Culture, Religion and Psychology

I currently am a part of a self-acclaimed culturally diverse program, where models that stress individuality and the culture of a person, like the 'ADDRESSING' and 'RESPECTFUL' model, are emphasised and verbally emphasised. At the same time, I am highly, and sadly, amused at the level of judgment and prejudice that comes up, predominantly against religion, but also against a majority of cultures considered 'not first world' or 'not modernised'.

The cultural aspect I can chuck up to an overall lack of knowledge, exposure and awareness. If your knowledge about another culture is not based on first hand knowledge to a certain extent - and by that I also mean interacting with individuals from that culture - but solely on what you see in articles written by individuals that are not a part of that culture, yet you choose to insist that your view is accurate than that of a member of the culture's, because yours is 'research based', then that is a lack/personal choice to be ignorant.

The religious aspect, that I find unsettling. It seems like there is an unspoken requirement, and a general endorsement to question/remove 'God', or the idea of religious beliefs from psychology. This is different from the concept of spirituality, which is very well embraced, most especially if its in the concept of meditation et al. However, everything in connection to religion is talked about from a judgmental stand point, and I sit listening both baffled and saddened. How and why is having faith in God a negative factor to mental health?? Why and how is being able to recognise that while there are problems associated with psychology, there are also issues that are spiritual in nature something that makes you 'superstitious' and therefore, 'not realistic'?? The message I get here is you can be a psychologist or have a religion, but you cannot be/have both. Laughing at the idea of 'exorcism', and chucking it up to 'superstition', can we still say its a self-acclaimed culturally diverse program??

And I do recognise that since I am trying to be as de-identifying as possible, some of my statements might sound judgmental and off base, but for those who know the background of where this is coming from, it might make sense and be kinda on base.

Ok, end of rant.

xo