Publication Date: Dec 21, 2023
By: Kisha Freed, Success Coach, Six Seconds Emotional Intelligence Practitioner/Assessor, Mindfulness Meditation Instructor
Mark Sanders, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Certified Substance Use Disorder Counselor
Ella Fitzgerald’s 1938 blues song, “When I Get Low, I Get High,” eloquently summarizes the medicinal role alcohol and other drugs have played for African Americans experiencing oppression, isolation, and depression (Sanders, Sanders and White, 2006). The first article of this three-part series discusses the cultural importance of spirituality for many African Americans, especially in dealing with the effects of historical trauma and oppression, and describes how spirituality is often an important ingredient of culturally-responsive mental health and substance use services for African Americans. Part 2 focuses on methods of integrating spirituality and counseling with African Americans seeking mental health and substance use disorder (SUD) recovery services.
In this third installment, we focus on the role of the church in supporting mental health and SUD recovery in African American communities. During the holiday season, it’s common for people to struggle with stress, past trauma, and personal loss associated with the holidays, and we discuss how feeling spiritually low can increase the risk of getting high. This blog post also addresses what spirituality can look like for African Americans seeking recovery who are not a part of a religious community and strategies to help African American clients cultivate inner peace.
Kisha: What role has the church played in SUDs and mental health treatment and recovery in African American communities?
Mark: In 1986, crack cocaine replaced marijuana as the number one street drug. Addictions Studies and Research Consultant, William White, says the “best” day to have a SUD in America was September 13, 1978. On that date, First Lady Betty Ford went on national television and said, “My name is Betty Ford; I'm an alcoholic” (White, 2017). By normalizing SUDs on a national platform, the public stigma associated with SUDs was greatly reduced and folks began to see SUD as a disease that should be treated.
Perhaps the worst day to have SUD when it comes to public opinion and stigmatization was June 15, 1986. On that date, basketball star Len Bias was drafted number one by the Boston Celtics. He went to a party that night to celebrate, snorted some cocaine, had a heart attack, and died. Congress was so angry about his death they intensified the war on drugs. In 1985, there were 400,000 incarcerated individuals in our nation's prisons. By 1995, the population had grown to 1,000,000, and by 2005, that number had doubled, with a disproportionately large percentage of those individuals being African Americans (White, Kurtz and Sanders, 2006). As stigma increased, insurance companies went from covering addiction treatment at a rate of approximately 90% to 10%, and many African Americans who needed treatment suddenly could not afford it (White, Kurtz and Sanders, 2006).
During the time period of 1986 to 1996, every denomination of African American churches formed their own church-based drug ministries to help support the recovery efforts of their members and the wider African American community. One of the most famous African American drug ministries, Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco, was established during this time of need. In addition to drug ministries, African American communities across the nation have helped countless people by further establishing HIV ministries, prison ministries, and mental health ministries through local churches.
Mark: Kisha, what are your thoughts about the Black church forming ministries to help with community healing?
Kisha: I'm excited to hear there are programs in place to support African Americans with SUDs, mental health needs, and those who lack housing. As you mention the stigma of SUDs, I think you really touched on something important when you mentioned shame. I think any time we are in spaces of recovery and wellbeing, having an awareness of the impact and influence of shame, guilt, and anxiety in the process of recovery is going to be paramount.
I appreciate the research of Dr. Peter Breggin on this trio of emotions—shame, guilt, and anxiety. He calls them “negative legacy emotions.” Breggins explains that shame, guilt, and anxiety have served as “internal emotional inhibitions or restraints”—a type of biological evolutionary mechanism—to protect and preserve familial and interpersonal relationships against the impulsive, violent human nature. So, these three emotions have played a huge role in human preservation and natural selection.
However, Breggins continues to explain that negative legacy emotions, being rudimentary in nature, have continued to hinder rather than help individuals to emotionally and psychologically progress. Instead, shame, guilt, and anxiety perpetuate emotional repression, which can eventually lead to unintended adverse effects, such as impulsive violence or the breaking down of restraints. My personal conclusion and perspective are that shame, guilt, and anxiety (being rudimentary in nature) stunts the awareness of the deeper repressed and suppressed emotions and as a result, this repression might be a hindrance to the progress of a client’s mental health or SUD recovery.
My point is, I think it would be helpful to integrate an educational program on mindful compassion in church recovery programs. Mindful compassion exercises can not only support both peer support specialists and patrons to cultivate a self-awareness to enable the recognition of negative legacy emotions and access the repressed emotions behind them, but also practice compassion and empathy and reduce the stigma of shame, guilt, and anxiety. I think this would be foundational for any church recovery program’s success and could have a significant impact on the surrounding community.
Mark: There is a movement where churches are receiving formal training on how to work with people who have SUDs and mental illness. When George W. Bush was President of the United States, he funded a program called Access to Recovery. This program provided funding to churches that offer recovery support for their communities. Since then, Barack Obama and Joe Biden have both increased funding for the Access to Recovery program during their terms as president.
Kisha: It is good that these services are available in the community with the support of federal funding. I’d also like to recount; the power is in the community and peers. However, I love the way Kurtz and White define “community” in their 2015 article entitled “Recovery Spirituality”:
Everyone needs a sense of ‘community’—the deep experience of being in some way at one with [some] others. Unlike other communi¬ties that one may join, ‘home’ is a place where we belong because it is where our very weaknesses and flaws fit in and are in fact the way we ‘fit in.’
Reflecting on the second article of this series, we touched on the reasons 12 Step programs are still successful to this day. The peers’ ability to leverage both mirroring the client’s mental and emotional experiences and modeling new behavior and attitudes are the factors that make peers strong assets to community recovery programs. Compassion, empathy, and connection will come naturally for peer specialists. So, as role models they also have great influence. Continuing to incorporate partnerships with peers in community-based or church affiliated programs is a very powerful approach for substance use recovery. Click here to continue reading.