Nature of Spirituality and Ethics: A Christian Perspective
Spirituality and ethics are crucial in healthcare since they provide the basis for cultivating values that allow nurses to remain empathetic and attentive to patients and their needs. Examining spirituality from the Christian perspective will show that the subject matter implies using a religious prism and incorporating the concept of God into it. Specifically, the nature of spirituality in healthcare is seen as the exploration of oneself and the world around through connection with God (Elliott, 2017). Namely, spirituality is regarded as the process of expanding one’s scope of knowledge while maintaining the dialogue with God and following His word and Christian values. The latter, in turn, constitute the bulk of Christian ethics, which insists that one should adhere to key principles of virtuous behavior (Elliott, 2017). Thus, one can live in peace with oneself and others, contributing to the community and exploring one’s relationship with God.
In connection to healthcare, the specified attitude implies equal treatment of all patients, as well as the focus on empathy and compassion as core elements of spiritual communication. Moreover, following the standards of Christian ethics and its spiritual concepts, a nurse must provide a patient with a chance to practice specific beliefs. The described approach contrasts with postmodern relativism, which implies that there is no objective truth, which is why investing in it and not discovering it should be seen as the correct way of encouraging spirituality (Elliott, 2017). As a result, a patient may be lift dissatisfied and lost.
Scientism: Definition and Key Arguments
Science has played a vital role in driving the evolution of humankind forward. However, the attempts at introducing a scientific viewpoint into every aspect of an individual’s life are likely to result in a severe lack of emotional and spiritual development. The propensity toward placing science at the helm of every domain of a person’s life can be considered a succinct definition of scientism. Mizrahi (2017, p. 351) defines the subject matter in the following manner: “Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture.” Therefore, scientism can be considered as the phenomenon of an individual attempting to shield oneself from emotional and spiritual challenges by substituting them with rationality.
Although a rational and scientific approach is useful in a range of areas, it is also important to nurture one’s spirituality and contribute to its growth. Therefore, scientism as an attempt to replace one’s spiritual needs with the continuous focus on scientific facts needs to be ousted from everyday life. With the promotion of scientism, people may unlearn the ability to engage emotionally with specific ideas and phenomena, as well as explore their spirituality.
Another argument against scientism lies in the tendency to denigrate the ideas and activates that cannot be explained clearly from a scientific perspective. The specified problem includes the optics of scientism on religion and religious rituals and activities. Failing to recognize the importance that the specified activities have on people’s spiritual growth and emotional balance, scientism rejects them blindly.
References
Elliot, D. (2017). Hope and Christian ethics. Cambridge University Press.
Fuller, M., Evers, D., Runehov, A., & Sæther, K. W. (2017). Issues in science and theology: Are we special? Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
Gooding, D. W., & Lennox, J. C. (2018). Finding ultimate reality: In search of the best answers to the biggest questions (vol. 2). Myrtlefield House.
McGrath, A. E. (2016). Re-imagining nature: The promise of a Christian natural theology. John Wiley & Sons.
Mizrahi, M. (2017). What’s so bad about scientism? Social Epistemology, 31(4), 351-367.