Abstract
Historically and in current times, religious, public health and health system partnerships have been essential in improving health at community scale, ranging from ending infectious disease epidemics to improving the health of the vulnerable dealing with chronic conditions. This chapter sketches that historical background, situating recent efforts against the backdrop of more than a century of public health practice and describes the roles of public health professionals and of empirical evidence in fostering community partnerships between religious organizations and health systems. We also offer seven key principles for religion/health partnerships distilled from the last three decades of practice and theory crafted and conducted by Gary Gunderson, Teresa Cutts and others, built upon the specific frameworks of strengths of congregations, religious health assets and Leading Causes of Life and, in some cases, backed by empirical evidence. These points are illustrated by two case studies of religion/health partnerships in Memphis and North Carolina that exemplify some of those principles. We summarize and draw conclusions, with a particular emphasis on offering useful information for public health practitioners.
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Cutts, T.F., Gunderson, G.R. (2018). Implications for Public Health Systems and Clinical Practitioners: Strengths of Congregations, Religious Health Assets and Leading Causes of Life. In: Oman, D. (eds) Why Religion and Spirituality Matter for Public Health. Religion, Spirituality and Health: A Social Scientific Approach, vol 2. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73966-3_18
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