Resources – Public Health, Religion, and Spirituality Network

RESOURCES

*Note: This page will be updated on a regular basis. The resources listed here are intended to be a “starting point” for those interested in religion, spirituality, and public health. Please let us know if there are other resources we can include: PHRSadm1@publichealthrs.org and phrsadmin0@publichealthrs.org

Academic Centers and Training Programs:

Baylor University, Program on Religion and Population Health
Duke University, Center for Spirituality, Theology, and Health
Emory University, Dual-Degree Program (Religion and Public Health)
Emory University, Religion and Public Health Collaborative
Harvard University, Initiative on Health, Religion, and Spirituality
Harvard University, Human Flourishing Program
See Part III in Oman (2018) to learn about religion/public health coursework at the following Schools of Public Health: Boston University, Drexel, Emory, Harvard, U.C. Berkeley, University of Michigan, and University of Illinois

Bibliographies:

Conferences:

Conference Proceedings:

Faith-Health Collaboration Workshop, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

COVID-19 and PHRS

*Note: Other COVID-19 resources and articles are listed below, in the “Research & Resources featured in the PHRS Bulletin” section.

AJPH: A Rapid Survey of State and Territorial Public Health Partnerships With Faith-Based Organizations to Promote COVID-19 Vaccination
AJPH: CDC Engagement With Community and Faith-Based Organizations in Public Health Emergencies
Wikipedia page: Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on religion
World Health Organization’s Practical considerations and recommendations for religious leaders and faith-based communities in the context of COVID-19.
CDC webpage for community and faith-based organizations
Emory University Interfaith Health Program COVID-19 Resources for Faith Communities
Emory University Interfaith Health Program COVID-19 Resources for Low and Middle Income Countries
Joint Learning Initiative for Faith and Local Communities COVID-19 Resource Page
Humanitarian Disaster Institute, COVID-19 Summit
Christian Connections for International Health COVID-19 resources & online forum
JLI-CCIH Report on global faith-based responses to COVID-19
Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, Joint Leaning Initiative on Faith and Local Communities, and World Faiths Development Dialogue joint google doc of Faith and COVID-19 resources
Religions for Peace dialogue between religious leaders and scholars on the intersectional nature of “Leadership” in and beyond a time of pandemic
Religions for peace multi-religious COVID-19 Hub
Special Issue: Christian Journal for Global Health, COVID-19 special issue
Special Issue: Journal of Religion and Health, Religion and Health During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Learning from the past, Ebola: Health Communications and Community Mobilization During an Ebola Response: Partnerships with Community and Faith-Based Organizations
Learning from the past, Ebola: Addressing Needs of Contacts of Ebola Patients During an Investigation of an Ebola Cluster in the United States — Dallas, Texas, 2014

Special Issues:

*Note: these special issues are just a few great places to begin reading. Each link in the Bibliographies section offer incredible collections of additional material

Faith-Based Health-Care: 2015 special issue of The Lancet
Religion and Sustainable Development: 2016 special issue of The Review of Faith and International Affairs
Religion and Public Health: 2019 special issue of Religions
Faith-based and Public Health Partnerships: 2019 special issue of the American Journal of Public Health
Religions and public health: critical insights from religious studies: 2019 special issue of Religions
The religion variable in community health promotion and illness prevention: 2019 special issue of Journal of Prevention and Intervention in the Community

Textbooks:

Book Chapters

Organizations:

Research & Resources featured in the PHRS Bulletin

*Note: the research and resources below are content we feature in each PHRS Bulletin Issue. For more resources, please see links in the “Bibliography” and “Textbook” sections .

From Issue 7, Fall 2022

New Research

Rapid Review: March 2022: Spirituality in the Health Curricula in Canada. (Pilato et al.)
Systematic Review: July 2022: Spirituality in Serious Illness and Health. (Balboni et al.)
Systematic Review: August 2022: U.S. Federal Investment in Religiousness/Spirituality and Health Research: A Systematic Review (Park et al.)

