A separate paragraph for each idea.4. Each paragraph begins with a transition/topic sentence before making your statement. Within your essay please include:a. The description one one image from the pre-assessment power point (found in handouts section) that inspires you regarding health and describe why this inspires you. b. Please choose and incorporate one idea from the Doug Oman article (found in handout section) that makes senHere is the articleSpiritual Practice, Health Promotion, and the ElusiveSoul: Perspectives from Public HealthDoug OmanPublished online: 3 May 2011# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011Abstract Spirituality and religion are topics of increasing interest in U.S. society andpopular culture as well for many health professions, including medicine, psychology, andpublic health. This article comments on Mark Graves’ (2008) synthesis of science andspirituality/religion, Mind, Brain, and the Elusive Soul from the perspective of a publichealth professional. I briefly review the sources, extent, and conceptual approaches ofemerging scientific and health interest in spirituality/religion. Spiritual practices areidentified as phenomena of central interest. Major concepts of Graves’ synthesis arereviewed, and the soul’s relevance to spiritual growth, popular culture, and scientificapplication is discussed. Several questions are posed as a stimulus to further extension andrefinement of Graves’ synthesis.Keywords Religion . Science/religion dialogue . Meditation . Cognitive scienceIntroductionThe relation of spirituality and religion to science is drawing increasing interest in U.S.popular and professional culture. Health benefits of religion and spirituality (RS) are onemajor focus. Professions such as medicine, psychology, and public health show clearlyincreased attention to the health effects of religion and spirituality (e.g., Campbell et al.2007; Fosarelli 2008; Koenig et al. 2001; Miller and Thoresen 2003). Health implicationsof RS have been a topic for special issues or sections of dozens of scientific researchjournals (e.g., Alston 2001; Masters 2007; Miller and Thoresen 2003; Pargament andSaunders 2007).
withcognitive science and its 6 constituent sciences (psychology, social sciences, linguistics,philosophy, neuroscience, and computer science). MBES addresses the question, “Whatdoes it mean to be a human person?” (p. 1) across 6 levels of reality ranging from thesubatomic to the spiritual.RS/science syntheses such as MBES, or others such as Stewart’s (2000) innovativeinterpretation of evolution, can potentially produce several types of benefit. They may helplaypersons to develop more balanced worldviews and spiritually grounded lifestyles; theymay help scientists and academics to draw on both science and religion more skillfully inteaching and research; and they may ultimately guide wise public policy that facilitates animproved balance between spiritual and materialistic perspectives across various sectors ofsociety (Oman and Thoresen 2007). In each setting, such RS/science syntheses can helpnurture compelling narratives that illuminate wiser courses of action (Kaplan 1986). Still, inspecific settings, the “devil” often resides in both the substantive and communicativedetails. Substantively coherent new ideas are often most readily assimilated when expressedsimply and vividly and when they clearly reveal courses of action. For specific professions,the most immediate impact seems likely from RS/science syntheses that persuasivelyidentify new questions for research or suggest improvements to existing theories orpractices.In the scientific research on RS/health, more theory is needed (Levin 2009). Especiallyneeded are syntheses that spur refinement of theory or improved communication with layand professional collaborators. But empirical RS/health findings have not emerged in atheoretical vacuum (e.g., Levin 1996b; Oman and Thoresen 2007). At present, the RS/health scientific literature commonly recognizes several well-established naturalisticprocesses or “mechanisms” through which RS involvement appears to affect health. Theseinclude improved health behaviors, social support, coping strategies, and psychologicalstates (Oman and Thoresen 2005). Some of these processes appear to provide benefit to allmembers of religious communities, irrespective of an individual’s level of devotion orsincere practice. For example, quitting or refraining from smoking is supported by898 Pastoral Psychol (2011) 60:897–906congregation-based social norms that discourage smoking. Similarly, the availability ofparish nurses can encourage regular check-ups by both the devout and the non-devout.Like congregational membership, personal spirituality and spiritual growth may alsofoster health through known processes. People often cope with stress in ways that arerelated to the sacred. Studies show these methods foster health and coping effectivenessabove and beyond purely secular forms of coping (Pargament 1997). Spirituality is ofteninterpreted as an