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Are You Happy With Your Religion? · Millennial Mental Health Channel

0:01
Speaker 1: This is Millennial Mental Health Channel. I'm doctor Justin Romano,
0:05
Speaker 1: a Child and Adolescent psychiatry fellow.
0:07
Speaker 2: And I'm Medikoreo, a licensed clinical therapist. Our podcast is
0:10
Speaker 2: here because we wanted to start a much need to
0:12
Speaker 2: conversation about mental health.
0:14
Speaker 1: Our goal is to teach you as much as we
0:16
Speaker 1: can by sharing our own experiences and interviewing experts in
0:19
Speaker 1: the mental health field. We will discuss topics like mood disorders,
0:22
Speaker 1: psychotic disorders, substance use, personality disorders, and many more.
0:26
Speaker 2: Millennial Mental Health Channel buy Millennials for everyone. We hope
0:29
Speaker 2: you enjoyed today's episode.
0:32
Speaker 1: MMHC is a production of Speaker from iHeartMedia. I heartma
0:39
Speaker 1: oh La bienvenidos. It's been a while since I've used
0:43
Speaker 1: my Mexican announcer voice, but welcome back to MMHC. We
0:47
Speaker 1: are excited you're here. We're excited to be here. We
0:51
Speaker 1: are going to be talking about a very cool topic
0:53
Speaker 1: today of religion, something that's been on our minds a
0:57
Speaker 1: little bit more recently. So let's start off with like
1:01
Speaker 1: a little bit about yourself. Tell me about your religious background,
1:04
Speaker 1: what did you grow up with?
1:05
Speaker 2: More importantly, your announcer voice. You know what I did.
1:10
Speaker 2: I learned this semi recently when Argentina won the World Cup.
1:13
Speaker 2: One of the announcers whenever I would watch like Mexican
1:16
Speaker 2: League soccer, I found out was Argentinian and I had
1:20
Speaker 2: no idea. So Argentina won and he had like this
1:23
Speaker 2: great like call when they won the World Cup. And
1:27
Speaker 2: so anyway, okay, back to the show. Religious background. I've
1:32
Speaker 2: been thinking about this for a couple of reasons. One
1:35
Speaker 2: with the episode topic, I've been thinking about it, and
1:37
Speaker 2: then the second is I'm currently teaching like cultural Foundations
1:40
Speaker 2: class the first year master students, and our next week's
1:43
Speaker 2: topic is actually about religion and spirituality. So this kind
1:46
Speaker 2: of works out well. So I've been thinking about my
1:48
Speaker 2: own background. I was raised Catholic, did most of the
1:52
Speaker 2: things right, Like I was baptized, have my first communion.
1:55
Speaker 2: We would go to church sometimes, definitely more often, like
1:59
Speaker 2: when I was in Sunday School for my first communion,
2:01
Speaker 2: and then just got the back a little bit, life
2:04
Speaker 2: got a little busy. I was never I never had
2:07
Speaker 2: my confirmation, which is like the next thing after communion.
2:11
Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean that's just kind of how I
2:12
Speaker 2: grew up. I know, for me, I don't know. I
2:15
Speaker 2: feel like I was one of those teenagers like, ah,
2:16
Speaker 2: we got to go to church. Now I got a
2:19
Speaker 2: job and sports and stuff. It kind of got on
2:21
Speaker 2: the way. But when I got to college, or while
2:23
Speaker 2: I was in college was like the last couple of years,
2:25
Speaker 2: I actually started going back to church with a few
2:27
Speaker 2: friends of mine, and that was like kind of an
2:29
Speaker 2: important part of our weekly routine, like going weekly, I
2:33
Speaker 2: will say, and I will say this openly. When it
2:36
Speaker 2: was the time of the year where we'd go out,
2:38
Speaker 2: like to parties and stuff, we'd go to the Saturday
2:40
Speaker 2: night Mass so that we wouldn't have to worry about
2:42
Speaker 2: waking up earlier for the Sunday morning Mass, which is
2:45
Speaker 2: its own thing. But yeah, it was something that I
2:49
Speaker 2: grew up with, kind of didn't like put a whole
2:51
Speaker 2: lot of effort in too as I got older, but
2:54
Speaker 2: then once I became like a young adult, went back
2:56
Speaker 2: into it. But honestly, I think one of the things
2:58
Speaker 2: that shifted for me kind of like going back to
3:01
Speaker 2: where I was of just not going to church as
3:03
Speaker 2: often or being super involved was moving when I graduated
3:07
Speaker 2: from school and everybody, you know, all of our our
3:09
Speaker 2: friends and Dana, your wife, like moved and for rotations
3:13
Speaker 2: and stuff, and Canvy moved, like I moved on my
3:16
Speaker 2: own with some friends in a different city and then
3:18
Speaker 2: I just wasn't close to a church there, and that
3:20
Speaker 2: probably just kind of started the cascading of just like
3:22
Speaker 2: not being super involved anymore. So that is my religious
3:26
Speaker 2: background in a minute and a half.
3:29
Speaker 1: Do you have any labels or titles for your current
3:32
Speaker 1: religious status?
3:33
Speaker 2: Some curious? No, hmmm, I think I'm still Catholic. I
3:38
Speaker 2: just maybe just not practicing.
3:39
Speaker 1: Is that the little Catholic curious?