Articles, Books, Commentaries, Interviews, Webinars

Vieten, C., & Lukoff, D. (2022). Spiritual and religious competencies in psychology. American Psychologist, 77(1), 26–38. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/amp0000821
Recent Webinar: September 1, 2022: Faith Leaders During Pandemics: Interfaith Collaboration Inspired by Jerusalem Impact Vaccination
Recent Webinar: October 18, 2022. The WHO Faith Network, The Importance of Language: Faith partner resources for health emergencies.
Book: The spirit of global health: The World Health Organization and the ‘spiritual dimension’ of health, 1946-2021. (Peng-Keller et al., 2022, Oxford)
Past Online Event: October 6, 2022, 4-5:30pm Central Time. Valparaiso University, How Do We Live Well in a Wounded World?

Upcoming Conferences and Calls for Papers (newest first)

Upcoming: Conference on Religion and Medicine, Conference theme: “At the Limits of Medicine: Caring for Body and Soul”. Conference Date: March 12-14, Columbus, Ohio.
Upcoming: American Public Health Association Conference, 150^th Anniversary, November 6-9, 2022. More information about the below special events can be found in Barbara Baylor’s article in this Fall 2022 Issue.
- Celebration: United to Heal: An Interfaith Celebration of Holistic Healing and Peace, November 6, 2022, 6-7 p.m. in the Boston Convention Center
- Special Invited Session: Faithful Dancing with the Bears of Inequity: Past, Present, Future, November 7, 2022, 10:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m. in the Boston Convention Center

From Issue 6, Spring/Summer 2022

New Research

May 2022: Special Issue Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture: Religion, COVID-19, and Biocultural Evolution. (Eds: Crews and Taylor)
April 2022: Religious/spiritual struggles and well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic: Does “talking religion” help or hurt?. (Upenieks)
April 2022: Associations of Changes in Religiosity With Flourishing During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Study of Faith Communities in the United States. (Jacobi, Cowden, Vaidyanathan)
March 2022: Health Effects of Religion, Spirituality, and Supernatural Beliefs in Mainland China: A Systematic Review. (Pan et al.)
February 2022: Narratives and counter-narratives in religious responses to COVID-19: A computational text analysis. (Idler, Bernau, and Zaras)
February 2022: “People Are Not Taking the Outbreak Seriously”: Interpretations of Religion and Public Health Policy During the COVID-19 Pandemic. (Johnson et al.)
January 2022: Keeping the Faith: Religion, Positive Coping, and Mental Health of Caregivers During COVID-19. (Sen, Colucci, and Browne)

Articles, Books, Commentaries, Interviews, Webinars

Webinar: June 16, 2022: Registered Reports and Funding in Consciousness and Religion Research. (Center for Open Science)
Commentary: May 2022: Religion, cancer, and sub-Saharan African health systems. (Olivier)
Commentary: May 2022: Religious Community in Public Health and Medicine. (VanderWeele)
Webinar: May 2022: Bridging Faith and Science to Combat the Overdose Crisis Series. (Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health)
Book: December 2021: Religion, Virtues, and Health. (Krause)
Funding: Call for Proposals –Open Science of Religion

Upcoming Conferences and Calls for Papers (newest first)

Deadline Approaching: Special Issue Religions, “Religion and Public Health Threats in the 21st Century“. Due July 31, 2022
Upcoming: August 2022: 18^th Annual Course on Religion, Spirituality, and Health. Duke University.
Upcoming: November 2022: American Public Health Association (Boston, MA). Link to the Caucus on Public Health and the Faith Community here.

From Issue 5, Fall 2021

New Research

October 2021: Faith-Based Organizations and SARS-CoV-2 Vaccination: Challenges and Recommendations. (Levin, Idler, and VanderWeele)
October 2021: Pew polling report on religion and COVID-19
September 2021: Religious or spiritual coping, religious service attendance, and type 2 diabetes: A prospective study of women in the United States. (Spence et al.)
June 2021: Special Issue in Religions “Pandemic, Religion and Non-religion“
June 2021: Psychological and spiritual outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic: A prospective longitudinal study of adults with chronic disease (Davis et al.)
March 2021: Religion and the World Health Organization: an evolving relationship. (Winiger & Peng-Keller)
February 2021: Religious service attendance typologies and African American substance use: a longitudinal study of the protective effects among young adult men and women. (Hodge et al.)
January 2021: Religion and Measles Vaccination in Indonesia, 1991–2017. (Harapan et al.)
June 2020: Building towards common psychosocial measures in U.S. cohort studies: principal investigators’ views regarding the role of religiosity and spirituality in human health (Shields and Balboni)

NIH Spirituality Listserv

New Listserv: If you would like the join the newly subscribable NIH Spirituality, and Health Scientific Interest Group Listserv, click here.

