Health and Spirituality as Contemporary Concerns

B. McGUIRE Meredith

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1993, vol. 527, issue 1, 144-154

Abstract: One theme of particular importance in contemporary U.S. religion and quasi-religion is health and healing. Groups as diverse as Pentecostal Christians and New Age groups, women's spirituality groups and New Thought churches are promoting non-medical approaches to health and healing. Indeed, to many contemporary Americans, health and healing appear to be salient metaphors for salvation and holiness. Religious and quasi-religious attention to health is adamantly holistic in the belief that spiritual, emotional, social, and physical aspects of well-being are fundamentally interconnected. To understand the significance of this widespread focus on health and healing, we need to look beyond the religious groups themselves and appreciate some twentieth-century structural and cultural changes in the meanings of the body, the self, and the nature of well-being.

Date: 1993
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:anname:v:527:y:1993:i:1:p:144-154

DOI: 10.1177/0002716293527001011

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