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of 20NumberThe south-central Texas community, the wealthiest county in the United States, and Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood, rife with violence and underemployment and home to the R&B music group New Edition, have something in common: the prevalence of mental illness.
The Darnestown Presbyterian Church in Darnestown, Maryland, experienced a mental health crisis 10 years ago when member Lindsay Hoggle’s eldest daughter, who suffered from schizophrenia, made local and national news when she tried to run away with her two sons, Sarah and Jacob. Ten years later, Sarah, 13, and Jacob, 11, remain missing. Hoggle’s daughter remains an inmate at Perkins Psychiatric Hospital in Maryland.
Speaking at Darnestown Presbyterian Church’s Minute for Mission last month, Hogle said: “Shortly after my situation occurred, in response to other similar situations in our community, then-deacon Jill Bremer asserted that we were not discussing mental illness and its impact on our community and that the DPC should. A NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) education session was then held at Darnestown Presbyterian Church to discuss what the DPC should do as a church and in 2019 we participated in the Montgomery County NAMI Walk.”
At the Roxbury Presbyterian Church in Boston, the Social Impact Center was founded in 2000 with the mission of creating and implementing education and economic development programs to strengthen the Roxbury community. The Center’s nonprofit partner is the Roxbury Presbyterian Church. The programs are secular and open to all, regardless of religion.
Since 2014, the Corey Johnson Program, a Christ-inspired, community-based, clinically supported nonprofit program of the Social Impact Center, has offered a peer-centered approach to addressing post-traumatic stress in urban neighborhoods. The program fosters connection and empowers individuals to take an active role in supporting their own and others’ healing.
At Covenant Presbyterian Church in San Antonio, Pastor Dan Milford has been passionate about mental health ministries for over a decade. The church’s Beautiful Minds Coalition is a team dedicated to making mental health a normal, open topic to discuss in the church. Covenant Presbyterian is one of the churches that formed with the Presbyterian Network on Severe Mental Illness to raise awareness of mental health ministries.
As a result of this work, mental health resources are now available to the Social Witness Policy Advisory Committee. Since 2020, many congregations have recognized the importance of faith communities playing an active role in community mental health work. This topic is a sensitive one, but it can be difficult to get started if people feel ill-equipped to handle this level of service and programming. The 2024 Mental Health Ministry Guide is a great place to start.
The guide is divided into three sections: the first encourages the cultivation of mental health ministries, the second provides a theological framework, and the third offers suggestions on how to build and leverage networks and community connections.
May has been designated Mental Health Awareness Month since 1949. This resource is particularly appropriate for this year’s theme: “Where do I start?”
The guide is intended to encourage churches to educate themselves about the contemporary needs of individuals and families living with serious mental illness and to introduce various resources churches can use to cultivate mental health ministries in their own contexts.
By Shani E. McIlwain, Presbyterian News Service
