Om hur själen försvann från psykiatrin och psykiatrins ointresse för den existentiella hälsan

Abstract

Mental disorders were described as disorders of the soul and psychiatrists as healers of souls until the midst of the twentieth century but then the soul disappeared from psychiatry. To natural scientists and psychologists, the soul is not an object and not needed as a construct. It is the “working brain” and the mental processes of individuals. To bishop Martin Lönnebo the soul “is the side of humans that is the object of pastoral cure”, the soul is the “immaterial identity”. As well as the soul does not fit into contemporary scientifically based psychiatry the existential dimensions of health that has been proposed by WHO in the concept of existential health and further developed in Sweden by the priest and theologian Cecilia Melder does not fit into the standardised care that is now being implemented in Sweden. The healing encounter that is vital and necessary in health care needs a genuine familiarity with the existential conditions of human life. Issues as the meaning of life, the immaterial identity and the mystery of life are still central in modern psychiatry but the question is how to promote these aspects.