I’m interrupting regularly scheduled programming here to share an essay I wrote with Keaton Douglas, my co-author on The Road to Hope: Responding to the Crisis of Addiction (affiliate link). August 31 is International Overdose Awareness Day. While the topic is one we often talk about in whispers, the reality is that we all know someone who has lost his or her life, someone struggling right now with the scourge of addiction, someone in recovery. These people, these stories, these souls matter.
In light of these realities, Keaton and I are publishing this essay here with hopes you, dear readers, will read it carefully and share it far and wide. We tried to place it in larger publications this spring, but to no avail. We invite you to commit to taking one small action in the next month to minister to those of our brothers and sisters suffering from addiction and their families. Ideas are in the penultimate paragraph, but please don’t skip to the end! Additionally, you might watch and share Unshackled: Healing Addictions Through Faith, now streaming on Shalom World TV.
Thank you.
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Recovery for Substance Use Disorder Needs Faith Communities to Step Up and Step In
Keaton Douglas with Lindsay Schlegel
Any time a person develops an unnatural attachment, whether it is to substances, pornography, devices, or otherwise, he forfeits a part of his unique human dignity. Whatever the focal point of that attachment might be, it distances him from his own being, his loved ones, his community, and the god of his understanding and thereby prevents him from seeing himself, his surroundings, and the purpose of his life with clarity. The severity of the damage covers a spectrum, but that there will be damage is inevitable. In many cases—like the 48.5 million individuals who suffered from substance use disorder in 2023—the stakes are high and the impact is profound.
These are the individuals with whom and with whose families I have been working for years as founder and executive director of iTHIRST, which stands for The Healing Initiative—Recovery, Spirituality, and Twelve Steps, and is a mission of the Missionary Servants of the Most Holy Trinity. The disease of addiction is sometimes the result of generational trauma, sometimes the consequence of an attempt to escape intense emotional pain, and sometimes the fallout of a too-aggressive prescription written post-surgery. Whatever its impetus, addiction is a disease of mind, body, and soul. While the latter is my present concern, because the latter is where I see the greatest hope for healing, the physiological realities of addiction are no less significant. Unfortunately, they are often misunderstood.
Individuals who fall into addictions like the ones I see every day—and let us not forget these people are individuals, with their own stories, relationships, backgrounds, and promise—cannot simply stop using whatever it is they have become chained to. Their brain chemistry has changed so that the midbrain is so intent on seeking a hit from its object that it overrides the rational decision-making of the prefrontal cortex. Even the relationships a person once held very dear can be steamrolled by choices made when the proper functioning of the brain is obstructed. Medical and psychological treatment can contribute to rewiring these systems, but recovery is incomplete when it neglects spirituality, a crucial element of holistic healing.
A missed opportunity
Recovery programs often excuse or exclude faith communities from contributing to healing from addictions, sometimes due to restrictions on the state or federal funding upon which they depend. Yet faith communities have a unique opportunity to play a very real role in reigniting the unique human dignity in one who is living with addiction. Across cultures and around the world, people are thirsting to find a relationship with a god of their understanding. To ignore this natural yearning is to significantly restrict the possibilities of those working toward long-term recovery.
Viktor Frankl believed that the primary motivation of the human person is to find meaning in life. What we find will inform how we respond to suffering. If we find resonance beyond ourselves and the present moment, we can locate the motivation to persevere through challenging circumstances, to fight for those weaker than ourselves. We can recognize and appreciate our own inherent dignity, which is not negated by poor decisions or patterns of behavior. Without a deeper understanding of the potential growth and redemption that might come from suffering, pain remains simply pain.
Government and secular social institutions are not equipped to navigate the road toward restoring the dignity that is compromised when an unnatural attachment takes hold. Time and again, I have witnessed timidity when it comes to spirituality, a reticence to offend, a reluctance to discuss the truth we see for fear it will dismiss someone else’s experience. For too long, spirituality in this arena has been shunned. We need to involve those who have not yet been involved.
