“Emotionally, Soulfully, Spiritually ‘Free to Think and Act’: The Helen Flanders Dunbar (1902–59) Memorial Lecture on Psychosomatic Medicine and Pastoral Care”

Abstract

This essay aims to stimulate rethinking about religious and medical “healing and wholeness.” While psychiatrist (Helen) Flanders Dunbar (1902–1959) is well known as a psychosomatic investigator and as “Medical Director” of the Council for Clinical Training, the initial home of Anton Boisen's groundbreaking movement for the clinical pastoral education of institutional chaplains and parish ministers, she is less appreciated as a theologically-trained scholar. This essay explores an earlier era's understanding of the “spiritual” and the more “soulful” components of healing and how Dunbar combined these to focus on helping all peoples become “free to think and act.” This essay was originally delivered as The Helen Flanders Dunbar Memorial Lecture on Psychosomatic Medicine and Pastoral Care at Columbia Presbyterian Center of the New York-Presbyterian Hospital, New York on November 2, 1999.