Upcoming Conferences & Webinars

Ongoing conference: World Health Organization and Religions for Peace Global Virtual Conference, October 20-December 3, 2021: Conference Website
Upcoming Webinar: December 14, 2021: NIH Religion, Spirituality, and Health Scientific Interest Group, “Religion, Spirituality and Health: Review, Update, and Future Directions”. Sign up here.
Upcoming conference: Conference on Medicine and Religion, March 13-15, 2022: CMR conference website

Recent Conferences & Webinars

American Public Health Association Annual Meeting, October 22-27, 2021: Caucus on public health and the faith community sessions
March 2021: Webinar: Sacred Work Science, Religion & Human Health (Dr. Ellen Idler, Dr. Emmanuel Y. Lartey)

From Issue 4, Spring/Summer 2021

General resources:

May 2021: Religious Service Attendance and Implications for Clinical Care, Community Participation and Public Health (VanderWeele, Balboni, and Koh), American Journal of Epidemiology
May 2021: Religion, Aging, and Public Health (Levin and Idler), Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Global Public Health
April 2021: Measuring Well-Being: Interdisciplinary Perspectives from the Social Sciences and the Humanities (Lee, Kubzansky, and VanderWeele), Oxford University Press
April 2021: Religion and the World Health Organization: an evolving relationship (Winiger and Peng-Keller), BMJ Global Health
February 2021: Training to Conduct Research on Religion, Spirituality and Health: A Commentary (Koenig, Hamilton, and Doolittle), Journal of Religion and Health
February 2021: [CHAPTER] Religion, Spirituality, Belief Systems and Suicide (Teo, Duchonova, Kariman, and Ng), Suicide by Self-Immolation
February 2021: The Study on Stress, Spirituality, and Health (SSSH): Psychometric Evaluation and Initial Validation of the SSSH Baseline Spirituality Survey (Warner et al.), Religions
January 2021: Religious Beliefs About Health and the Body and their Association with Subjective Health (Walters and Benjamins), Journal of Religion and Health
December 2020: Religion and Spirituality among American Indian, South Asian, Black, Hispanic/Latina, and White Women in the Study on Stress, Spirituality, and Health (Kent et al.), Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion

COVID-19 specific resources:

May 2021 Webinar: The role & impact of faith actors in global and national advocacy for vaccine equity and access
May 2021: “If a rabbi did say ‘you have to vaccinate,’ we wouldn’t”: unveiling the secular logics of religious exemption and opposition to vaccination (Kasstan), Social Science & Medicine
May 2021: Faith-based Approaches Can Overturn Vaccine Hesitancy (Hornbeck)
March 2021: Faith leaders’ year of pandemic: grief, solace, resilience (Henao, Crary, and Fam)
March 2021 Webinar: Vaccines, the Role of Faith Groups, and How to Stay Safe
March 2021 Podcast: Religion in the Time of Pandemic
March 2021 Webinar: Partnerships in Religion and Public Health: Lessons Learned for the COVID-19 Pandemic
March 2021: Combating Contagion and Injustice: The Shared Work for Public Health and Faith Communities During COVID-19 (Williams, Miller, and Nussbaum), Journal of Religion and Health
January 2021: Churches in predominantly Black communities can play a key role in vaccinating against COVID-19 (MacDonald)
January 2021: More Americans Than People in Other Advanced Economies Say COVID-19 Has Strengthened Religious Faith (Pew Research Center)
January 2021: Taking the Cloth: How Religious Appeals Increase Compliance with COVID-19 Prevention Measures (Adida et al.), SocArXiv Papers

Articles, Commentaries, Interviews, Webinars:

