Call for Faith: Religiousness, Religious Coping and Psychological Disturbance of Chinese Christians During COVID-19.

OBJECTIVES: This study is aimed at investigating the relationships between religious practice, religious coping strategies, and mental health among Chinese Christians in the context of the COVID-19 outbreak. METHODS: A total of 915 participants from several cities in China completed online questionnaires, including sociodemographic data, mental disorder history, and years as a Christian, as well as frequency of weekly religious practice, Religious Coping Scale, the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), and the Generalized Anxiety Disorder scale (GAD-7). RESULTS: The result of multivariate analysis indicated that during the COVID-19 pandemic, among Chinese Christians without a history of mental disorder, negative religious coping were associated with depression, and anxiety symptoms. Among Chinese Christians with a history of mental disorders, comorbidity with 1 mental disorder, comorbidity with 2 or more mental disorders, negative religious coping, and positive religious coping were associated with depression symptoms. Comorbidity with 2 or more mental disorders, negative religious coping, and positive religious coping were associated with anxiety symptoms. CONCLUSION: Christians with a previous history of mental illness are more likely to experience anxiety during the epidemic. In the future, mental health services during disasters may put more attention on certain religious groups and provide more spiritual care to maintain their well-being accordingly.

Persevering in Nursing with Godly Purpose.

ABSTRACT: COVID-19 impacted the psychological and spiritual wellness of healthcare providers, in addition to their physical health. Christian nurses must continue to look for reassurance of God's provision and control of circumstances as a means of coping through adversity in their work. Practical Scripture applications are provided to sustain nurses' resilience and encouragement.

Religion, Islam, and Compliance with COVID-19 Best Practices.

While many have implemented best practices intended to help stem the spread of COVID-19, there are also a substantial number of citizens, both domestically and abroad, who have resisted these practices. We argue that public health authorities, as well as scientific researchers and funders, should help address this resistance by putting greater effort into ascertaining how existing religious practices and beliefs align with COVID-19 guidelines. In particular, we contend that Euro-American scholars-who have often tended to implicitly favor secular and Christian worldviews-should put added focus on how Islamic commitments may (or may not) support COVID-19 best practices, including practices that extend beyond the domain of support for mental health.

The Role of Religion and Religiosity in Health-Promoting Care for the Body During the Lockdowns caused by the COVID-19 Pandemic in Egypt, Poland and Romania.

The coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), as a widespread health threat, has triggered an increase in health-related behaviours, both pro-and anti-health, especially with regard to diet and physical activity. One of the factors modifying the intensity of such activities may be the religious doctrine and religiosity with which a person is associated. A total of 1502 people (1147 women) from countries that feature one dominant religion, took part in the study. Participants represented Sunni Islam (Egypt, n = 798), Roman Catholicism (Poland, n = 443) and Orthodox Christianity (Romania, n = 261). The Coronavirus Anxiety Scale, the Eating Attitudes Test and the Inventory of Physical Activity Objectives were used in the study. Fear of COVID-19 is associated with engagement in pro-health activity, although not to such a significant extent as might be expected. The type of religion in question was revealed to moderate this relationship, but the intensity of religiosity was not found to serve as a moderator.

Providing Spiritual Care to In-Hospital Patients During COVID-19: A Preliminary European Fact-Finding Study.

Historically, there has be a close relationship between the nursing services and spiritual care provision to patients, arising due to the evolvement of many hospitals and nursing programmes from faith-based institutions and religious order nursing. With increasing secularism, these relationships are less entwined. Nonetheless, as nurses typically encounter patients at critical life events, such as receiving bad news or dying, nurses frequently understand the need and requirement for both spiritual support and religious for patients and families during these times. Yet there are uncertainties, and nurses can feel ill-equipped to deal with patients' spiritual needs. Little education or preparation is provided to these nurses, and they often report a lack of confidence within this area. The development of this confidence and the required competencies is important, especially so with increasingly multicultural societies with diverse spiritual and religious needs. In this manuscript, we discuss initial field work carried out in preparation for the development of an Erasmus Plus educational intervention, entitled from Cure to Care Digital Education and Spiritual Assistance in Healthcare. Referring specifically to post-COVID spirituality needs, this development will support nurses to respond to patients' spiritual needs in the hospital setting, using digital means. This preliminary study revealed that while nurses are actively supporting patients' spiritual needs, their education and training are limited, non-standardised and heterogeneous. Additionally, most spiritual support occurs within the context of a Judeo-Christian framework that may not be suitable for diverse faith and non-faith populations. Educational preparation for nurses to provide spiritual care is therefore urgently required.

Cross-National Comparison of Religion as a Predictor of COVID-19 Vaccination Rates.

We examined the effects of religiosity on COVID-19 vaccination rates using a cross-national comparison while controlling for socio-economic factors and culture. Our analysis, conducted on data from 90 countries representing 86% of the world population, showed that Christianity was negatively related to vaccination, while there was no relation with Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and nonbelief. The importance of religion, freedom of expression and belief, sex ratio, median age, and almost all cultural factors were not related to vaccination, whereas Human Development Index was. The influence of different religions on vaccination rates has also been described.

What we think prayers do: Americans' expectations and valuation of intercessory prayer.

Praying for others in the wake of a disasters is a common interpersonal and public response to tragedy in the United States. But these gestures are controversial. In a survey experiment, we elicit how people value receiving a prayer from a Christian stranger in support of a recent hardship and examine factors that affect the value of the prayer. We find that people who positively value receiving the prayer do so primarily because they believe it provides emotional support and will be answered by God. Many also value the prayer because they believe it will improve their health and wealth, although empirical support of such effects is lacking. People who negatively value receiving the prayer do so primarily because they believe praying is a waste of time. The negative value is particularly large if people are offended by religion. Finally, the hardship experienced by the prayer recipient matters to the intensity by which recipients like or dislike the gesture, suggesting the benefit of prayers varies not only across people, but also across contexts.

Disentangling the Role of Religiosity in Human Papillomavirus Vaccination Amidst COVID-19 Pandemic.

Religion is a complex and sociocultural driver of human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination decisions, but its exact role has been mixed/unclear. We used a cross-sectional study of 342 Christian parents to examine the associations between the three domains of religiosity (organizational, non-organizational, and intrinsic) and the intention to (i) seek HPV information and (ii) receive the HPV vaccine. Organizational religiosity was the only domain that was positively associated with information-seeking intention regardless of the type of covariates included. Mixed findings in the association between religiosity and HPV vaccination decisions may depend on the religiosity domain being assessed.

Christianity, Family, Students, and COVID-19.

Four substantial topics are explored in this issue of the Journal of Religion and Health, namely: (1) Christianity, (2) family and faith dynamics, (3) the spiritual and religious experiences of students from Islamic, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, and Jewish perspectives, and lastly, (4) the lingering effects of COVID-19. This issue also notes the diamond jubilee-60th year-of JORH (2021).

Christian nationalism and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and uptake.

Understanding COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and uptake is vital for informing public health interventions. Prior U.S. research has found that religious conservatism is positively associated with anti-vaccine attitudes. One of the strongest predictors of anti-vaccine attitudes in the U.S. is Christian nationalism-a U.S. cultural ideology that wants civic life to be permeated by their particular form of nationalist Christianity. However, there are no studies examining the relationship between Christian nationalism and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and uptake. Using a new nationally representative sample of U.S. adults, we find that Christian nationalism is one of the strongest predictors of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and is negatively associated with having received or planning to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Since Christian nationalists make up approximately 20 percent of the population, these findings could have important implications for achieving herd immunity.

Spiritual Health and the COVID-19 Pandemic: Impacts on Orthodox Christianity Devotion Practices, Rituals, and Religious Pilgrimages.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on multiple aspects of physical and social health, including spiritual and religious dimensions, has been discussed not only by numerous theologians, scientists, and politicians, but also by millions of believers of all faiths worldwide. The pandemic seems to have exerted a significant impact on religious practices. Massive gatherings of devoted and faithful people have been strongly discouraged and even openly banned. Prominent religious festivals and pilgrimages that have been conflated by the media with other "mega-spreader events" are incessantly canceled to mitigate the pandemic and alleviate the burden of COVID-19 on the healthcare system. The impact of the pandemic on Catholic or Muslim religious tourism has been extensively described in peer-reviewed and gray literature. However, observant members of the Orthodox Christianity faith have also experienced the constrictive prohibitions for gathering at and worshiping in shrines, churches, and monasteries. Among the manifestations of devotion that the pandemic has interfered with are the attendance to public worship spaces for the celebration of rites and ceremonies, like the celebration of Orthodox Easter. Expressions of reverent devotion including the kissing of crosses and icons as well as the sacrament of Holy Communion may have also been considered a motive of concern as these holy objects and the spoon used might act as fomites in the dissemination of the virus. Visitation of holy places has been also hampered by the pandemic. The most important centers of pilgrimage for Orthodox Christianity are Mount Athos and Jerusalem, as well as the Shrine of Panagia Evangelistria in the Island of Tinos, Greece. Authorities have halted almost completely the arrival of visitors to these sites. This paper aims at elaborating on the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on social manifestations of religiosity and therefore taking a toll on the spiritual health of believers who have deeply rooted religious convictions and are strongly attached to Church tradition. This analysis closes with the provision of specific suggestions for the care, support, and healing of the impacted or splintered spiritual health of the believers who cannot participate in expressions of devotion, such as pilgrimages and religious tourism because of personal and public health concern, such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

A fundamental Christian argument for vaccine promotion.

A recent correspondence highlighted the need to change the COVID-19 vaccine narrative to combat vaccine hesitancy by stressing that vaccination is a moral act. The said article was in response to another correspondence which said that science and religion must work together for vaccine promotion. This article presents a fundamental Christian argument for vaccine promotion by saying that God may have provided an answer to the pandemic through the COVID-19 vaccine.