Abstract
Since the 1980s, we can identify a progressive and pluralistic recognition of spirituality as a health issue. In this period, medical scientists have engaged in that theme, global government agencies as the World Health Organization included the thematic in its official documents and healthcare policies have mentioned spirituality as a permanent dimension of primary care. Each of these formulations has legitimized, in different levels, the idea “spirituality is health”. Is this process also a new way to institutionalize the relationship between state and religion? This chapter presents reflections about the way in which the idea of spirituality, in healthcare settings, has configured a special frame for the religion in the public space.
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Notes
- 1.
The more prominent and traditional research centers include Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health (Duke University); Program in Spirituality and Medicine (Howard University Hospital); Center for Spirituality, Health and Disability (University of Aberdeen); Center for Spirituality and Healing (University of Minnesota); Spirituality Mind-Body Institute (Columbia University); Center for Spirituality and Health (University of Florida).
- 2.
For a detailed analysis of these and other clinical studies that evaluate the impact of the “spirituality factor” on health, see Toniol (2015).
- 3.
http://portal.saude.gov.br/portal/saude/cidadao/area.cfm?id_area=1114. Accessed on 8 May 2012.
- 4.
The policy in Rio Grande do Sul state, for example, recommends, beyond the practices described in the PNPIC, “floral therapies, reiki, corporal practices, community therapy and diet therapy”. The municipal government of Santo Ângelo, in the interior of this state, passed law no. 3.597, on 23 March 2012, which calls for the implementation of “hypnosis, yoga, chromo therapy, iridology” and others in the city’s public healthcare services.
- 5.
The careful work of Catherine Albanese (2007) is an example of the recent studies taken to produce genealogies of the concept of “spirituality” in the West.
- 6.
The similarity between this affirmation and what Talal Asad (1993, 29) says about the category of religion is not irrelevant—although it should also not be extended beyond the methodological plane.
- 7.
The Grupo Hospital Conceição (GHC) includes 4 hospitals and more than 12 community healthcare clinics, presenting itself as the largest public hospital network in Southern Brazil. Cf. http://www.ghc.com.br/default.asp?idmenu=1, accessed on 08.05.2012. The activities addressed in this text are concentrated in one of the hospitals in this network.
- 8.
The only information on the site of the GHC about the Forum is at http://www.ghc.com.br/default.asp?idMenu=cidadania, accessed on 19.01.2015.
- 9.
- 10.
This text was not published, as far as we know. We received it from direct contacts with the coordinators of the Inter-religious Forum of the GHC.
- 11.
- 12.
The regulation determines that the participation in these courses, with an attendance of 100%, is required for registration and issue of the corresponding identity card. Since 2007, courses of this nature have been organized by the Forum. In 2010 and 2011, they were divided into five sessions, addressing the following issues, according to a definition of the Inter-religious Forum: “the importance and the role of Spiritual Assistance, concepts and principles of SUS, administrative norms and those about hospital hygiene and infection specific to a hospital and specific to GHC”.
- 13.
Records of its activity in: http://projetoeliezer.blogspot.com.br/p/quem-somos.html, accessed on 8 May 2012; http://www.ghc.com.br/noticia.aberta.asp?idRegistro=7011, accessed on 19.01.2015. The pastor is a member of the Christian Association of Spiritual Hospital Assistants of Brazil, which has operated since 2008 with this name, organizing courses and events. For more information, see Boldrini (2012). About the relationship between “palliative care” and “religiosity/spirituality”, see Menezes (2006).
- 14.
The declaration is found in the Work Plan mentioned in a previous note.
- 15.
This event took place on 1 December 2011, at an ordinary session of the Porto Alegre City Council, cf. http://200.169.19.94/documentos/notas/docs/365/original/114SessoOrdinria01DEZ2011.htm, accessed on 19 January 2015.
- 16.
Cf. http://www.ghc.com.br/carta/internacao_hnsc.html, accessed on 19 January 2015.
- 17.
Source: Secretaria Estadual de Saúde do Rio Grande do Sul. Resolução no. 695/13. Política Estadual de Práticas Integrativas e Complementares, 2013. Mimeo.
- 18.
Ibid.
- 19.
This sector exclusively serves hospital employees, so that the experience of providing reiki in oncology, although it is not unprecedented, was the first at Conceição aimed at a broader public.
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Giumbelli, E., Toniol, R. (2017). What Is Spirituality for? New Relations between Religion, Health and Public Spaces. In: Mapril, J., Blanes, R., Giumbelli, E., Wilson, E. (eds) Secularisms in a Postsecular Age?. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-43726-2_7
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