RecoveryThe Interface between Psychiatry and Spiritual Care Erik Olsman, Bernice Brijan, Sujin Rosie, Hanneke Muthert

This edited volume explores the interface between psychiatry and spiritual care. Philosophers, psychiatrists and chaplains focus on recovery, trauma and grief in mental health care, prison and military settings.

“A brilliant move to focus on recovery when exploring the interface between psychiatry and spiritual care! I appreciate the thorough and simultaneously accessible manner in which existential perspectives on recovery, trauma and grief are described and discussed in relation to mental vulnerability. Theoretical insights are shared in such an inspiring way, that they form starting points for concrete actions in daily practice. A must-read for mental health professionals, pastoral workers and spiritual caregivers.”

Hanneke Schaap-Jonker is psychologist and theologian, rector of the Centre for Research and Innovation in Christian Mental Healthcare (Eleos/ De Hoop ggz), and endowed professor in clinical psychology of religion, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

“If different perspectives on recovery come together, this can cause tension between values. This book creates thinking space and acts as a ‘boundary object’ (Star, 2010) to bridge that tension. How people give meaning to what they experience is essentially what can connect them to the world or alienate them from it. The rediscovery of (the hope of) connectedness seems to form the common thread in recovery described in the various parts in this volume. A very readable and important boundary object.”

Floortje Scheepers is psychiatrist, professor of innovation in mental health care, and head of the Department of Psychiatry, University Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands.

“How to deal with existential dimensions of mental vulnerability and stimulate existential recovery? This volume is a welcome enrichment of recovery models, offering a broad variety of theoretical and empirical contributions from the field of spiritual care. The authors take an existential, phenomenological approach, and pay special attention to moral issues, embodied and aesthetic practices, and the social-cultural context. A wonderful, informative book, for students and practitioners both in spiritual care and in mental health care.”

Hetty Zock is theologian, coach, supervisor, trainer, and professor of religion and mental health, University of Groningen, the Netherlands.

See other books on mental health care.