In our post-enlightenment world, many seem to think faith belongs to ‘that old world’ – the world of our grandparents. The thought is that faith may no longer have anything relevant to say to our ‘modern’ ways of thinking. As a result, the idea that faith may affect health in positive ways can grate against people. But there it is – it does. Why that might be is what I want to look at in this post.
Life expectancy enhanced by faith
Various studies have found that attending faith-based services four times in a month can add from 4 to 14 years to a person’s life. That is quite remarkable. It even supersedes the number of years potentially lost by smoking, diabetes and other life-shortening practices and diseases.
If people knew this, there might be more people in church – a whole new reason for regular attendance!
Belonging
A recent post I wrote broached the subject of loneliness <link>. Being part of a faith group is one way to overcome this problem. In this way, faith affects health. Joining a church can be like joining a tribe. There is the opportunity for lives to become intermingled. People should notice when you are not present for whatever reason.
I say “there is an opportunity” because there is also an opportunity to attend a church or other faith-group and NOT allow your life to connect in any meaningful way with others. Some choose to come in late and leave early. I would suggest that doing this cuts you off from experiencing any health-enhancing benefits that belonging could bring.
In our busy world today, many churches have emphasized the “service” or the “meeting” and de-emphasized the “relationships” side. As a Christian, I do not see that as a Bible practice. It seems to me that meeting house to house and doing things together was a big part of early church life. And so it should be with us. We can benefit from making space on Sunday and through the week to actually hang out with other attendees. This can be just as important as the preaching and music.
This emphasis takes a time commitment. It takes a choice to arrange to communicate with people from the group each week during the week. It takes work to build a life that mingles with other’s lives in this way.
Everything I have written about here could also be done at Little Athletics or the Rotary Club.
The next point could not though.
Stress reduction
Stress leads to chronic inflammation and almost every disease. Faith groups by their very essence attack stress. And they want to do so – they are all about inner peace and talk about it regularly.
Let’s look now at this issue on how faith affects stress affects health.
Stress-reducing practices
There are two main stress-reducing practices I have seen in church settings. The first is the practice of forgiveness. In a society which prides itself on being easily offended over every little thing, this practice is the opposite. Most people who practice spirituality seriously learn how to forgive others, overlook offences – and, just as importantly, learn to forgive themselves. Faith groups encourage all of these practices.
The second is the encouragement of members to involve themselves with personal prayer, meditation and worship. In most churches, these activities are modelled in the combined services. It is implicit that members carry out the same practices individually during the week.
Many visitors feel a sense of peace entering a room where a group of people are experiencing that wonderful taste of peace and faith and trust. It is a drawing experience that touches something deep inside us regardless of our beliefs. Something is going on and we can feel it and we want it too.
How faith can reduce relationship stresses
Churches and other faith-based groups do not only provide ways to reduce stress through facilitating contact with God, but also by teaching better ways to relate to one another.
Relationships can become a major cause of stress in life. The teachings of many faith-based groups commonly touch on forgiveness, kindness and grace as the way to live with others. If you are involved in a group that does not emphasise these aspects of faith, it is likely the teachings may actually be causing stress.
Many churches have classes on better marriages, raising happier kids and dealing with past detrimental relationships. These can give hope and decrease stress, therefore, improving health.
Summing Up
If most of us are honest, there is a drawing inside us for connection with the spiritual.
If we stay busy we can avoid thinking about it for a while, but it will surface and break through from time to time. Often it is actually the trials of life (sickness, relationship breakdown, other traumatic life experiences) that cause this desire to surface – but we are – oh-so-fast – to try to fix things and dull the pain with medications, so we can get busy again – and we miss our chance to learn life’s deeper lessons.
Because of this, we may miss the chance to discover that there is a link between faith and health.
Even Christians can stay so busy while going through the hectic motions of church life. It all looks bona fide on the outside, but the inside gets empty before long – unless there is this spiritual connection I have spoken about.
Both of these aspects are beneficial for our health. On one hand, we have the ongoing, meaningful relationships formed within a faith group. On the other hand, we have the connection formed with God.
I hope this long post has encouraged readers to take meaningful steps toward including both in life.
0 Comments