3:43
Speaker 2: That's fair Catholic light. I don't know. I still pray
3:49
Speaker 2: here and there, and yeah, we'll go to church on
3:53
Speaker 2: like Christmas time. Sometimes we're CEOs Christmas in Easter only
3:58
Speaker 2: for a bit. But yeah, yeah, it's definitely, yeah, let's
4:02
Speaker 2: do let's do like Catholic light. I think that's it's
4:05
Speaker 2: just not as maybe embedded in my daily life as
4:08
Speaker 2: it used to be.
4:09
Speaker 1: Thank you for sharing, because I feel like it's important
4:11
Speaker 1: for people to be able to talk about this stuff
4:14
Speaker 1: in an open and friendly way, because it seems like,
4:17
Speaker 1: unfortunately religion is such a point of contention for so
4:21
Speaker 1: many people in a way to divide people, but it
4:23
Speaker 1: can be a really good way to bring people together.
4:25
Speaker 1: So that's one of the reasons why we wanted to
4:27
Speaker 1: have this topic today. And for me, I grew up
4:30
Speaker 1: in a very Christian household. My dad was an elder
4:34
Speaker 1: in the church. We grew up in northern California initially
4:38
Speaker 1: before moving to Wyoming when I was eleven, spent some
4:41
Speaker 1: time in the Baptist Church. I was always a very
4:44
Speaker 1: much a people pleaser growing up, so I was all
4:46
Speaker 1: about church because it was Plus I was always really
4:49
Speaker 1: good at memorizing things, so I was praised in church
4:53
Speaker 1: all the time because I could memorize versus like nobody's business,
4:56
Speaker 1: and like I was the kid in Nawanas who was
4:58
Speaker 1: like going fast and getting like earning his Did you
5:00
Speaker 1: ever do auanas or anything? It was like a church club.
5:03
Speaker 1: The you like got like badges and stuff for memorizing
5:07
Speaker 1: a bunch of verses and completing a bunch of work.
5:09
Speaker 1: And so loved that stuff. But then, yeah, we moved
5:14
Speaker 1: to Wyoming and didn't ever really find another church that
5:16
Speaker 1: we liked as much as our church back home in California,
5:20
Speaker 1: And I tried a couple of different ones, and I
5:22
Speaker 1: just felt like all the churches I tried were so cliquy.
5:25
Speaker 1: People didn't hardly even talk to me as like the
5:27
Speaker 1: new guy there. It just felt like I was the outsider,
5:30
Speaker 1: didn't feel welcome. Started to kind of question the religion thing.
5:34
Speaker 1: Around high school, even I had a teacher who got
5:39
Speaker 1: me kind of back into religion and said, like, you
5:41
Speaker 1: can believe in science and religion at the same time.
5:44
Speaker 2: But then in.
5:45
Speaker 1: College started to learn more about science and the history
5:48
Speaker 1: of religion itself, and towards the end of college, I
5:52
Speaker 1: kind of realized that I just don't believe that there
5:56
Speaker 1: is a god in this world. I don't see any
5:58
Speaker 1: existence or evidence of a god in this world. And
6:01
Speaker 1: so for probably about the last ten or so years,
6:05
Speaker 1: I have been an outspoken atheist. But I always like
6:09
Speaker 1: to say, like most atheists are kind of douchebags and
6:13
Speaker 1: always spends so much time trying to convince you why
6:17
Speaker 1: everyone else's religion is wrong and why they're right. But
6:20
Speaker 1: my personal belief is that I think religion can be
6:23
Speaker 1: a great thing, and I think it's a wonderful thing
6:25
Speaker 1: for a lot of people, and I think you should
6:27
Speaker 1: be able to believe whatever the hell you want to believe,
6:30
Speaker 1: so personally atheist, but also just want other people to
6:36
Speaker 1: do what makes them happy and what they enjoy too.
6:39
Speaker 1: So that's a little bit about my journey and how
6:41
Speaker 1: I ended up here.
6:42
Speaker 2: It's too bad a lot of other people don't have
6:44
Speaker 2: that same thought of like, it's okay for you to
6:47
Speaker 2: believe in whatever you believe in, and it doesn't have
6:49
Speaker 2: an impact on me.
6:51
Speaker 1: Such a novel concept, that's what.
6:52
Speaker 2: It seems like right now.
6:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's always this, Oh I got to prove I'm
6:56
Speaker 1: right everyone's wrong. And you know, even in the church
7:00
Speaker 1: growing up, there was an air of well, we're the
7:03
Speaker 1: right ones, we are the ones who have it all
7:06
Speaker 1: figured out, and everyone else is going to hell. And
7:09
Speaker 1: once I kind of learned about even just the world
7:12
Speaker 1: population and how there's about seven billion people and there's
7:16
Speaker 1: a little bit less than two billion Christians, I was like, so,
7:19
Speaker 1: according to your religion, God's just gonna damn eighty percent
7:22
Speaker 1: of the earth to hell. Like that didn't make any
7:25
Speaker 1: sense to me if God is truly a loving god
7:27
Speaker 1: like they claim. So yeah, a lot of different things
7:29
Speaker 1: along the way made me think like this just doesn't
7:31
Speaker 1: make sense to me.
7:32
Speaker 2: I think one of the things with religion that I've
7:35
Speaker 2: thought about, you know, for the episode and just for class,
7:38
Speaker 2: is how much it can be in a very important
7:41
Speaker 2: part of someone's life, like their identity and like thing
7:44
Speaker 2: just things that are important to them. I think when
7:46
Speaker 2: you look at something like religion and even like spirituality,
7:49
Speaker 2: it's it's one of those things that can help and
7:51
Speaker 2: still hope into people. It can help them work through
7:54
Speaker 2: or process difficult times and moments in their life, could
7:57
Speaker 2: really just kind of be a guiding force for them
8:00
Speaker 2: things are going well, when things are not going well.
