Barbados Spiritual Baptists

Social acceptance enhances opportunities for supporting public health

Bibliographic Data

ID19503844
AuthorsEzra E H Griffith (Yale University, corresponding author), George E Mahy (University of the West Indies System), John L Young (Yale University)
Year2008
Volume11
Issue7
Pages671-683
Publication date2008-11-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueMental Health Religion & Culture (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1367-4676 • E-ISSN: 1469-9737
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13674670801954403
OpenAlexW2065457764
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited10

The Spiritual Baptist faith has been present in the Caribbean from about the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. However, the movement only extended to Barbados in 1957 when a Spiritual Baptist preacher, a Barbadian by birth, returned to his native island from Trinidad, where he had been living for several years. The Reverend Granville Williams established the first Spiritual Baptist Church in Barbados and has continued to oversee the church's development since its inception. This article describes the evolution of the church's status over the past 50 years, as seen by both members and non-members of the group, from a marginalized religious group into a settled and accepted denomination. Explication of this transformation phenomenon is also explored through qualitative interviews with Barbadian clergy non-members of the group. The implications of this transformation for the interplay of religion, mental health, and social services in the Caribbean are then discussed. We also thank all the subjects who gave so freely of their time for the interviews

Public health · Social acceptance · Sociology · Food Security and Health in Diverse Populations · Medicine · Nursing · Psychology · Religion, Society, and Development · Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology · Social Psychology

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