Prayer to Saint Dymphna

[mdmc]

O merciful God,
You have willed that St. Dymphna
Should be invoked as the patroness
Of nervous and mental disease.
Grant that, through the prayer
Of this youthful martyr of purity,
Those who suffer from nervous
And mental illness may be helped
And consoled. I recommend
To You in particular
(here mention those
You with to pray for).
Through Christ Our Lord.
Amen

[Tobin S.]

1. That brings up an interesting idea

I wonder what percentage of mentally ill people say they are atheists or agnostics compared to the regular population. I know that when I was suffering from my symptoms I was prone to religious type thoughts and I thought a lot about the world's major religions and New Age spirituality as well. I studied the Baghavad Gita, Qabala, the story of Gautama Siddhartha (the founder of Buddhism), the Dalai Lama, the New Testament, many works about eastern philosophy written by westerners, the Subgenius Foundation :D, David Icke, Astrology, Satanism and probably a lot more religious and New Age stuff that I can't remember right now.

I think what leads some symptomatic mentally ill people down that kind of road is 1) obsession and 2) they know something is deeply wrong but it never occurs to them that the problem is inside their own heads. So they start looking for answers, some kind of explanation for why things have gone terribly wrong, and also for some relief from their misery. They're looking for a savior and when one ideology doesn't work they move on to the next. And when that one doesn't work there's another to fill its place, and so on. Obsession with religions is a symptom that many mentally ill people experience.

There are examples out there about what can happen when untreated mental illness and religion mix. There is Charlie Manson, Jim Jones, David Koresh, and Fred Phelps (maybe). There is a preacher out of Florida who claims to be the second coming of Christ and he has 100,000 followers worldwide. Those men all probably had messianic complexes to some degree and/or may be sociopaths.

I'm an atheist now days, but I still like to read about religion occasionally. Recently, I went to a Universal Unitarian church and I still get their newsletter. I will always be looking for answers to the world's mysteries. Maybe that is a good thing to come out of my battles with mental illness.

[mopinko]

2. it has been shown that epileptics

are more likely to be fervently religious than the general population. and someone wrote a book a while back looking at the stories of a lot of the catholic saints and felt that many were likely schizophrenics. so i think there is definitely a neurochemical process at work there.

in line with the discussion recently about the possible purpose of the depressive mindset, i think that it is possible that schizophrenics and shamans could help spur risky leaps necessary for a tribe that is in trouble. you are stuck, you are doomed, but you do not want to venture into the unknown. but someone who could get you to break out might be useful to your survival. of course, if you end up dead anyway, it changes nothing. but if you take risks and survive, that would be passed along.
dunno. just things that flow through my twisted brain.

[hedgehog]

4. The visions and voices can be explained as simple diseases,

but what made some people saints is what they did with the visions and voices.

Lots of people have hallucinations associated with migraine, but Hildegarde Von Bingen turned hers into meditations on heaven and hell.

Many schizophrenics hear voices, but Joan of Arc used hers to lead people to expel a foreign invasion.

I'm convinced that many of the women saints we were told about who subsisted only on water and the Host were actually anorexics, but they interpreted their compulsion as a devotion to God rather than to fashion.

[mdmc]

8. a tv show had a similar premise

I once saw a ST/TNG (Star Trek - The Next Generation) episode where the Star Fleet (The Enterprise / Humans and such) met an alien race that was socially darwinistic (they killed the weak and diseased among them).

For some reason this race was dying. The Star Trek team saved them from extinction by using technology that helps blind humans see. Because the humans worked to help the disabled (blind), they had the technology to solve this problem. The alien race was more advanced, but did not have similar technology because they would always kill their blind people.

I alway seek out a reason for mental illness. A benefit for mental illness.

[mdmc]

7. I think that mentally ill people are also looking for something good

something that will explain existence. Explain why all the suffering exists. Why death. Why hurt.
Why are we here?

All people crave this information. Mentally ill people can't put these ideas aside for kicks or good times or whatever...

[sakabatou]

3. Oh Saint Joe Pesci...

[hedgehog]

5. The story of St. Dymphna intrigues me. I understand it's

considered apocryphal, but look at the particulars: A young woman flees her father who has gone insane and wants to marry her. Enraged, he kills her. To me, this is a recognition of the innocence of victims of incest.

[mdmc]

6. it is that... her father was insane

and she died instead of falling victim of insanity. It would have been an insane decision to take her father as her lover. It would have surely driven her insane.
She chose to die in purity rather then live in insanity.
She gave up riches, power, and life in order to do what was right.

ps- I didn't know what apocryphal means. I looked it up but am unsure of how you meant to use it.

[hedgehog]

9. I think it means something that is told as if true but it really isn't.

More than myth, less than reality.

[mdmc]

10. I found out about her while researching the concept of

de-institutionalization.
Ray-gun closed the mental hospitals, but never delivered on community based funding.
Now communities (states) are working on treating MH issues within the community (as opposed to mental wards).
There is an institute in Gheel, Belgium that treats MH issues while allowing patient to live within the local community. A world class institution.

Apparently there was an insane Irish king. His wife died, and he could not find an equal beauty. So he hit on his daughter. His daughter fled with a priest. The king tracked them down, and killed her when she exposed his madness to him.

I quess it could be a fairy tale, but I thought that the story was true.

[hedgehog]

11. If the story isn't literally truth, it resonates with a deep truth.

With what we've all learned about child abuse htese recent years, it seems more plausible every day.