TheoEd Talks from Emory University (ongoing)
Emory Spiritual Health Youtube Playlist (ongoing)
Duke University Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health: Spirituality, Theology and Health Seminars (ongoing)
Religion, Spirituality and Health Scientific Interest Group: Development of an Instrument to Assess Psychosocial Spiritual Healing – The NIH HEALS, Recorded Webinar from May 18, 2021
Religion and Mental Health: Is the Relationship Causal?, Recorded Seminar from April 27, 2021
Sacred Work: Science, Religion and Human Health with Ellen Idler and Rev. Emmanuel Lartey, Recorded Webinar from March 31, 2021
Religion, Spirituality and Health Scientific Interest Group: Harmonizing the Spiritual and Scientific Worldviews, Recorded Webinar from February 9, 2021
The International Association for Spiritual Care Seminar Series “What Is Spiritual Care from the Perspectives of Our Different Professions?” (Includes seminars on Medicine, Public Health, Psychology, Nursing, and Pastoral Care), Recorded Seminar Series (Jan 5 to Feb 2, 2021)
Decolonizing Global Health Series | “The Role of Religion & Culture in Shaping Global Health”, Recorded Webinar from January 19, 2021
Bridging the Gap Between Science and Faith, Recorded Webinar from December 14, 2020

From Issue 3, Fall 2020

General resources:

November 2020: Mantram Repetition as a Portable Mindfulness Practice: Applications During the COVID-19 Pandemic (Oman et al.), Mindfulness
November 2020: Integrating spirituality and mental health: Perspectives of adults receiving public mental health services in California (Yamada et al.), Psychology of Religion and Spirituality
October 2020: Forgiveness of others and subsequent health and well-being in mid-life: a longitudinal study on female nurses (Long et al.), BMC Psychology
October 2020: Policy Brief: Religious Networks, Their Impact on SDGS (SDG17), and the Challenges for the International Legal Order (Petkoff et al.), Think20 Saudi Arabia
October 2020: USAID Evidence Summit on Strategic Religious Engagement Research Papers
October 2020: Second Victims: Aftermath of Gun Violence and Faith-Based Responses (Galiatsatos et al.), Journal of Religion and Health
September 2020: Exploring the Impact of Religion and Spirituality on Mental Health and Coping in a Group of Canadian Psychiatric Outpatients (Adams et al.), The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease
August 2020: Religious-service attendance and subsequent health and well-being throughout adulthood: evidence from three prospective cohorts (Chen et al.), International Journal of Epidemiology
August 2020: The International NERSH Data Pool of Health Professionals’ Attitudes Toward Religiosity and Spirituality in 12 Countries (Kørup et al.), Journal of Religion and Health
July 2020: Spiritually Motivated Self-Forgiveness and Divine Forgiveness, and Subsequent Health and Well-Being Among Middle-Aged Female Nurses: An Outcome-Wide Longitudinal Approach (Long et al.), Frontiers in Psychology
June 2020: Building towards common psychosocial measures in U.S. cohort studies: principal investigators’ views regarding the role of religiosity and spirituality in human health (Shields & Balboni), BMC Public Health
April 2020: Effects of Religious Service Attendance and Religious Importance on Depression: Examining the Meta-analytic Evidence (VanderWeele), The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion
March 2020: Antecedents of purpose in life: Evidence from a lagged exposure-wide analysis (Chen et al.), Cogent Psychology
January/February 2020: A Pilot Study on Sleep Quality, Forgiveness, Religion, Spirituality, and General Health of Women Living in a Homeless Mission (Brewer-Smyth et al.), Holistic Nursing Practice

Articles, Commentaries, Interviews, Webinars:

WHO Special Bulletin Call for Papers on Behavioural and Social Sciences For Better Health. Manuscript submission open until December 31, 2020.
Podcast, “Religion as a Social Determinant of Health” with Ellen Idler, Recorded Talk from October 23, 2020
Conversations in Religion and the Healing Arts, Recorded event from Valparaiso University, Oct 14, 2020
Lecture by Prof. David Nirenberg, Dean of the University of Chicago Divinity School: What Pandemics Mean for Religion, Recorded Talk from July 2, 2020

