Bodies, agency, and the relational self: A pauline approach to the goals and use of psychiatric drugs

In this essay, I use the theological anthropology of the apostle Paul as a diagnostic lens in order to bring into focus some implicit assumptions about human personhood in the goals and methods of treatment with psychotropic medications. I argue that Paul views the body as a mode of participation in larger relational matrices in both vulnerable and vital ways. He thus sees the self as constituted relationally rather than as fundamentally isolated and self-determining. Such an understanding of personhood yields an account of human agency as co-constituted and freedom as interpersonally mediated and sustained. From this perspective, the proper goal for psychiatric medication is the removal of barriers to life-giving human connections; methods of care for persons in psychological distress may include medication, but they also require embodied personal encounter.

Duke Scholars

Author Susan Eastman Divinity School