On Tuesday 8th March Revd Dr Joanna Collicutt will be giving us a seminar talk entitled – Psychosis and religious experience.
Abstract: The psychoses (mental health conditions that involve delusions, hallucinations, and disorganized thinking) have several points of connection with aspects of religion and creativity. The form of experiences overlap, and people who are prone to psychosis or special sorts of spiritual experiences are also more likely to be creative. Both psychosis and religion can be understood as ways of making existential meaning. Does this mean that mysticism can be reduced to madness? Or that religious beliefs are a form of delusion? Or the converse – that people living with psychosis, especially if they are also creative, may have a prophetic role in opening up alternative realities to the church and society? These are some of the themes to be explored in this seminar.
