Relig, Medicine Disability

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This course focuses on how theological and religious understandings of and sensitivity to disability and disease can enhance, enrich, and deepen the doctor-patient relationship, and the care that is provided to those with disabilities, illnesses, and diseases of different kinds. Students will explore how different religious traditions seek to understand and explain different kinds of disabilities, differences, and challenges, and how different theological explanations for suffering inform the way that members of different faith traditions (as well as cultures and societies) respond to disability, disease, and death. The course will examine how the process of death and dying is understood in different faith traditions, and how those in the medical field as well as chaplains and community members can support those of diverse religious and cultural backgrounds in navigating it. Religious traditions to be explored include Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Daoism, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism.