March 15, 2021 — Spirituality, in general, is part of holistic care and part of what would complement all medical perspectives. As we care for ourselves holistically, our care for patients should also be holistic, meaning not only medical, surgical, pharmaceutical, or psychological, but also spiritual.
This was the gist of the talk delivered by Fr. Gregory Ramon D. Gaston, SThD, Rector of Pontificio Collegio Filippino in Rome during the UPMed Lenten Webinar entitled “Healing through Prayer: Spiritual and Medical Perspective” held on February 26, 2021.
Fr. Gaston, a second year UP College of Medicine student (Class of 1990) when he was called to the priesthood was subsequently ordained in 2013, presented medical literature and articles on the positive effects of prayer, spirituality, faith, and religion on disease and wellness. Prayer and spiritual life affects mental strength, relieves stress, overcomes addictions and denials, and builds determination toward health promoting and life affirming attitudes and actions. He emphasized that prayer is not a substitute for medicine but will complement human efforts towards healing. Prayer builds relationships between the healthcare practitioners and other hospital staff and the patients.
He cited passages from the Bible where Jesus went to a secluded place by Himself to pray even if, like us, He had so many things to do like curing the sick, teaching the people, feeding the hungry, and so on. There were times He brought the apostles close to Him up a high mountain to pray. Fr. Gaston mentioned the Transfiguration, when Jesus went to a high mountain taking the apostles Peter, James, and John and there He was transfigured before them, with His face and clothes turning white as snow.
“We are now in our Lenten season when we pray and lift our mind to God and reflect on His will; do fasting to offer some of our pleasures, not only food, but also the use of cellphones, shopping; and do almsgiving and other charity works. This way, we join Jesus in His sacrifice and passion, in His death and resurrection. Through these actions, we experience growth in our spiritual life,” said Fr. Gaston, a Philosophy and Theology graduate of the University of Nevada in Spain who obtained his licensure and doctorate in Sacred Theology at the St Thomas University in Rome.
Dr. Cynthia G. Morales, lecturer at the Cebu Doctors University College of Medicine, stated that the points presented by Fr. Gaston lead to deeper insights about healing and about man. She highlighted that well-being and happiness come from the fulfillment of our nature as human beings while disease results from a deviation or disintegration of our nature. Man is a unity of body and soul and is evidenced across the different fields of science.
She enumerated examples of these evidences, such as metabolic syndrome that demonstrates bodily unity; common inflammatory pathways that explain the interrelatedness of disorders of various body systems; epigenetics that shows that the environment and behavior can modify gene function and gene expression in many diseases; psychosomatic illnesses that bring body-mind relations; and neuroplasticity that shows how the nervous system can adapt to external and internal stimuli and actually change in terms of neurochemistry, neurotransmission, neurogenesis, and even morphology of the brain.
“It would be good for us to regard prayer not just as another strategy for well-being but rather as a deeply embedded function of our nature,” Dr. Morales explained as she stressed the need to integrate prayer into our personal and professional lives.
The UPCM Class of 1990 dedicated the webinar to the memory of their classmate, Dr. Max Tandock who was a dedicated physician and teacher. This is the fourth year of the Lenten and Advent Webinar series which have been live streamed in the Philippines and the rest of the world with 400 to 500 attendees per webinar.
Charmaine Lingdas
Published in UP Manila Healthscape Special COVID-19 Issue No. 25
