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The Sciences of Religion,
Public Health and Popular Education in Health
Coordinators:
Eymard Mourão Vasconcelos, Julio Alberto Wong, Faustino Teixeira.
Institution:
UFPB (articulated with REDEPOP, UFF and UFJF).
Maximum number of participants:
30
Summary:
Since the 90s, popular educators in the health sector have been
concerned with understanding the importance placed on religion by
the popular classes of Latin America, its relationship to their
struggles for social equality and health, and the constant re-orientation
of its ways of organizing daily life. Many times religion has been
viewed with disdain by public health professionals, and, because
of this, is not considered in their attempts to understand the motivations
and feelings that guide the lives of the great majority of the Brazilian
people. Despite religion being a central theme in the classic literature
of social sciences, in the field of health it has been mostly avoided
because of the usual controversies and tensions that it usually
creates.
Nevertheless, a large number of health professionals credit their
personal work motivation to their religious and spiritual lives.
The majority of the populace finds solace and motivation in them
in the struggle to overcome existential crises brought on by grave
illnesses. But the predominating mode of modern scientific thought
has negated and made illegitimate the debate about the relationship
between religion/spirituality and health in universities and health
providing organizations. And so, this central dimension in the process
of subjective elaboration between health professionals and patients
has been abandoned, to be dealt with only in their private lives,
leading to a depressing and undisguised spiritual/religious omission/vacuum
in the health services, subject to exploitation by private groups.
The development of the science of religion holds the possibility
of creating a language capable of facilitating an open debate between
the various systems of belief present in our society.
Objective:
- Include and discuss the most important scientific and religious
theories to enable a better understanding that will improve the
way the popular Latin American classes face their struggle for better
health.
Target
Audience:
Health professionals and students, managers and health councils.
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