individual’s internalized commitment or search for the sacred or fortranscendence (Pargament 2007; Zinnbauer and Pargament 2005). Benefits associated withsome methods of coping may be more available to those who are more spiritually engaged.For example, benevolent religious reappraisal (redefining a stressor via religion aspotentially beneficial) may be more available to individuals who are already committedto a spiritual search (Pargament et al. 2000). Similarly, Emmons (1999) has argued thatspirituality, expressed in what he calls “spiritual strivings,” leads to improved well-being byfostering fewer intrapsychic conflicts and greater personality integration.Spirituality and/or religion have been incorporated in practical health interventions (e.g.,Campbell et al. 2007; Harris et al. 1999; Oman and Thoresen 2007; Pargament 2007).Some of these interventions make available to participants a substantial amount ofpotentially novel spiritual material (e.g., Carlson et al. 1988; Oman et al. 2007, 2008).Others provide simple tools or experiences to connect recipients more effectively tospiritual resources (Bormann et al. 2008; Kristeller et al. 2005). For example, the simpleinterventions by Wachholtz and Pargament (2005, 2008) conveyed few novel spiritual ideasbut appear to have regularly activated preexisting spiritual resources and perspectives,facilitating greater peace of mind and improved coping.Can syntheses such as MBES foster health benefits by spurring better integration of RSinto health interventions, healthcare systems, and perhaps other social institutions? Forexample, might MBES’ modernized conception of the “soul” allow advances in the RS/health field? At present, the term “soul” is seldom if ever employed as a technical term inthe RS/health field, but some RS interventions use the word “soul” in intervention content(e.g., Oman et al. 2007, 2008). Indeed, concern for the soul—its existence and alignmentwith God—was for millennia a central concern of much Western spirituality. Is the soulimplicated in the processes that link RS to improved physical and mental health? Can anexpanded perspective on the soul, such as that offered by MBES, guide improved RS healthinterventions or encourage their wider usage in professional practice?In this commentary, I consider these issues from the perspective of a public healthprofessional. Next, I review some central concepts of Graves’ synthesis. I then discuss waysthat the soul is relevant to spiritual growth, popular culture, and scientific application. Iclose by posing several questions to stimulate further extension and refinement of Graves’synthesis.Modern science and the elusive soulMind, Brain, and the Elusive Soul opens by asking, “What does it mean to be a humanperson?” (Graves 2008, p. 1). As Miller (2005) has noted, this is a question of“Menschenbild—one’s fundamental understanding (picture) of the nature of the humanperson . . . parallel to a more familiar term . . . Weltanschauung—one’s world view orbroader understanding of reality” (p. 16). In the course of eight chapters, Graves (2008)seeks to provide “coherence and unity of view over a moderate range of topics thatcurrently appear fragmented in the existing literature” (p. 1). These topics include sixPastoral Psychol (2011) 60:897–906 899“levels of reality” that begin with the subatomic, proceed through the physical, biological,psychological, and cultural levels, and culminate with consideration of the spiritual/transcendent level of reality. But a fully comprehensive synthesis is not attempted—Graves“systematically describes why no single coherent view of the person can be known or evenexists. Understanding the complexity of the human person requires multiple coherent viewsthat unify only in their relationship to each other” (p. 1). Graves roots his discussion incognitive science, a late-twentieth-century interdisciplinary blend of psychology and thefive other fields noted earlier. Religion, mostly in the form of Christian theology orBuddhist philosophy, is included as a seventh discipline: “In drawing from seven, large,complex disciplines . . . I select a combination of approaches that unify and cohere witheach other. Other combinations might also work, but many potential combinations do notcohere” (p. 22). MBES may thus be regarded as a resource book of issues and approachesfor synthesizing disparate mono-disciplinary views of human nature.Many rich ideas, far too many to summarize here, appear in the course of Graves’ tour ofthese seven disciplines, six levels of reality (from subatomic to spiritual), and various crosscutting or shared issues. MBES frequently draws on systems theory as a unifyingperspective (e.g., Laszlo 1996). MBES regards higher, more complex levels of reality as“emerging” out of lower levels in such a way that “the combination of parts gives rise tonovel properties” (p. 95). Soul, too, is viewed as an emergent property and is regarded as“informative” rather than substantive: “The soul has no substance as typically understood ina materialistic (or Aristotelian) way [but] does inform the body . . . as the form of the body,and in an information-theoretic sense . . . one can define the human soul as the constellationof constitutive relations that enable real possibility” (pp. 217–218). MBES notes that“reinterpreting soul as information carried by the arrangement of relationships in a system”(p. 219) provides a way of approaching some perennial questions of life:“When does life begin?” becomes “when does a human system form?” . . . At thephysical level, perhaps at conception. . . . As a psychological-level system, whenviable outside the womb. . . .