8:02
Speaker 2: And I think that's one of the things that I've
8:04
Speaker 2: I've tried to talk with students when I do like
8:06
Speaker 2: teach my classes of like, yes, racial identity, socioeconomic status,
8:12
Speaker 2: all these things are really important, but I also want
8:15
Speaker 2: you to consider religion and spirituality in someone's life, like
8:17
Speaker 2: that's also equally important. Like I almost feel like sometimes
8:21
Speaker 2: that gets missed. I look back to my intake forms
8:24
Speaker 2: when I used to do new client assessments. It felt
8:27
Speaker 2: like everything else was a pretty big box, but religion
8:29
Speaker 2: and spirituality was like kind of a little one that
8:31
Speaker 2: you could, yeah, you could miss if you weren't paying
8:33
Speaker 2: attention to it. So even even the absence of religion
8:38
Speaker 2: and spirituality is important to know right when getting to
8:41
Speaker 2: work with a new client and working with new.
8:43
Speaker 1: People totally, if your goal is to get some get
8:47
Speaker 1: to know someone better, you should know about what their
8:49
Speaker 1: religious preferences are. And especially as mental health providers, you
8:54
Speaker 1: and I, it's so important to know that about people,
8:57
Speaker 1: just to have a basic understanding and know about the
9:00
Speaker 1: social support because in many cases religion is like the
9:03
Speaker 1: number one way people get connected, people get their social support.
9:07
Speaker 1: And one of the reasons why I really wanted to
9:09
Speaker 1: focus on this topic for today is that overall, I'm
9:13
Speaker 1: a pretty happy person. But I had the thought of,
9:15
Speaker 1: like if I was religious, Like if I believed in
9:18
Speaker 1: heaven and the afterlife, Like if I believe there was
9:21
Speaker 1: really a God pulling all the strings making sure that
9:23
Speaker 1: life is going to be okay, Like would I be happier,
9:27
Speaker 1: would I be more at peace? Maybe it's worth considering
9:31
Speaker 1: and thinking about, and so things that I wanted to
9:34
Speaker 1: bring up and discuss today.
9:36
Speaker 2: A lot of the numbers that we're going to use
9:38
Speaker 2: kind of for the beginning YEA, for the first part
9:41
Speaker 2: of the show is a research study by I was
9:44
Speaker 2: trying to make sure I pronounce this correctly. I think
9:45
Speaker 2: it's mob fuck, I sucked it up?
9:53
Speaker 1: Is that what it? And is probably silent and I'm
9:56
Speaker 1: probably we got to cut out.
9:58
Speaker 2: Just so bad, so bad. I'm so embarrassed. Ah if
10:06
Speaker 2: it's an a silent and then it's Gamma Gomaba, yes,
10:12
Speaker 2: Gamaba and Sony or Sonny. I don't know. God, I'm
10:17
Speaker 2: so bad. Please cut this out, bro, just you read it.
10:21
Speaker 2: Let's go here we go.
10:22
Speaker 1: Is it bad that I like intentionally leave in tough names.
10:27
Speaker 2: I know there's no disrespect to anybody that is more
10:33
Speaker 2: cultural than me.
10:34
Speaker 1: I just oh, Gamaba and Sony. In twenty seventeen, This
10:40
Speaker 1: is a paper funded by the National Institute of Health.
10:43
Speaker 1: They looked at subjective well being results with religion, which
10:48
Speaker 1: is interesting in and of itself has probably been not
10:50
Speaker 1: the strongest data in the world, but how people perceive
10:53
Speaker 1: that their own happinesses, which I think is still useful
10:56
Speaker 1: information to use. The scale of one point four or
10:59
Speaker 1: one to two for being the most happy, and at
11:02
Speaker 1: the top of the list coming in at a whopping
11:04
Speaker 1: score of three point twenty one were Protestants.
11:07
Speaker 2: It's been a religion that's been around since fifteen seventeen,
11:11
Speaker 2: when Martin Luther split from the Catholic Church over disagreements
11:14
Speaker 2: on indulgences. What is indulgences? What did they mean by that?
11:18
Speaker 1: An indulgence was a way for Catholics to buy their
11:22
Speaker 1: way out of hell. So they would do something bad,
11:26
Speaker 1: they would need to atone for their sins, and they
11:28
Speaker 1: could just pay for it. So they'd be like, Oh,
11:30
Speaker 1: I've got the money. I can do whatever I want
11:32
Speaker 1: because I'm going to pay my way out of hell
11:34
Speaker 1: if the church is happy with me. And Martin Luther
11:36
Speaker 1: was like, I really don't like that we're doing this
11:38
Speaker 1: as a religion as Catholicism, So he made his own
11:41
Speaker 1: separation from the Catholic Church.
11:43
Speaker 2: Well, this was called the Protestant Reformation. I remember that name.
11:47
Speaker 2: I don't remember what happened, but I remember that name.
11:50
Speaker 2: Luther wanted to focus on a personal relationship with Jesus
11:54
Speaker 2: as the main way to get to heaven. It is
11:56
Speaker 2: currently estimated that about zero point six to one point
12:00
Speaker 2: one billion people are Protestant I believe in the world,
12:04
Speaker 2: and that it accounts for twenty four to forty percent
12:06
Speaker 2: of Christians as a whole. Protestants like that term also
12:10
Speaker 2: include subgroups like lds SO Church of the Latter day
12:13
Speaker 2: Saints or Mormons, and Jehovah's Witnesses. And one interesting stat
12:18
Speaker 2: is that Africa is the continent that holds the most Protestants,
12:21
Speaker 2: so forty one percent of the world's Protestants are in Africa.
