#mentalhealth

Pastor Rick Warren has praised a pastoral letter discussing mental health and the church. The letter, titled, “Hope and Healing,” calls for an end to the stigma around mental illness and for greater collaboration between science and medical professionals and people of faith.

While we were rightly concerned about surges in Covid-19 cases, we should also be concerned about the surges in the struggle with mental health, specifically anxiety and depression.

I recently sat down with two clinical psychologists, Dr. John Townsend and Dr. Buddy Mendez, to talk about mental health. They shared with me that “whatever level of stress, anxiety, or depression a person had before the pandemic has been greatly escalated by the pandemic.”

Pastoral depression is truly a struggle for many church leaders. Here are the five primary causes pastors identify as the reasons for their battle.