“When does life end?” becomes “when does a human system cease having aneffect?” . . . Biologically, shortly after death when all cell function ceases.Psychologically, when autonomous sentience-response-animation ceases, such asbrain death. . . . Transcendentally, a person may never live, or if continued in theinterpretation of a community, never die. (pp. 219–220)Spiritual growth and the soulGraves notes that this information-centered view of the soul allows one to “reframe oldquestions of life and soul in a contemporary scientific framework to facilitate their answeror more fertile debate” (p. 219). Indeed, especially if they can lead to a new socialconsensus, fresh approaches to perennial or contentious questions might help address manysocial and ethical challenges. For example, clarifying when life begins and ends couldpotentially ameliorate controversies about abortion and withdrawing versus prolongingmedical treatments at the end of life. Drawing upon multiple academic disciplines, MBESprovides resources to advance such integrative perspectives for assimilation in highereducation and research.Despite its breadth, however, the MBES synthesis is not universal, nor does it claim to be.For example, MBES addresses the emergence of ethical norms and virtues (pp. 128–138) but900 Pastoral Psychol (2011) 60:897–906says very little about the spiritual practices that structure many RS adherents’ daily lives, orabout the spiritual experiences that serve as guides or benchmarks. Prayer, which WilliamJames (1902/1961) called the “very soul and essence of religion” (p. 361), is unindexed inMBES and seldom mentioned. The same pattern holds for meditation, a perennial spiritualpractice and a hot topic in contemporary health research (Brown et al. 2007; Goleman 1988).Since these topics are one focus of my health research, I wondered: Could the MBESsynthesis be expanded to provide a fuller treatment of these spiritual practices?Also outside the scope of the MBES synthesis are influential popular and traditionalviews of the soul. Little theory or MBES language clearly resonates with non-informational,more substantive views of the soul as possessing consciousness. Such views, thoughperhaps a challenge to synthesize with science, remain influential and widespread acrossmany faith traditions.1 Eminent religious scholar Huston Smith (1976/1992) has describedcommonalities between many faith traditions in their view of human nature (menschenbild).He reports that coherent resemblances across traditions can be found in views of the humanindividual at four broad levels, which he calls “body,” “mind,” “soul,” and “spirit.” Thelevel of “soul” concernsthe final locus of our individuality. . . . If we equate mind with the stream ofconsciousness, the soul is the source of this stream; it is also its witness while neveritself appearing within the stream as a datum to be observed. (p. 74)The soul, viewed in this more substantive and traditional way, may possess various typesof relevance to a spiritual quest for the sacred. Of course, faith traditions and individualsvary in their precise views. But commonly, across many traditions, people attempt to directtheir soul’s desires and strivings toward seeking God or other sacred goals (includingdevotion to a saint or incarnation). Also commonly, people seek knowledge or insight intodeeper, more divine aspects of their own soul, often called spirit:2If soul is the element in [the human individual] that relates to God, Spirit is theelement that is identical with Him—not with his personal mode . . . but withGod’s mode that is infinite. Spirit is the Atman that is Brahman, the aspect of manthat is the Buddha-nature, the element in man which, exceeding the soul’s fullpanoply, is that ‘something in the soul that is uncreated and uncreatable’ (Eckhart).(Smith 1976/1992, p. 87)Substantive views of the soul also continue to be influential in U.S. society. A recentsurvey of psychology students (N=161) at the Riverside campus of the University ofCalifornia reported that two thirds (67%) believed in the existence of the soul (Richert andHarris 2008). These participants “often dissociated the existence of the soul from the cycleof conception, growth and death” (p. 111), and a large majority (84%) believed that the soulcontinues after death. About a quarter (26%) believed that the soul begins beforeconception and is invariant over the lifecycle (28%). These views of the soul clearlycontrast with how the mind was viewed by these participants. Almost all participants (94%)believed that the mind existed (might the few disbelievers in the mind have been influencedby recent classroom study of behaviorist psychology?). But few participants regarded the1 Rao (2002) suggests that “bhavanga is the key concept [for] continuity of existence through several births . . .