Date
6-26-2025
Department
School of Behavioral Sciences
Degree
Doctor of Education in Community Care and Counseling (EdD)
Chair
Sharita Knoblock
Keywords
Mental health, mental health stigma, pastors, culture, spirituality
Disciplines
Counseling | Social and Behavioral Sciences
Recommended Citation
Liburd, Jannett, "Exploring the Stigma of Mental Health in Oneness Pentecostal Churches from a Pastoral Perspective" (2025). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 7158.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/7158
Abstract
The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the stigma of mental health in Oneness Pentecostal churches in the Northeast from a pastoral perspective. The theory guiding this study is Sigmund Freud’s object relational theory (ORT), as it focuses on the past experiences an individual has with an object, person, or event, and how the experience, whether negative or positive, shapes the person’s attitude and behavior in the future. Mental health stigma is a phenomenon with which individuals may have had a harmful experience. In the study, the central research question was: What are the lived experiences of Oneness Pentecostal pastors in the Northeast area of the United States, navigating mental health and mental health stigma in their churches? Three sub-questions and semi-structured open-ended research questions were used to gather data via audio-visual recorded interviews from 15 participants. Data analysis was constructed under the guidelines of Cresswell and Poth (2018) for qualitative research methods. The findings of the study highlighted five themes: understanding mental health and spirituality, mental health stigma awareness, culture and diversity, challenges and barriers, and support networks. These themes also encompassed 15 subthemes. Pastors acknowledged that mental health is prevalent in their churches and that one of the ways mental health stigma was addressed was by providing a Christ-centered church culture. Practical implications suggests that pastors establish contact and maintain collaboration with community mental health providers to increase access for congregants who need the service. Future study can focus on the congregants’ perspective on mental health stigma, as this study focused primarily on pastors’ perceptions.
