Christian Beliefs and Cognitive Reframing for Treating OCD

Reviews the book, Can Christianity Cure Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder? A Psychiatrist Explores the Role of Faith in Treatment by Ian Osborn (see record 2008-03817-000). In this book, Osborn introduces his argument with a brief and fascinating overview of the rise of the concept of personal responsibility in the West, emerging in the Renaissance view of the sense of self. The disadvantage of this developing perspective was a magnified sense of responsibility, which the Church reinforced with a new emphasis on self-determination and empowerment. The individual now was appreciated for having the capacity to know and weigh his sins. For its part, the Roman Catholic Church developed more and more exquisitely refined manuals to assist confessors in their approach to evaluating the sins of those who were confessing. Osborn argues that this contributed to a widespread social pathology known as scrupulosity, or the tendency to obsess about minor sins. He argues that it is not unreasonable to view what he calls "twin epidemics--of scruples and of horrible thoughts" as the first widespread occurrence of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). This book is valuable for drawing attention to the need to recognize, in this case, Christian religious beliefs and the role that they can play in helping to restore psychological health. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)