[and] may be regarded as a functional substitute for substantive soul in Buddhist thought” (p. 237). 2 A Protestant Christian version of this mystical view is presented by William Law (1750):“Though God iseverywhere present, yet He is only present to thee in the deepest and the most central part of thy soul . . . thecentre, the fund or bottom of the soul. This depth is the unity, the eternity—I had almost said the Infinity—ofthy soul; for it is so infinite that nothing can satisfy it or give it rest but the Infinity of God” (Pryr 1.2–9).Pastoral Psychol (2011) 60:897–906 901mind as beginning before conception (8%), as invariant over the lifecycle (4%), or ascontinuing after death (29%).In popular culture, these more traditional views of the soul coexist with many otherusages of “soul.” The resulting blend is often confusing with regard to both the nature ofthe soul and its role in a spiritual search for the sacred. This is evident in eminentsociologist Robert Wuthnow’s (1998) study of spirituality and religion in the U.S. since the1950s. He noted that in popular culture the word “soul” is often defined vaguely, “therebypermitting it to be used almost interchangeably with ‘self’” (p. 157). But more traditionalmeanings, as endorsed in the student survey noted earlier, are also present. Consequently, inmany cases, “the blending of language from psychology, therapy, and recovery literaturewith the language of religion makes it difficult to determine whether spirituality of the innerself is similar to traditional religion or a radical departure from it” (p. 157).QuestionsAppropriately integrating spiritual perspectives into professions and institutions where ithas been neglected is a long process. Graves’ (2008) synthesis weaves together manythreads related to the natural world, the soul, and human nature. This will likely proveuseful for helping integrate spiritual perspectives into corresponding academic disciplinesand professions. Less clear is the take-home message of MBES for day-to-day reconciliationof science with central concerns of popular RS, such as the use of spiritual practices tofoster spiritual growth and the possible persistence of a substantive soul. For healthprofessions with applied concerns, such connections are relevant to developing theory andcommunicating with patients. I therefore pose several interrelated questions as a catalyst forpossible further expansion of the MBES approach. An overarching first question, notedearlier, is:& How might the MBES account be fruitfully expanded to better describe spiritualpractices and spiritual growth?Additional questions concern how MBES might encompass several closely relatedphenomena:& Systematic training of the mind and attention is present across major faith traditions.Goleman (1988) argued that all forms of spiritual meditation and contemplative prayer,both East and West, constitute “in essence, the effort to retrain attention” (p. 169).Stewart (2007) described how such practices appear to improve mental functioning andRossano (2007) suggested that rudimentary forms of meditation may have evencontributed to human biological evolution. Can the MBES account shed further light onhow such practices function or how they might more effectively be incorporated byreligious, educational, healthcare, or other organizations?& Spiritual direction and mentoring, of one form or another, are universal across majorfaith traditions (Miller et al. 2008; Oman et al. 2009). They offer ways of transmittinghigh-level attentional skills, such as the ability to consistently “strive first for thekingdom of God and his righteousness” (Matthew 6:33, NRSV). Can the MBESaccount clarify how such mentoring activities function and may best be carried out?& Higher or transformed states of consciousness and spiritual experiences are regarded inmany traditions as benchmarks or vehicles of spiritual growth (Dietrich 2003, 2004; Levinand Steele 2005). To this reader, the MBES definition that transcendent spiritual-level902 Pastoral Psychol (2011) 60:897–906phenomena “emerge from interactions between societies of people as properties ofrelations between cultures” (p. 129) does not compellingly resonate with traditionalreligious and spiritual understandings (e.g., the Buddha’s search for a path beyondsuffering, Prabhavananda 1963/1979). Could an emergent spiritual/transcendent level ofreality be defined through higher states of consciousness and their effects? Oman andThoresen (2005) asked whether “maintaining higher states [may] require the convergenceof specific measurable physiological processes involving energy flows . . . with specificmental schemas that structure experience into a flow-like activity” (p. 450).