Religion and spirituality have long shared a border with psychology. But where should the border be now? In the premodern past, there was no domain of scientific psychology, and all of the knowledge we would now see as psychological was contained in various other fields—religion chief among them. But issues and problems that were once seen as religious in nature are now seen as belonging to the domain of psychology. Chief among them is the problem of suffering, one of the most persistent and thorny problems facing human existence. Religion used to claim to be the premier field for the solution to human suffering, with its ultimate solution being the turn to God. In the modern era, human suffering is seen as a problem that is amenable to the techniques of science and technology, like other problems facing technology; since the problem is located in the sufferer’s interior experience, as opposed to being a physical problem amenable to engineering, the problem is seen as falling within the domain of psychology. One answer for the sufferer in modern times is to go to psychotherapy, where their problems are brought to a trained psychologist, who analyzes and empathizes with the patient to help them reach a state of well-being; the drug-based approach of the psychiatrist is another avenue for a solution.
There is no doubt that the methods of the therapist and psychiatrist have been effective in treating a large amount of human suffering. But does that mean that the religious or spiritual approach has no place? Religion and spirituality offer psychological techniques, some of which overlap with those that might be prescribed by a therapist. But there are aspects of the religious or spiritual approach that go beyond the scope of scientific psychology. Scientific psychology is proscribed from offering a holistic worldview to a sufferer. Religion and spirituality offer some sort of overarching cosmic account within which the sufferer’s problems have a meaning and an eventual purpose. That worldview can support healing practices, such as faith or rituals, that seem meaningless and pointless within the neutral worldview of scientific psychology.
Scientific psychology is thus able to tolerate religion and spirituality as adjunct practices for its own project of healing, but is unable to view them as domains with their own autonomous logic and purpose. But the purpose of spirituality is not only to heal. Spirituality in part may aim to heal the being if there are emotional wounds that prevent it from progressing towards God, but a good part of spirituality is about going beyond the normal experience, not healing to an undamaged state. While it is acknowledged that seeking healing or relief from suffering is a legitimate reason to approach God, it is not the only reason, and is indeed not the most characteristic reason for one to seek God. By partially ceding the problem of suffering to psychology proper, then, spirituality may actually come closer to its characteristic approach. The essence of spirituality is the quest for God and the inner spirit, and not healing; healing is an ancillary benefit.
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