Therapy should be free, but can we fuse therapy and spirituality?

[mandyjw]

It's abundantly clear to me just about anywhere I look that therapy needs to be free, easily accessible, normalized, and perhaps integrated into communities more. We can say that the government should pay for therapy and we should work towards making mental health a bigger priority. By making mental health a huge priority, we can prevent many issues by making it part of the school curriculum as Leo suggested in his conscious politics series. However, most mental health professionals despite investing an incredible amount of time and money in their education, still misunderstand mental illness, awakening and the nature of reality in general. Many parents are going to object to having their children things that border on the line of or may be interpreted as "religious." 

What about separation of church and state? What happens to this as the consciousness of humanity evolves? 

A lot of people's unhappiness comes from a lack of real spiritual connection. People used to get this from religion but as churches and religious organizations stay in stage blue, people leave them to pursue stage orange and beyond. 

I wonder if an alternative solution would look something more like... (stick with me here, open minds now), organized religion, or a church setting. What if you had a "church" that's purpose was to offer community, some education, but ultimately to help people awaken, understand themselves and live amazing lives? It would have to exist on donations (something like tithing) and volunteers and would have to have a hierarchy of some kind. 

Obviously corruption and abuse would be a concern, but these problems are already givens with the government. And again how does the government transition into the realm of spirituality and the mystical? Should we wait around for that day to come? Should spiritual teachers always go with the model of operating their own independent businesses, with expensive retreat centers, seminars and fees for sessions with them? Should resources for awakening be reserved for those with the privilege of time and money? 

Couldn't a church or organized religion of some kind, as dirty as those words may sound, be the bridge to make awakening and self-actualization more accessible for everyone?  

 

 

[Ariesleith]

I don't understand why you claim the importance of a central religious union for therapy over just a central therapy system.in my view, spiritually can only be purifying and therefore beneficial if it is Embraced, even self created. Mental health should be using psychedelics,  music , meditation,  yoga, diet , education,  economic intervention (which means that we must not force a price on any one In need and they should get social security benefits for not being able to work ) and lifestyle changes long before prescription drugs with absolutely insane side effects and little to no actual benefit at huge profits.thus a well done centrally and single payer planned therapy system would enable and grow inherently spiritual things. As for whether there should be a Buddhist or taoist or Christian teacher and students or monks , should be totally up to the doctors and democratically run governmental organizations that have birth to the social system. I hope one day that we can have actually religious medical society,  but to in anyway deny the client's or doctors or anyone Involved to be atheist and secular is wrong in my view.