COVID-19 specific resources:

In this issue: Doug Oman, Covid-19 and Religion/Spirituality: A Global Review from a Public Health Perspective (please see bibliography for an expanded list of resources)
PHRS Board Member, Susan Holman, Disease, Community, and Grief in a COVID-19 World
International Dialogue Centre (KAICIID), Interfaith Dialogue in Action on COVID-19
Essay by Mark Faries, Texas A&M Professor of Behavioral and Lifestyle Medicine: Voices: COVID-19 and the concern of chronic disease in the church
Essays reflecting on tensions between COVID-19 restrictions, illness prevention, and Eucharist in Orthodox Christian communities: Public Orthodoxy and Eucharist and Do the Sacraments Prevent Illness?
November 2020: Spirituality, religiosity and the mental health consequences of social isolation during Covid-19 pandemic (Lucchetti et al.), International Journal of Social Psychiatry
October 2020: National Well-Being Measures Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Online Samples (VanderWeele et al.), Journal of General Internal Medicine
October 2020: Coping with Racism: a Perspective of COVID-19 Church Closures on the Mental Health of African Americans (DeSouza et al.), Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities
October 2020: Relationships between religion/spirituality and mental health in youth during COVID-19 (Kang et al.), Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
September 2020: Emergency department approach to spirituality care in the era of COVID-19 (Pierce et al.), The American Journal of Emergency Medicine
July 2020: The role of spirituality in the COVID-19 pandemic: a spiritual hotline project (Ribeiro et al.), Journal of Public Health
July 2020: A look at the first quarantined community in the United States: Response of religious communal organizations and implications for public health during the COVID-19 pandemic (Weinberger-Litman et al.), Journal of Religion and Health
June 2020: Religion as a Health Promoter During the 2019/2020 COVID Outbreak: View from Detroit (Modell & Kardia), Journal of Religion and Health
May 2020: COVID-19 Epidemic and Spirituality: A Review of the Benefits of Religion in Times of Crisis (Fardin), Jundishapur Journal of Chronic Disease
For more COVID-19/PHRS resources, please see the PHRS resource page: https://publichealthrs.org/resources/

From Issue 2, Spring/Summer 2020

November 2019: The Role of Religion for Mindfulness-Based Interventions: Implications for Dissemination and Implementation (Palitsky and Kaplan), Mindfulness
February 2020: Private Religion/Spirituality, Self-Rated Health, and Mental Health Among US South Asians (Kent et al.), Quality of Life Research
February 2020: Does spirituality or religion positively affect mental health? Meta-analysis of longitudinal studies (Garssen et al.), International Journal for the Psychology of Religion
February 2020: The role of Hope in subsequent health and well-being for older adults: An outcome-wide longitudinal approach (Long et al.), Global Epidemiology
March 2020: Religion, Spirituality, and Health: New Considerations for Epidemiology (Ransome), American Journal of Epidemiology
April 2020: Handbook of Spirituality, Religion, and Mental Health, 2nd Edition (Rosmarin and Koenig), Academic Press
May 2020: Religious Service Attendance and Deaths Related to Drugs, Alcohol, and Suicide Among US Health Care Professionals (Chen et al.), JAMA Psychiatry

From Issue 1, Fall 2020:

Mental health and self-rated health among U.S. South Asians: the role of religious group involvement (2019). Stroope, Kent et al., Ethnicity and Health
Religious service attendance, health behaviors and well-being—an outcome-wide longitudinal analysis (2019). Pawlikowski, Bialowolski et al., European Journal of Public Health
An update on America’s changing religious landscape, (2019). Pew Research Center
Interview with Dr. Mirfin Mpundu, Director of the Ecumenical Pharmaceutical Network in the April 2019 World Health Organization Bulletin: Mirfin Mpundu: accessing medicines, fighting resistance
Webinar of 2019 Emory Conference marking the release of the Special Issue on Faith-based Partnerships in the American Journal of Public Health: Finding common ground: partnerships in religion and public health
Sandro Galea, Dean of Boston University School of Public Health, on Religion and Public Health: On religion and public health