Suicidal Ideation and Sense of Community in Faith Communities

religions Article Suicidal Ideation and Sense of Community in Faith Communities Karen Mason * ID , W. Blake Martin and Esther Kim Counseling Department, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, 130 Essex St., South Hamilton, MA 01982, USA; (W.B.M.); (E.K.) * Correspondence: Received: 11 December 2017; Accepted: 26 January 2018; Published: 30 January 2018 Abstract: Previous studies have found that religion and spirituality (R/S) are related to less suicidal ideation (SI), fewer suicide attempts and fewer suicide deaths and that an absence of social support is associated with SI, suicide attempts, and suicide death. 745 Catholic, Jewish, and Protestant congregants completed an online survey measuring their sense of community (SOC) in their faith community, overall belonging and SI. SOC was weakly related to SI. Congregants attending more than one service per week reported more SI and more importance to feel a SOC. Jewish and Hispanic congregants reported more SI. Unmarried congregants reported lower overall belonging, more SOC and more SI, suggesting that people apportion their sense of connectedness differently. Future studies might examine the relationship of SOC to suicide attempts and deaths and how a faith community might confer SOC differently from a non-religious/non-spiritual community. Keywords: suicide; sense congregants; belongingness of community; religion; spirituality; faith community; Religion and spirituality (R/S) are associated with greater physical and mental health (Koenig et al. 2012) including less suicidal ideation (Bearman and Moody 2004; Blackmore et al. 2008; Cohen et al. 2008; Cook et al. 2002; Greening and Stoppelbein 2002; Pienaar et al. 2007), fewer suicide attempts (Burshtein et al. 2016; Nonnemaker et al. 2003; Thompson et al. 2007), and fewer suicide deaths (Barranco 2016; Hilton et al. 2002; Nisbet et al. 2000; VanderWeele et al. 2016). However, the relationship between R/S and suicidal behaviors is complex (Lawrence et al. 2016). R/S may not be protective in all populations (Lawrence et al. 2016; O’Reilly and Rosato 2015) and under all conditions. For example, religious faith has been found to be significantly and negatively related to suicidal behavior only at low levels of family support (Wang et al. 2016). Meaning in life differentiated between suicidal and non-suicidal religious youth (Wilchek-Aviad and Malka 2016). In addition, gender differences have been found with women reporting higher levels of SI (Piscopo et al. 2016) and religion and spirituality being more protective among women in some studies (Kralovec et al. 2017) but not all (Kazi and Naidoo 2016). In this study, we investigated the relationship between congregants’ sense of community in their faith community and suicidal ideation, which is a focus on religion. While religion and spirituality are overlapping constructs, they are distinct. Religion refers to “affiliation with an organization that is guided by shared beliefs and practices” and spirituality refers to “an individual’s internal sense of connection to, or search for, the sacred” (Vieten et al. 2013, p. 136). This study is an investigation of sense of community in a faith community, a type of protection conferred by religion which may differ from other types of protections including those conferred by spirituality. This study’s focus on religion is grounded in Durkheim (1897) theory of social integration and suicidal behavior. He theorized that the higher suicide rates among Protestants was related to lower social integration in their faith communities. This study’s focus on sense of community and sense of belonging is further grounded in the substantial evidence linking social support to physical (Holt-Lunstad et al. 2017) and psychological Religions 2018, 9, 40; doi:10.3390/rel9020040 www.mdpi.com/journal/religions Religions 2018, 9, 40 2 of 15 well-being (Cohen and Wills 1985; Maulik et al. 2011; Moak and Agrawal 2010; Morton et al. 2017). Social integration in a congregation is associated with life satisfaction (Lim and Putnam 2010). An absence of social support is associated with suicidal behavior including suicidal ideation (Chioqueta and Stiles 2007), suicide attempts (Kleiman and Liu 2013), and suicide death (Tsai et al. 2015). Social support is protective against suicide even apart from R/S (Rasic et al. 2009), and in fact, more frequent attendance at religious activities was associated with decreased current suicidal ideation, a relationship which remained significant when social support was added to the model (Rushing et al. 2013). Sense of community (SOC) is a community level variable (Kuo et al. 1998) which has been measured in the workplace (Mahan et al. 2002) and in religious communities (Kissil and Itzhaky 2015; Miers and Fisher 2002). SOC is defined as “a feeling that members have of belonging, a feeling that members matter to one another and to the group, and a shared faith that members’ needs will be met through commitment to be together” (McMillan and Chavis 1986, p. 9). SOC includes four elements: integration and fulfillment of needs (that one’s needs will be met by membership in the group), membership (a feeling of belonging and relatedness), influence (a sense of mattering and making a difference), and emotional connection (that members share similar experiences). Sense of belonging to a community has been associated with positive mental health (Kitchen et al. 2012) and low sense of community belonging with higher risk of suicidal ideation (McConnell et al. 2016). The U.S. Congregational Life Survey (2001) found that sense of belonging differentiated the top 20% spiritually vital congregations from other congregations (Woolever and Bruce 2004, p. 19), with 58% of worshipers reporting “their sense of belonging to this congregation is strong and growing” (ibid., p. 48) (S. Barnett, Director, US Congregational Life survey, personal communication 6 June 2017). In the USCLS, sense of belonging depended on network embeddedness which was affected by size of congregation, frequency and length of attendance, and ideological unity (Stroope and Baker 2014). According to Joiner (2005) interpersonal theory of suicidal behavior, thwarted belongingness (a sense of low belonging or social alienation) is an emotionally-painful experience that is associated with suicidal behaviors including suicidal ideation (Conner et al. 2007; Joiner et al. 2006, 2009; You et al. 2011; Van Orden et al. 2008). In this study we hypothesize that (1) high SOC will be related to less suicidal ideation; (2) SOC and belonging will be positively related; and (3) high belonging will be related to less suicidal ideation. A fourth research question regarding differences in SOC, belonging, and suicidal ideation between genders and among three religious traditions (Catholicism, Judaism, and Protestantism) guided further inquiry. 1. Materials and Methods 1.1. Participants Using personal networks including a military cha (...truncated)