Mental Health is the Church’s business

BY MICHAEL THOMAS

The stigma, the shame, the scorn, the lack of support and the marginalization. This is the story of one family who was willing to share their story about how mental illness directly affected them at the Symposium on Faith & Mental Health held on Saturday, April 13^th at the York Woods Theatre in Toronto.

Dr. Elaine A. Brown Spencer, President of Kaleo Productions is the powerhouse behind the event. Even though this part of her ministry is just a couple of months old, Spencer told Toronto Caribbean Newspaper, that she with the help of volunteers like Patricia Thomas plan to take the Symposium on Faith & Mental Health on a Canada wide tour soon.

If it is said that silence gives consent this certainly cannot be said of Dr. Natasha Williams a Registered Psychologist, and the speaker of the evening symposium. Williams directly spoke to certain sectors of the church for not doing enough to alleviate the mental suffering of some of its members, and what she calls perpetuating the stigma of mental illness. She said she wanted to challenge the church by letting them know, “When people become mentally ill it is not because they are not praying hard enough, or due to a lack of faith in God. The church can be a place of healing if we allow it to be.”

Julie Christiansen a Registered Psychotherapist also expressed her concerns about how the church, particularly the black churches, handle mental illness. “A lot of preachers preach against Psychology from the pulpit, so nobody is going to go to a Psychologist for counseling, and this remains the challenge.”

One of the many topics raised at the two-day event was the funding for therapy, as treatment of mental health illnesses is not covered by OHIP and could well be out of reach for the most vulnerable individuals in the community. Founder, Dr. Spencer suggested that these issues be raised in the church, noting that when folks are faced with these worthy causes, they usually give in abundance. This all started when she was invited by a church to speak on mental illness and left with a pressing need to continue along this trail, mobilizing the community. She told Toronto Caribbean Newspaper, “There is a huge link between the criminal justice system, mental health, and addiction; it all goes hand in hand. If our youth and our communities are overrepresented in these institutions, we need a black, focus faith-based approach to tackle that using a preventative and treatment model.”

Spencer and Williams both agreed that due to a lack of understanding, and not being educated on this subject, many people from the Caribbean look down on people with mental illness, and as a result  use derogatory statements to describe victims like, “They head is not good,” or, “They crazy,” just to name a few.

Dr. Delores V. Mullings, an Associate Professor at Memorial University of Newfoundland, was another keynote speaker who had some serious concerns about the way black people with mental illness are been handled by some members of the Toronto Police Force. In her speech , she provided some insight on the subtle forms of racism here in Canada that she has had to deal with in her workplace, “If you think that being a professor with: good pay, a nice house, and all the trappings are going to save you from racism, you are mistaken.”

Daniel Cullen, Director of the Hope Coalition, and a former mental illness patient himself was also present. He spoke with us briefly and disclosed, “From 1978-2004, I was a homeless man, but then I found the man Christ Jesus. Since then I have received numerous rewards. The church is a healing spot and it needs to view itself as such.”

It is reassuring to know that there are professionals in the mental health field who are speaking up and making themselves available to a vulnerable community. It goes to show that there are changes happening in Toronto.