Here, then, is where faith communities of all stripes can step up and step in to guide those individuals toward discovering the purpose and meaning of their lives. I see my work through the lens of Catholicism, which appreciates the mind-body unity of the human being and encourages reflection on mercy, forgiveness, and the hope of joyful everlasting life. I have worked alongside Jewish, Protestant, and Muslim individuals who promote the same realities through their texts and traditions. No denomination has the market cornered when it comes to the dignity of life, which means we all have the responsibility and the potential to guide our brothers and sisters back to themselves.
A global crisis
Substance use disorder is a human crisis that exists not only in the United States, but as a scourge on all of human society. For years, I have been training spiritual companions to walk with those suffering from addictions and their families through iTHIRST. The course, which is academically certified through the Continuing Education and Professional Studies Division of Seton Hall University, has reached into forty-seven states and eight Native American reservations, across the ocean into Europe, and in the last year, the curriculum was taught for the first time on the continent of Africa. The pain and suffering of fractured family units and distorted relationships is everywhere. The loss of human dignity is everywhere.
I was surprised to find the rate of addiction among adults in the African nations we’ve reached is 14-16%, which is the same as in the States. The people I worked with in Nigeria, Cameroon, and elsewhere were seeking the same kind of resources those in suburban America are pursuing. Those in war-torn African nations are trying to restore the dignity of the human person. I had a student participate in class in the dark because the separatists were outside. I was struck by the diligence of her search for answers, even in the midst of warfare. She, like others I’ve worked with, is staunchly committed to helping those suffering around her.
Consider the priest from Nigeria who inquired about the course from the Northlands, where the terrorism is going on. The youth are so despondent that they are turning to drugs and alcohol. No other social institution is stepping up, and so faith leaders like this priest are looking for help. More like him are ready and waiting for the next session to learn how to address the issue in a manner that will serve their people. Elsewhere, too, people in rural areas with no clinical or government support are desperate for at least spiritual consolation and whatever resources might be available as they watch their brothers and sisters lose themselves and their lives.
Here in the States, too, people are looking for a way out of the pain and destruction that addiction causes in families, the foundation of society. Think of a teenager who is making dinner and driving his siblings where they need to be because his father is gone and his mother is unable to care for her children. Rather than being protected and provided for, this young man—who is still in many ways a child—must shoulder the responsibility of protecting and providing for his mother and his siblings. Clinicians’ aid only goes so far. This, too, is why we’re creating a curriculum for incarcerated youth incorporating logotherapy, the mode of psychotherapy formed around Frankl’s findings, which encourages the pursuit of meaning and purpose.
Seeking hope with purpose
This scourge on society can take so many different forms, yet a simple truth rests at the root of the solution: human beings possess inherent dignity that unnatural attachments deteriorate and threaten to outright destroy. Humans thrive in community, but addiction leads to isolation. They long for the transcendent, and yet addiction shackles them to the chase for a fleeting moment of reprieve. The general public’s misconceptions and many social institutions’ inadequate programming fail to serve those on the margins whose minds, bodies, and souls have been distorted, though, to be sure, not irredeemably so.
The solution starts with a conversation. Addiction remains taboo, even in spiritual circles, and so a prompt can go a long way in opening the door. Add prayers for those addicted and their families to shared intentions at religious services. Offer a book club to promote understanding of what addiction really is. A facilitators’ guide for my book, The Road to Hope: Responding to the Crisis of Addiction, is available for free online. Organize a service to commemorate International Overdose Awareness Day on August 31.
Once faith communities have made these simple moves, the next step is to listen. Listen to those who didn’t know where else to turn and were surprised to find an opening where they worship. Listen to those who have only been able to talk about the journey of their son, daughter, spouse, or parent in whispers. Listen to those who feel called to serve those in need, but didn’t know where to start.
