Here at Tria Corda Ministry, we often talk about resilience, an important ability that helps us find healing after trauma, handle stress well, and thrive, even in the face of adversity.
There are five different building blocks of this important ability:
- Mental health: Conforming your mind to the truth
- Physical health: Having good friendships and taking care of your body
- Spiritual health: Consistent prayer and reception of the sacraments
- Virtue: Striving to live virtuously and to uproot vices
- Vocation: Striving to live out your state-in-life vocation, career, and other endeavors the Lord may call you to
When we consistently engage in activities that build these five areas, we grow in resilience.
An important thing to know about these five building blocks is that they do not exist independently. Each building block affects the others, so a weakness in one can bring down the others and undermine our resilience.
In previous articles, we’ve discussed how mental and physical health affect the other building blocks of resilience. Today, we’ll do that for spiritual health.
This page may contain affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, at no extra cost to you. Thank you for your support of Tria Corda Ministry!
How Spiritual Health Impacts Mental Health
When we pray, we become better able to hear God, the voice of truth. This helps our mental health in three ways.
First, hearing the voice of God can help us better distinguish when the voices in our heads are from God, the world, or the devil. If we hear a lie about ourselves, God, or others, we can then better identify it as not coming from God and recommit ourselves to the truth.
Additionally, being in a relationship with God reveals the truth about God, ourselves, and others. When we spend time with God, we can get to know Him as good and loving. He speaks words to us to remind us that we are loved, and He reminds us of His love for others.
Third, this ability to hear God’s voice helps us hear His words of love that can be a corrective experience for the wounds that have led us to believe lies.
How Spiritual Health Impacts Physical Health
Caring for the Body
We are called to care for our bodies because they are great gifts from God and dwelling places of Him. Regular prayer is a great reminder of that.
When we regularly converse and commune with God, we can better remember that we’re made in the image and likeness of our loving Creator. We can better see that He gives us good gifts, which can inspire us to be great stewards of our bodies, one of these many great gifts.
Relationships With Others
In 13 Powerful Ways to Pray, Fr. Eamon Tobin writes that how we relate to others tends to come up in our relating to God, and vice versa.
Thus, when we regularly pray and converse with God, we will improve our style of relating to others, making it more loving, thereby improving our capacity for virtuous friendship.
How Spiritual Health Impacts Virtue
When we regularly pray and receive the sacraments, we receive the grace to grow in virtue, which we can’t do without God’s grace
Additionally, when we regularly come before God in prayer and the sacraments, we become more mindful of the sins that distance us from Him, which is the first step in growing in virtue
How Spiritual Health Impacts Vocation
As we said above, prayer helps us to better hear the voice of God. When we hear God’s voice, we can discern what He is calling us to do. Through prayer, we also receive the grace to do it.
Conclusion
Spiritual health is crucial to our mental and physical health, virtue, vocation, and, ultimately, our resilience.
I highly encourage you to take some time to evaluate your prayer life and reception of the sacraments, and take steps to make sure these things are a regular part of your life
To Learn More
If you would like to learn more about prayer and the links between mental health, physical health, and spiritual health, I highly recommend picking up a copy of 13 Powerful Ways to Pray by Fr. Eamon Tobin.