COAPN Volume 43: Christianity Reinforced My Depression

I’ve never been a terribly happy person. I do not remember when I transitioned from contented and safe to perpetually anxious and sad, but somewhere along the line I became a chronically depressed, silent, worrier.

Rather than detail the timeline of my transition from fret-some child who worried that her house would burn down and that her mother would yell at her for spilling something, to depressed prepubescent constantly wishing hell wasn’t real and that God would just save everybody, I want to focus on a specific doctrine that fed the cycle of anxiety, self-loathing, and depression that plagues my existence. As a child I was taught that salvation, that is acceptance of Christ and spiritual rebirth in him, will not give one a happy life or spare one from hardship, but it will provide inner peace in Christ. The classic illustration authorities in my childhood reached for was the imprisoned Apostle Paul. Despite spending years in a Roman prison because of his faith, Paul had a contented, peaceful heart because he had Jesus. The doctrinal flip side is that a Christian who experiences unease with their faith, who questions the scripture, who worries, or who chases perfection, is a Christian who at best has insufficient faith in God thanks to sin, or at worst isn’t saved and is therefore destined for hell. If one’s faith is sufficiently flawed as to allow for doubt or discontent, then no matter how hard a Christian prays, tries, works, or conversely trusts and gives over their concerns to God, they are still doing it wrong and failing to let God lead. Or they’re damned. There is no option 3.

I never felt that inner peace as a Christian. But I did feel it when I began to medicate my major depressive disorder.

This is where I likely lose the Christians in the audience with an easy dismissal. “Well then you were never really saved.” This is also where I ask you please take that easy answer and pity and judge me from afar and refrain from preaching at me in the comments. I will not debate you.

Back to my conundrum.

According to the doctrine of salvation providing peace through Christ, I was a bad Christian. But when I began to take man made, man devised medication, I finally experienced true relief from a lifetime of crushing sadness. The disconnect between these ideas requires mental pretzels to justify in scripture and Christian principles. Maybe God let you be depressed to teach you to rely on him. Maybe you were so steeped in sin, you just couldn’t see God working in your life. Maybe God ad nauseum. In medical terms, the disconnect is far simpler. Major Depressive Disorder stems from a genuine chemical imbalance in the brain. The imbalance makes it physiologically difficult to impossible for people to combat or overcome feelings like sadness and inadequacy and self-loathing. The depressive’s mind is hardwired against them. Hormones literally prevent inner peace. A depressed brain makes its host sad and that brain makes them hate themself and that brain can even make them want to die. This physical condition is easily exacerbated by circumstances. So combine a chemical imbalance that predisposes someone to sadness with the social messaging that if you are sad then you are displeasing to God or destined for hell, and there appears a recipe for chronic depression and suicidal ideation.

This discussion likely looks like I now believe faith and medicine or mental health to be incompatible. I do not. But I do believe the tendency in Christianity to blanket all problems in “leave everything to God and if you’re sad you’re bad at Christian-ing” is harmful. I’ve lived through the harm, and I can’t describe the simultaneous relief, gratitude and restoration of hope coupled with furious rage that I might have been able to improve my mental health sooner had I just take a single dang pill that came from starting medication. Years of prayer, study, church attendance, guilt, begging God for help and forgiveness, self-loathing and existential dread did nothing but exacerbate my existent mental illness. Medication helped it. That is a truth I cannot escape.

Medication isn’t a perfect fix. It doesn’t alter circumstances or the fact life WILL have ups and downs no matter the amount of pills one takes. But if a diabetic can take insulin to repair their blood sugar issues and make life easier to live, then it’s okay for me to take a damn pill to help my mind without feeling like a guilty failure destined for damnation.

Thank you for reading,

B