& A fifth question concerns equifinality, a construct from systems theory that is brieflymentioned in MBES (p. 59). Equifinality is the notion that “the same final state may bereached from different initial conditions and in different ways” (von Bertalanffy 1968,p. 40). Equifinality is of increasing interest in social science (e.g., Curtis and Cicchetti2003; Oman 2009), and is obviously relevant to fostering positive interfaith relationsand dialogue. If adherents to distinct faith traditions regard themselves as followingdifferent paths to the same goal, they may be less likely to demonize each other andmore likely to maintain peaceful relations. Equifinality has long been endorsed by somereligious teachings. For example, many millennia ago the Rig Veda (1:164:46) taughtthat “Truth is One: sages call it by various names” (Prabhavananda 1963/1979, pp. 34,355; see also Long’s 2007 argument for religious pluralism using Process Theology).Features of religious traditions suggesting equifinality have also been noted by scholarsand social scientists. For example, two influential positive psychologists, Peterson andSeligman (2004), have argued for a “coherent resemblance,” but not identity, betweenthe character strengths and virtues endorsed by diverse faiths. Going further, Smart’s(1996) “two-pole” theory of religious experience argues on a variety of grounds that“differing experiences might apply to the same entity…. [P]erhaps nirvana and theDivine are one. It is not de rigueur to think this, but it is a possibility” (p. 173). Goingfurther still, Robert Forman (1990, 1999) has argued for the identity across traditions of“non-dual” mystical states of consciousness (e.g., related to experiences of theimpersonal Godhead).3 Could the MBES account be expanded to address the possibilityof equifinality between faith traditions and how equifinality might be verified?& A sixth question concerns compatibility with popular and traditional views of the soulas substantive, not merely “informative.” As noted earlier, such views often permit thesurvival after death not merely of a soul’s “information” but also of some personalcharacteristics and consciousness. The MBES account seems to assume uncritically thatall naturalistic phenomena are dependent upon (though not reducible to) the physicalforces already recognized in mainstream natural science, such as gravitation,electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Yet many scientists arguethat empirical evidence has accumulated for decades in support of phenomena, such astelepathy, that involve distant action or communication (e.g., Kiang et al. 2002;Sheldrake and Smart 2005). Such phenomena remain highly controversial, but theirexistence has been taken seriously by respected scientists, including officials in theNational Institutes for Health (e.g., Jonas and Crawford 2003). Theories and empiricalfindings from such research suggest the possibility of previously unrecognized physicalor mental forces (e.g., Levin 1996a; Rao 2002; Sheldrake 1981). Some theories permitthe persistence beyond death of aspects of individual minds. Without becoming3 Forman (1990, 1999) persuasively refutes Katz’s comprehensive cultural constructivism, apparentlyaccepted without caveat in MBES, that “religious experience appears [in all cases] to require epistemologicalactivity, which in turn depends upon culture” (Graves 2008, p. 129).Pastoral Psychol (2011) 60:897–906 903entangled in controversies about evidence, could the MBES account be coherentlyexpanded to address perennial, popular, and scientific views that something more thanexternally registered “information” might persist beyond death? As Cowper (1785)noted long ago, “Knowledge is proud that he has learn’d so much; Wisdom is humblethat he knows no more.”& A final question links directly back to empirical health literature. How might MBESinterpret the empirical findings, noted earlier, that better outcomes are produced bymeditating on a spiritual focus in comparison to meditating on a secular focus(Wachholtz and Pargament 2005, 2008)? For example, does spiritual meditation allowgreater participation in an RS “collective memory” (Graves 2008, p. 168) concerningspiritual attitudes, behaviors, and states (Flinders et al. 2009; Oman et al. 2007)?ConclusionIn Mind, Brain, and the Elusive Soul, Graves (2008) offers an intriguing synthesis ofscientific and spiritual/religious perspectives. I have described various reasons whyspirituality and religion are of increasing interest to health professionals. I have also posedseveral questions that might be useful for expanding the MBES account to encompassphenomena, such as spiritual practices, that reflect the applied concerns of the healthprofessions. Graves’ book, like others in the field of science/religion dialogue, shows boththe challenges and the rewards in seeking more integrated views of science, religion andspirituality. 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