A little more than a week and a half ago, kindergarten teacher Jamie Tull was found after having been missing for nearly three weeks. Family and friends began searching for Tull in Merced County after her car was found crashed in the area. She was found on the brink of death, being extremely dehydrated and sunburnt. Reports state that Jamie Tull was able to survive so long on her own by drinking from a water trough for cattle and eating insects.

What’s possibly even more fascinating than the fact that she survived for so long by extraordinary means may be the fact that she seemed disinclined to be found in the first place.

Now, in her right mind, that may have been a completely different story. In her right mind, Jamie Tull might have been rescued sooner, or even more likely, would not have disappeared in the first place.

The problem is, she wasn't in her right mind.

Another crucial point of this story is the fact that Jamie Tull has bipolar disorder, grossly summarized as a mental disorder characterized by erratic and intense behavior. She had also been taking medication for this disorder, but had stopped taking it for about six months because “a pastor and his wife told her that pills lead to demons.”

Now let me preface this: I respect the Church as a whole. It is a community for believers that should be focused on worshipping God, helping our fellow man and strengthening our faith. That being said, the Church has a way of screwing up those who deal with mental illness, and it makes me sick. Jamie Tull was close to death because of a pastor making the ridiculous suggestion that the pills she was taking would be detrimental to her own spiritual well-being.

Even if a pastor making a crazy suggestion such as this is a rarity, it is indicative of the overall weakness of the church in dealing with mental illness. I’ve addressed my own experience with the church and how it deals with mental illness in a few previous articles. It is all too common to hear the typical phrases from the pulpit and congregation of “Pray more” or “Just trust in God, and it will get better."

Prayer is good, I’m not denying that. But to give people the idea that their mental illnesses require no medical help whatsoever is dangerous and irresponsible. Medicine is a science, and science is not the enemy of religion. Science is another part of God’s creation; to deny it is to deny a part of God.

Even more than that, mental illness should not be treated by the Church as something different than any other physical ailment. Mental illness is an affliction of the brain. If you break a bone, you don't just pray for it to get better and completely avoid going to see a doctor. Could you imagine if a pastor had told someone who had cancer to not get any treatment, but instead to simply pray? He’d be endlessly criticized for his endangering of that person’s life. So why is mental illness treated any differently?