12:25
Speaker 2: And then for the United States, about forty percent of
12:27
Speaker 2: Americans identify as Protestants, which is actually down from over
12:30
Speaker 2: fifty percent in two thousand and nine according to the
12:33
Speaker 2: Pew Research Center. One interesting thing about that, and one
12:36
Speaker 2: of the things I'm trying to add into my lecture
12:38
Speaker 2: for this week with religion, is how much of it
12:40
Speaker 2: there is a decline, Like there really has been a
12:42
Speaker 2: very sharp decline and people identifying as religious, as identifying
12:48
Speaker 2: with a certain religion, and identifying as like religion being
12:52
Speaker 2: important to them. I can't remember the exact numbers because
12:55
Speaker 2: it's still a newer article that I was reading for
12:57
Speaker 2: my class, but it's a pretty big decrease. And then
13:00
Speaker 2: the other piece is one of the interesting stats from
13:04
Speaker 2: the article was that while let's say like there was
13:08
Speaker 2: a drop and don't quote me on this, but let's
13:09
Speaker 2: just say there was like a drop in fifteen to
13:12
Speaker 2: twenty percent of people, they're that much less are religious.
13:16
Speaker 2: Instead of going to a different religion, people are basically
13:19
Speaker 2: leaving the church to then be atheist or agnostic. So
13:23
Speaker 2: they're just leaving a religion for no religion.
13:26
Speaker 1: And I'm fascinated as to why people are turning away
13:29
Speaker 1: from Christianity from Protestantism so much, and boy, that could
13:34
Speaker 1: be the topic of a three hour long podcast. But
13:37
Speaker 1: I think just the Internet in andet of itself has
13:40
Speaker 1: given people an outlet because in the past, if you
13:43
Speaker 1: grew up an environment where everyone was Christian and that
13:47
Speaker 1: was all you were exposed to, all you knew, that
13:50
Speaker 1: was what you kind of had to believe in. But
13:53
Speaker 1: now that there's the Internet and unlimited knowledge at your
13:55
Speaker 1: fingertips about any and all religion, I think the Internet
14:00
Speaker 1: in and of itself is a big factor as to
14:01
Speaker 1: why people are less religious.
14:04
Speaker 2: I think to one of the piece is not just
14:06
Speaker 2: like the information part, but just seeing people's real life experiences.
14:11
Speaker 2: So like, if you grow up in a certain community,
14:14
Speaker 2: maybe it with like a pretty small community, you just
14:15
Speaker 2: don't know. You only know what you know, right so
14:18
Speaker 2: if you grow up being taught certain things and then
14:21
Speaker 2: maybe you leave for college or whatever it is. But
14:23
Speaker 2: so I guess what I'm trying to say is, like
14:25
Speaker 2: I feel like I hear a lot of like, oh,
14:27
Speaker 2: I left for college and I met new people, and
14:29
Speaker 2: that really changed my perceptions. But now maybe that's that
14:31
Speaker 2: part is happening. It's still happening. But the other part
14:34
Speaker 2: that's increased is that, oh, I started watching these videos
14:37
Speaker 2: on how certain people were being treated based off of
14:40
Speaker 2: like who they were by certain religious and I guess
14:42
Speaker 2: this is like a pretty specific example with what's going
14:45
Speaker 2: on currently in the world, I guess the United States,
14:48
Speaker 2: but like people just having more information and seeing more
14:51
Speaker 2: people's experiences where how they were treated by certain people
14:55
Speaker 2: or by certain religious groups. I think that's unfortunately kind
14:58
Speaker 2: of where we're at with you kind of mentioned it.
15:01
Speaker 2: But like people feeling like my religion is the best
15:03
Speaker 2: or my ideas are the best. It's the only one,
15:06
Speaker 2: and if you don't follow these rules, even if I
15:07
Speaker 2: don't know you, you're a shitty person. I'm going to
15:10
Speaker 2: start the second religion one because I see a name
15:12
Speaker 2: in there that I know I can pronounce and I'm
15:14
Speaker 2: going to redeem myself. Going back to the study, the
15:18
Speaker 2: second happiest religion with the score of three point one
15:20
Speaker 2: seven is Buddhism. And I think Buddhism has been something
15:23
Speaker 2: that has popped up more like in my professional life
15:27
Speaker 2: and just personal life. Like when we went to Japan,
15:29
Speaker 2: like we went to cool like Buddhist temples. We saw
15:32
Speaker 2: the I believe the city was called Kamakuda, and there's
15:35
Speaker 2: a big Buddha. We got to go inside of it
15:37
Speaker 2: like that. That was pretty cool, right, And I think
15:39
Speaker 2: one of the things that blew my mind in Japan
15:42
Speaker 2: and just like other countries, is like how much older
15:45
Speaker 2: things are there, Like there's they have like what feels
15:48
Speaker 2: like actual history, whereas the United States, like it's like
15:50
Speaker 2: two hundred years old like whatever, Like there's people who
15:55
Speaker 2: are half that age and they're still alive. So anyway,
15:58
Speaker 2: real history in other places. But Buddhism has been around
16:02
Speaker 2: since the fifth century BCE or the before Common Era,
16:05
Speaker 2: so about twenty five hundred years ago. I will also
16:07
Speaker 2: add with Buddhism, the professional part of my life, uh
16:10
Speaker 2: DVT has a lot of Buddhist principles in it. Uh
16:14
Speaker 2: doctor did Am I now, I don't think I'm making
16:18
Speaker 2: that up. I'm pretty sure. Look it up, look it up.
