Where Medicine Meets Religion

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 66, 10 December 1938, Page 1 (Supplement)

Where Medicine Meets Religion

<< HE doctor must be priest in his attitude toward his patients M spirit, and the priest must be doctor in his attitude toward I his patient’s body.” said Lord Horder, Physician-in-Ordinary to JL 11. M. the King, in the course of an address on Medicine am) Religion.” which lie delivered to members of the Philosophtea Institution in Edinburgh. "The body ami the spirit are partners during man? lifetime —an. indissoluble partnership till death do them pail

•'The doctor’s main function is the care of the body. Diseases, are not abstractions. but modes of acting, disorganizing, suffering, and <ljin o , in living, moving sentient thing. It is this sentient thing, the partuei of the soul, that must be the doctor’s continual care—his active, willing, earnest caie "And what of the spirit, that vital, tenuous unsubstantial ess nee which we can designate no more nearly, nor yet less universally than to call it Kite breath of life. . • This is the priest’s especial care. Through all its i e, from Hie moment of its birth, in its budding and its blossom.ng and its fruition, he must no more leave it than the physician may have the body The body and the spirit are irrevocably fused The personality is one. . includes body ami spirit, and we can know those only in an inseparable union. ‘•ls it not clear that though the doctor ami the priest have their separate functions, these cannot be carried out efficiently tntkSs each keeps hi close touch with the other’s objects and methods The doctor who regards the spirit as a mere expression of bodily function is not justified in ln< thesis by the available facts, and the priest who n fuses to recognise the part played by the body in man's nature is still dominated by the doctrine Ilia, eonsiderthe body essentially evil and a mere drag upon the progress of the soul. Lord Horder referred at length’to so-called •■spiritual healers." and thee continued . "To put the position bluntly, medicine regards these folks askance, places them Wirh those who talk about "magnetic" and "psychic" powers, ami finds it difficult to avoid the term "charlatan” in speaking of them. This would lierhaps not be very important were it not that some priests get intrigued bv a desire to emulate the alleged successes of the spiritual lltalei •Tn my own judgment, this is a pity. Im-ause by endeavouring to do so they step down from that high plane upon which their mission is so clear

and so successful. 1 know that they feel they have uot only authority, but also injunction, to do this very work, but this does not change my view that such action is a disservice to their calling.

"The past three decades lias seen an immense increase in our knowledge o! the science of the mind. This science is proved to be of great service alike Io medicine and religion. In the realm of the mind there exists a common lield for action by both doctor and priest, the body and the spirit having received help along their different, yet parallel, paths. “When we relinquish the idea of tile mind as a trauscendeutu 1 unit, tin priest does not cease his interest in it. He will prove a better curer of sick souls if lie understands a good deal about man’s mind, since the spirit has its temporary home there. He will acquire this knowledge, but In- will not if he-is wise, allow it to usurp the place, of religion in his treatment of tile spirit. He would still preach the Kingdom of God and leave the doctor l< help the patient resolve his mental complexes.

"What then,” asked Lord Horder, "is it that religion and medicine should attempt to do for mankind? To cure their spiritual and their bodily ills? B,\ all means. But 1 conceive their functions as being larger than that. Slowly —too slowly—lint I trust surely, medicine is beginning to realize that though research is good, though all this rapid accumulation of knowledge is good, new forms of medical service are required. Health and disease are no longei matters for private concern. The invalid is useless to his community. He becomes a burden to it! Moreover, though the economic problem is largely with I he statesman, it is wi.h the physician. too.

"He can tell the lit bow to keep fit, and he can tell the near to lit how •„ t>e quite til. His [lower is greater and wider than ever it wilts. but he mils' serve the whole of society, not merely the few who fall by the wayside. "Surely the same call conies to religion? There are competing tendencies amongst tile teaching of religion today as there always have been between isolated detachment and active social service.

"Both are necessary for spiritual health. but 1 suggest that rhe presen' need is especially in the direction of social service just as it is in medicine Cannot we, together, recapture that serenity, that simplicity of the Greeks, that imself-conseious mood in which both body and soul are encouraged to function to their full?”