Caregiving, Self-Care, and Contemplation

Resources from Thomas Aquinas

Bibliographic Data

ID21363450
AuthorsEmily Z Dubie (0000-0002-9166-8705, Duke University, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume102
Issue1099
Pages384-400
Publication date2021-05-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueNew Blackfriars (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0028-4289 • E-ISSN: 1741-2005
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1111/nbfr.12538
OpenAlexW3010532749
LanguageEN
References cited13

In the last decade, the helping professions have increasingly recognized compassion fatigue, burnout, and secondary trauma as hazards integral to care-work, and in response, they have turned to self-care to build caregiver resilience. To examine the theological and ethical assumptions implicit in self-care literature, I turn to Thomas Aquinas's account of the active and contemplative lives in the Summa Theologiae . In correlating the two lives as meeting neighbors’ needs and beholding God, Thomas offers three competing accounts. Rather than synthesizing these differences, I argue that they map a range of interactions possible between one's own wellbeing and another's: care for the neighbor can hinder, prepare for, or be referred to contemplation and its consolations. While affirming self-care's recognition of human limits, my reading of Thomas also offers a correction, insisting that divergent experiences of caregivers are possible. This depends on the particulars, among which include the grace of divine assistance

Burnout · Compassion · Compassion fatigue · Contemplation · Epistemology · Health care · Pastoral care · Political science · Psychological resilience · Reading (process) · Self care · Theology · Clinical Psychology · Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health · Law · Medieval Philosophy and Theology · Philosophy · Psychology · Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology · Social Psychology