16:19
Speaker 1: It makes sense.
16:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think Doctor Marshall Lenehan has been
16:24
Speaker 2: pretty open about like having Eastern influences in DBT and
16:30
Speaker 2: having something that come from Buddhism. Are you looking up
16:32
Speaker 2: right now? I see?
16:32
Speaker 1: And according to Google's AI, DVT is a psychotherapy that
16:39
Speaker 1: incorporates principles of Zen Buddhism.
16:42
Speaker 2: Let's go, I know some shit anyway, So Buddhism was
16:47
Speaker 2: started by the prophet Siddhartha Gautama, so he would later
16:51
Speaker 2: be called Buddha or like the like as most people know,
16:55
Speaker 2: he'd be referenced to Buddha. Very basically put, he believed
16:59
Speaker 2: that life is suffering and that suffering comes from craving,
17:03
Speaker 2: and that suffering ends when we conquer our cravings. So
17:06
Speaker 2: if we end craving, we end suffering. They also had
17:09
Speaker 2: five precepts that they live by, so it's like no killing,
17:13
Speaker 2: no stealing, no sexual misconduct, no engaging a false speech,
17:17
Speaker 2: and no indulging in intoxicans.
17:20
Speaker 1: Third on the list is Roman Catholicism. They believe in
17:25
Speaker 1: the Bible that is their main religious document. They believe
17:28
Speaker 1: that they will be united with God in the afterlife
17:31
Speaker 1: in heaven, very similar to Protestantism because they split off
17:34
Speaker 1: from each other. Remember around fifteen hundred. You always hear
17:37
Speaker 1: about Catholicism from comedians, like comedians who grew up Catholic,
17:41
Speaker 1: and they always talk about the shame and guilt, And
17:44
Speaker 1: so for me, I was thinking, like, well, there's no
17:46
Speaker 1: way that these people are so happy if they're just
17:48
Speaker 1: carrying around a bunch of shame and guilt all the time.
17:51
Speaker 1: But they were number three on the list in terms
17:53
Speaker 1: of subjective happiness. Some famous Catholics include the Pope. I
17:59
Speaker 1: would say he's a pretty famous Cathleen. Every one of them,
18:02
Speaker 1: every single one. Is it a coincidence?
18:05
Speaker 2: I think, Oh, I don't think so.
18:08
Speaker 1: JFK, Stephen Colbert, Nicole Kidman. And then you had a
18:12
Speaker 1: good example for me too.
18:13
Speaker 2: Right, former President Joe Biden. O sleepy Joe, Oh, thanks
18:21
Speaker 2: for doing your best, Joe. Number four on the list
18:24
Speaker 2: is Judaism. So some of their beliefs include believing that
18:27
Speaker 2: there's one true God who is eternal. They believe that
18:30
Speaker 2: they have this special covenant with God. They believe the
18:33
Speaker 2: Messiah has not yet appeared on Earth, and they tend
18:36
Speaker 2: to have a strong community. So people who are Jewish
18:40
Speaker 2: make up about zero point two percent of the world population,
18:44
Speaker 2: so it's about fourteen million of them in total. They
18:46
Speaker 2: make up about two point four percent of the US population.
18:50
Speaker 2: And one of the central concepts of Judaism is joy
18:53
Speaker 2: and they have a word for it, which is simchaw.
18:56
Speaker 1: There's only fourteen million Jewish people in the world, and
18:59
Speaker 1: the cost killed six million Jews total, so that was
19:03
Speaker 1: a huge chunk of their population in total. You know,
19:06
Speaker 1: I have a friend who is Indian and our shared
19:10
Speaker 1: friend Kush, and he watched so much Seinfeld growing up
19:15
Speaker 1: that he's pretty much more Jewish than he is Hindu
19:18
Speaker 1: at this point.
19:18
Speaker 2: It's like.
19:21
Speaker 1: He knows like so many like Jewish words, and so
19:23
Speaker 1: I think it's funny, like how many Yiddish words, which
19:27
Speaker 1: is their name for their language that they use, like
19:31
Speaker 1: so simcha. I've heard, you know, people talk about kismet
19:35
Speaker 1: and schmilkis and all these funny words that make their
19:39
Speaker 1: way into United States culture.
19:42
Speaker 2: And there's different like like sectors of Judaism, riter is
19:47
Speaker 2: there different Like yeah.
19:49
Speaker 1: They're little, You're absolutely right. Looks like there's Orthodox Reform,
19:54
Speaker 1: Conservative Reconstructionist, Hasidic, Messianic, Karates, rabbinical farieses, seduce Sees, Issennis,
20:03
Speaker 1: and Zelots.
20:04
Speaker 2: That's way more than a thought I thought there'd be
20:06
Speaker 2: like three. Okay, Okay, that was more than I thought too.
20:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm glad we learned something today.
20:13
Speaker 2: I mean, it is interesting how much like there's differences
20:17
Speaker 2: like in even within religion. Like I almost think of,
20:20
Speaker 2: like there's got to be some written out there about
20:23
Speaker 2: like the differences with like Roman Catholic versus like Mexican Catholic. Right,
20:28
Speaker 2: there's definitely differences with like I don't want to like
20:31
Speaker 2: misspeak and like not do a good job of my
20:33
Speaker 2: own like Mexican Catholic religion. But like there's definitely differences
20:36
Speaker 2: in terms of like cultural celebrations and things like that.
