We live in a world separated from God, but God still
chooses us, chooses to love us and be there with us.
You may be asking the question I ask myself, where do we draw the line on what was good
before “the fall of man” and how do we come to terms with what is considered not good now?
Were mental illnesses and these chemical imbalances present before the fall? Did God speak
these into existence and see them as good? Did they come as a result of the fall, like painful
labor and the toil of the land for food mentioned in Genesis 3: 14-19? Or was it present before?
This is something we each must come to terms with and ask ourselves. For me, I personally think
that God created us in God’s image and called us good. That this creation included mental
illnesses and chemical imbalances. And you do not have to believe the same as me.
No one is alone in their mental illness.
Suffering has been a reality of the human race since “the fall”. Speaking again of “the fall” I want
to read this excerpt from Holy Imagination: A Literary and Theological Introduction to the Whole
Bible by Judy Fentress-Williams. On page 10 she writes, “Another literary reading...”
This view of “the fall” changes things for me. It makes it plausible that we have always suffered in
this life as humanity. That since birth, suffering has been a present reality. If this is the case, then
mental illness has always been a reality and makes it so that God did call it good. Which, may be
hard to accept, but it makes it even more clear that this brokenness we experience is not the
fault of our own, but rather the reality of humanity and separation from God.
If this is the case, then mental illness has existed since the earliest humans, we know that God’s
people have suffered – mentally, emotionally, and physically – as portrayed in the Old and New
Testaments. Even Christ called out on the Cross asking, “My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me?” at Matthew 27:46, echoing the psalm of lament at Psalm 22:1. This experience of
mental illness and suffering is not new, it has been a piece of the human existence and allows us
to know that we are not alone in this place of darkness.
As we heard earlier, it is more likely that you’re in a room with others with mental illness than it
is that you are not. I’ve learned over my experience with mental illness to just start sharing
(whatever you’re comfortable with) because it is then that you’ll realize you are even less alone.
God Sees You and Is with You.
Our Lord, Jesus Christ, our personal Savior experienced loss and an array of emotions in his life
here on earth. He most likely laughed and played and experienced much joy in his life. We know
he wept, as he did with Lazarus’s family in John 11:35. He cried out on the cross as we spoke of
earlier. Jesus is with us in the midst of our emotions because he lived it.
We hear Paul’s words in Romans 8:26-27 as he writes, “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our
weakness, for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with
groanings too deep for words. And God, who searches hearts, knows what is the mind of the
Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God”.
God sends the Holy Spirit to comfort us, to counsel us, to be with us, to help us. The Holy Spirit
knows our hearts and minds when even we don’t know what to say or how to ask for it.
Is Our God a Suffering God? A Passible God? A Wounded Healer?
Passibility means “capable of feeling, especially suffering” or “to be susceptible to emotion”.
Theologians often question whether God is a passible God or an impassible God. Does God
experience emotions. I think God has to, that God created us, created Jesus, and formed us to
understand and feel. What do you guys think? Does God suffer like we suffer?
Resources:
https://www.geneva.edu/blog/uncategorized/stigma-mental-illness
https://www.gotquestions.org/impassibility-of-God.html
Fentress-Williams, J. (2021). Holy Imagination: A Literary and Theological Introduction to the Whole Bible. Abingdon Press.