Are Spirituality and Religion Relevant to Mental Health?
For many individuals, spirituality and religion aren’t just belief systems, they’re deeply rooted sources of strength, identity, and healing.
Whether it’s prayer, meditation, community rituals, or simply a sense of something bigger than yourself, spiritual practices can be a beautiful experience that plays a meaningful part in strong mental resilience and wellness.
The Healing Power of Spirituality
Spirituality can offer:
Hope during hard times
A sense of purpose or meaning
Connection to others or a higher power
Rituals that ground and soothe
Literature shows that for many, religious and spiritual engagement is linked to lower rates of depression and anxiety, as well as higher life satisfaction. It can also be that for individuals who are connected to a higher power - or their place in the universe - gratitude becomes a lot easier for them to see and feel, because life doesn’t feel like random chance anymore.
What About Religious Trauma?
Not all spiritual experiences are healing. Some people come to therapy needing to untangle the pain and heartbreak they’ve experienced through religious and spiritual teachings, such as religious trauma, shame-based teachings, and conflicts around spiritual teachings and their identities.
However, this is where therapy and religion intertwine perfectly:
A trauma-informed approach that therapy offers honors your story. Whether you’re reconnecting with spirituality, questioning your beliefs, or seeking to heal from religious harm, therapy helps make space for where you are and how you’d like to integrate your own spiritual and religious discovery.
Therapy Makes a Difference
Therapy helps explore how spiritual beliefs support your growth, ways to use religious connection to process grief, purpose, or forgiveness, and how to heal if religion has ever been a source of harm. Which for many, it unfortunately has.
But it doesn’t have to be the end for you if it has, and not all religious and spiritual paths need to look the same.
Whether you find the sacred in nature, scripture, community, or silence, your inner world matters! And at Herr-Era, we want to help you celebrate how you connect with yourself and your spiritual life!