20:39
Speaker 2: So it is interesting to see how much like there's
20:42
Speaker 2: like the base religion and then how much those things
20:44
Speaker 2: there's different interpretations and things like that based off of
20:47
Speaker 2: like the cultures that practice those those religions.
20:50
Speaker 1: Protestantism, with Christianity as a broad blanket term, there is
20:54
Speaker 1: just so many different types and one Christian will probably
20:59
Speaker 1: have completely different beliefs from the next Christian. It is
21:02
Speaker 1: so entwined with your culture. And yeah, you're absolutely right.
21:06
Speaker 1: There are a lot of differences. And I was thinking,
21:08
Speaker 1: maybe the big differences between Mexican Catholic is just those candles,
21:12
Speaker 1: those little Jesus candles, Right.
21:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, we definitely have those miles of but there's also
21:18
Speaker 2: like the there's just like also different stories too, and
21:21
Speaker 2: like I think of like like like my I had
21:24
Speaker 2: two cousins. I had King Signet's last year, and there
21:26
Speaker 2: was like a church service for that, and like other
21:29
Speaker 2: Catholics don't do that, right because Kensnetta is like a
21:31
Speaker 2: Mexican thing. So yeah, it's it's just it's definitely interesting
21:34
Speaker 2: how pieces of the religion change based off of the
21:38
Speaker 2: culture that practices them.
21:40
Speaker 1: Number five Hindus. This is a five thousand year old
21:45
Speaker 1: religion that started in the Indus Valley. Hinduism is often
21:50
Speaker 1: called a way of life or family of religion because
21:53
Speaker 1: it embraces multiple different religious ideas. It doesn't have like
21:57
Speaker 1: a strict outline of what it is should be like
22:00
Speaker 1: a lot of other religions do. They view everything in
22:03
Speaker 1: the universe as God. Hindus believe that each person is
22:07
Speaker 1: intrinsically divine, and the purpose of life is to seek
22:11
Speaker 1: and realize the divinity within all of us. And I
22:15
Speaker 1: think that's really beautiful.
22:16
Speaker 2: Hindu belief is totally non exclusive and accepts all other
22:20
Speaker 2: faiths and religious paths. Maybe some people should try that.
22:26
Speaker 2: Hindus make up about fifteen percent of the world population,
22:29
Speaker 2: however only about one percent of the US population. Is
22:33
Speaker 2: it practice is Hindu?
22:34
Speaker 1: Verse six the religion of Islam or Muslims. They believe
22:40
Speaker 1: that there is no God other than Allah. There is
22:43
Speaker 1: one true God. The prophet Muhammad was the messenger of God.
22:48
Speaker 1: These people tend to pray five times per day as
22:51
Speaker 1: a big part of their religion. They also fast during
22:53
Speaker 1: the month of Ramadan to renew their awareness and gratitude
22:58
Speaker 1: for everything God has provided, and their sacred text is
23:01
Speaker 1: the Qoran.
23:02
Speaker 2: Seventh on the list is non religious people, and then
23:06
Speaker 2: the unhappiest religious groups are or the docs or the
23:11
Speaker 2: docs meaning like the more I guess hardcore religious people,
23:17
Speaker 2: so eighth on the list when ranking religions from happiest
23:21
Speaker 2: to unhappiest.
23:23
Speaker 1: Honestly, when I talk to young people, they seem to
23:26
Speaker 1: have very poor religious literacy, like I'll even ask people
23:31
Speaker 1: like are you religious? And a lot of kids will
23:34
Speaker 1: straight up look at me, My teenagers that I that
23:37
Speaker 1: I work with, They'll look at me and say, what
23:38
Speaker 1: does that mean? Like what is that? What is religious?
23:41
Speaker 1: Like they don't even know the basics of terminology for
23:45
Speaker 1: religion and spirituality because I used to say, like, are
23:48
Speaker 1: you spiritual? And people also didn't know what that was,
23:51
Speaker 1: So I switched to religion and people still don't know
23:53
Speaker 1: what that was. So one question I like to talk
23:57
Speaker 1: about or ask and then also teach about, is can
24:01
Speaker 1: someone be spiritual without being religious?
24:05
Speaker 2: I mean, what would classify as being spiritual? Like in
24:09
Speaker 2: things like this is gonna make me sound kind of ignorant,
24:12
Speaker 2: but I'm just doing my best. Like things like karma
24:16
Speaker 2: and manifestation and like maybe like inner belief and mindfulness
24:22
Speaker 2: and inner peace, those feel like spiritual concepts, and I
24:25
Speaker 2: feel like not all of those need to be tied
24:28
Speaker 2: to a religion. I think, even like things like with meditation,
24:33
Speaker 2: like that they don't always need to be religious practices,
24:36
Speaker 2: but people will incorporate those in their kind of daily life,
24:39
Speaker 2: So I think so, And I think that's I think
24:41
Speaker 2: that's why you ask the question of are you religious
24:45
Speaker 2: or do you have any like spiritual practices, because they
24:47
Speaker 2: can be different, they can be similar, and there can
24:49
Speaker 2: be some overlap, but I think they're Yeah, you could
24:51
Speaker 2: probably do be spiritual without the other. What do you think?
24:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would agree, And I think you gave some
24:57
Speaker 1: really good examples too, And I would say I'm probably
25:00
Speaker 1: an example of spiritual but not religious. Like I like
25:05
Speaker 1: some of the spiritual concepts of religion. I like being
25:08
Speaker 1: connected with other humans. I like helping other people. I
25:13
Speaker 1: want to live in a world where we help each
25:15
Speaker 1: other instead of tear people down. But I don't ascribe
25:18
Speaker 1: to any particular religion in this world. But I think
25:21
Speaker 1: it's important to have that spiritual connection to the earth,
25:25
Speaker 1: to other human beings, because it can make life better
25:29
Speaker 1: if you feel connected to this world around us.
25:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, well you talked about earlier, how not you're not
25:35
Speaker 2: necessarily or you're not a religious person anymore. But if
25:38
Speaker 2: we look at our list, that means you're the seventh
25:41
Speaker 2: unhappiest person I know. So, just like off the top
25:46
Speaker 2: of your head, why do you think religious people at
25:48
Speaker 2: least according to that study, which we've already said, Like
25:51
Speaker 2: isn't the greatest in terms of like collection of data.
25:54
Speaker 2: But why do you think religious people are happier? Can
25:58
Speaker 2: be happier?
25:59
Speaker 1: Probably the biggestart of the community. You talk to people
26:02
Speaker 1: who are religious, who are still actively religious, involved in
26:05
Speaker 1: their church, they just have a built in network. They
26:08
Speaker 1: know so many people. There's so much support, there's financial support,
26:11
Speaker 1: there's spiritual support, there's so many different things that they
26:14
Speaker 1: can fall back on. And our world is becoming more
26:18
Speaker 1: and more and more individualistic, especially with phones and social media.
26:25
Speaker 1: People aren't going out and meeting face to face as
26:27
Speaker 1: much as they were in the past. They're sitting in
26:30
Speaker 1: their house, and loneliness is at an all time high.
26:33
Speaker 1: We're starting to really hit epidemic pandemic levels of loneliness
26:38
Speaker 1: in this world. And spirituality and religion gives you a
26:41
Speaker 1: way to connect with other people, which is good for us.
26:44
Speaker 1: It's healthy for us. Plus, you know, we talked about
26:47
Speaker 1: it a little bit earlier, just having that idea that
26:51
Speaker 1: there is someone out there pulling the strings making sure
26:54
Speaker 1: you're going to be okay. So a divine being, a
26:58
Speaker 1: god watching over everything is a comforting idea. I remember
27:03
Speaker 1: the first time I thought because growing up christian I
27:06
Speaker 1: always thought like, when I die, I'm going to heaven.
27:08
Speaker 1: But then when I started to question this stuff, I
27:10
Speaker 1: was like, WHOA, if I die, what if there is nothing?
27:14
Speaker 1: What if my brain stops firing and there is nothing
27:18
Speaker 1: but eternal darkness and just nothing forever once I'm dead?
27:24
Speaker 1: And that scared the shit out of me. At first,
27:27
Speaker 1: I was like, whoa, this is an awful feeling of
27:29
Speaker 1: feeling like there's there's going to be an endpoint and
27:32
Speaker 1: absolutely nothing after that. So it is comforting to have
27:36
Speaker 1: the religion to have some of these ideas. And Christianity
27:39
Speaker 1: really got popular during the Dark Ages, you know, around
27:44
Speaker 1: you know, five hundred AD, because the earth sucked. Then
27:49
Speaker 1: it was after the fall of the Roman Empire. The
27:51
Speaker 1: Romans kind of kept everything together, but once they fell,
27:55
Speaker 1: it was lawlessness and disorder. They were burning libraries, We
27:59
Speaker 1: went backwards in terms of technology. There were marauders and
28:02
Speaker 1: raiders running around everywhere. It was a tough time to live,
28:06
Speaker 1: and that's when Christianity took off. Life was so bad
28:10
Speaker 1: here on Earth. They said there's got to be something
28:12
Speaker 1: better after this, and so that's when people are like, hey,
28:15
Speaker 1: there's this religion that's been kind of on the low
28:18
Speaker 1: levels of things for a while for the past hundred years.
28:21
Speaker 1: This might make people feel better in the moment.
28:23
Speaker 2: Something like religion can give people answers. Yeah, I think
28:27
Speaker 2: we get really anxious when we don't have answers, and
28:29
Speaker 2: for some people being able to get the answer through
28:32
Speaker 2: something like religion is really helpful and really call me
28:35
Speaker 2: and can internally to like feeling happier. I also agree
28:39
Speaker 2: with you with like the sense of community and the
28:41
Speaker 2: sense of like having those people you know, I know
28:44
Speaker 2: people who every week we go to our church group,
28:48
Speaker 2: we hang out with our church friends, like that kind
28:50
Speaker 2: of thing. At the school that I work at, there's
28:52
Speaker 2: a pretty big Mormon population, and like meeting with those students,
28:56
Speaker 2: are checking in with them, and them telling me about
28:58
Speaker 2: their daily routine of going to seminary or going to
29:02
Speaker 2: church on the weekend, and like that being embedded in
29:04
Speaker 2: their life. Feeling happiness from that, feeling like support through
29:08
Speaker 2: the community that they have is I think something that's
29:10
Speaker 2: really helpful. Now, obviously I mentioned earlier, you know religion
29:14
Speaker 2: is on the decline. Something to think about is just
29:16
Speaker 2: how much like you start to have your own thoughts
29:19
Speaker 2: and ideas as you get older, and sometimes that religion
29:22
Speaker 2: or that community that you relied on maybe isn't really
29:27
Speaker 2: there for you anymore because you're starting to have those
29:29
Speaker 2: those differences of thoughts and opinion. So I don't know
29:33
Speaker 2: something to think about, and I.
29:34
Speaker 1: Appreciate your insights and what's going through your head too.
29:39
Speaker 1: It was one of the things I wanted to bring
29:40
Speaker 1: up to. One thing that I find fascinating is just
29:43
Speaker 1: the interplay in mental health and religion in a couple
29:46
Speaker 1: of different ways.
29:47
Speaker 2: Like I've come.
29:48
Speaker 1: Across some people in my life who they'll come to
29:51
Speaker 1: me and they'll ask for mental health advice, and then
29:53
Speaker 1: after talking with me and I'll say, you know, go
29:55
Speaker 1: to a therapist, you know, talk to your doctor about
29:57
Speaker 1: maybe starting medicine if it's really bad, and then you know,
30:00
Speaker 1: I'll give advice. And then I've even had people say,
30:03
Speaker 1: now I think they just need to they need God,
30:05
Speaker 1: they need God to fix it for them. And I'm like, like,
30:09
Speaker 1: that's that's okay to rely on your religion and fall
30:12
Speaker 1: back on it, But I also think it's important to
30:14
Speaker 1: try some other things too, try some evidence based things
30:17
Speaker 1: that can be helpful with those types of things. It
30:20
Speaker 1: can be a both. It doesn't have to be in
30:22
Speaker 1: either or. Plus, I remember learning in residency that a
30:27
Speaker 1: lot of times religious delusions are more common in bipolar disorder.
30:33
Speaker 1: I was fascinated by this, and I met a couple
30:35
Speaker 1: people on the impatient units who were really manic, so
30:39
Speaker 1: bipolar disorder, supermanic. They're not sleeping, They've got a ton
30:42
Speaker 1: of energy. And I was doing some reading on it,
30:46
Speaker 1: and I think it's because that people who are manic,
30:50
Speaker 1: you know, they feel great. They've got that euphoria, they've
30:53
Speaker 1: got that grandiosity. They think they're amazing. And a lot
30:57
Speaker 1: of people will use their religious beliefs to justify the
31:00
Speaker 1: way they feel. So they'll say, I am amazing, I
31:04
Speaker 1: am so wonderful. I can read a book without even
31:08
Speaker 1: opening the pages. I can just touch it and absorb
31:10
Speaker 1: all the words I've had. Actually, people tell me that
31:12
Speaker 1: before too, and I think they'll say, like, well, if
31:15
Speaker 1: I'm this amazing, I must be Jesus, Like I must
31:18
Speaker 1: be some religious figure. I am the Second Coming. So
31:22
Speaker 1: I think oftentimes in schizophrenia, in bipolar disorder, sometimes people's
31:28
Speaker 1: religion shapes the disease itself, and that is something I
31:32
Speaker 1: find incredibly fascinating.
31:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, I forget. I feel like I had a patient
31:37
Speaker 2: one time telling me like, man, I just I woke
31:41
Speaker 2: up this morning feeling so ready. I felt like I
31:44
Speaker 2: could wrestle God. And I was like, oh, okay, let's
31:48
Speaker 2: let me call this like real quick.
31:51
Speaker 1: God is a black belt in jiu jitsu.
31:54
Speaker 2: So I don't know if I would be interesting thing.
32:00
Speaker 2: Even if the numbers are declining in the US, it's
32:03
Speaker 2: still something that's around and I feel if anything, some
32:06
Speaker 2: people maybe even taken the opportunity to get more strengthened,
32:10
Speaker 2: to strengthen their relationship with their religion, to really get
32:13
Speaker 2: embedded in their religion and the beliefs. And even if
32:16
Speaker 2: there is a decline, I sometimes I feel like in
32:19
Speaker 2: some cases there's examples of people becoming more with their
32:24
Speaker 2: religion even while it's declining around them. So interesting stuff
32:28
Speaker 2: to think about.
32:29
Speaker 1: A lot of people in the United States don't ever
32:32
Speaker 1: take any time to learn about other religions. Yeah, and
32:36
Speaker 1: I think it's important to know on a human standpoint,
32:39
Speaker 1: on a spiritual standpoint, on a political standpoint, it's important
32:43
Speaker 1: to understand what drives people, what motivates people, where people
32:46
Speaker 1: are coming from, and the culture associated with their religion too.
32:50
Speaker 1: So one of the reasons why we wanted to talk
32:52
Speaker 1: about this is to try and you know, make the
32:54
Speaker 1: world a better place, like we're always trying to do,
32:57
Speaker 1: to teach you a little bit about these religions and
32:59
Speaker 1: show that I love that you weren't afraid to be
33:02
Speaker 1: a little bit vulnerable and say like, I don't know
33:03
Speaker 1: about this, like let's look it up, because that's the
33:06
Speaker 1: mindset that we should be having, Like we don't have
33:08
Speaker 1: to have all the answers. As long as we're opening
33:11
Speaker 1: ourselves up to learning about other people, then we're in
33:14
Speaker 1: the right spot.
33:15
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever we get your podcasts, you can
33:18
Speaker 2: find this. You can leave us five star review, You
33:19
Speaker 2: can like, comment, subscribe all that good stuff on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok,
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Speaker 2: YouTube at Millennium MHC, at our website at millennimac dot com.
33:30
Speaker 2: Thank you all for listening. I just saw Marshaun Lynch
33:33
Speaker 2: was at my boy Pete Carroll's press conference yesterday or
33:36
Speaker 2: two days ago. So really a renewed love for the
33:39
Speaker 2: phrase take care of y'all. Mentals