[Extract from ]Amish community builds mental-health home
Sunday, April 24, 2005By Martha Raffaele, The Associated Press
MOUNT GRETNA, Lebannon County -- On the grounds of a private psychiatric center, a modest two-story house with light gray siding is being built by Amish carpenters.
Their labor is creating a service currently unavailable to members of this area's Old Order Amish and conservative Mennonite communities who suffer from mental illness.
The house known as Green Pastures will allow the Amish to live among their own people and maintain a lifestyle that eschews modern conveniences -- no television or radio -- while receiving outpatient clinical treatment.
Known for their plain style of dress and their use of horse-drawn buggies, the Amish tend to avoid seeking psychiatric help in secular settings, fearing their religious traditions will be viewed as part of the problem.
When it opens in July, the Amish-run Green Pastures will be one of at least two residential facilities in the nation that place the Amish in familiar settings, said the organization that will provide the treatment, Philhaven Behavioral Healthcare Services.
Counselors will assure patients that their treatment will not require them to abandon their faith, [emphasis mine] said Charles G. Bauman, a Mennonite who is Philhaven's liaison with the Plain communities.
"This will build a bridge between the professional (mental-health) services and their culture," Bauman said. "People who are mentally ill are vulnerable to being easily influenced by other people."
A broad range of psychiatric care is available to the Amish communities throughout North America, from professional services to more informal, homespun programs run by conservative sects, said Donald B. Kraybill, a sociologist of Anabaptist studies at Elizabethtown College.
In the latter case, "they do have counselors who may be good listeners and provide good emotional support, but they do not have advanced medical or psychiatric training," Kraybill said. "There may be more reliance on homeopathic treatments rather than medical drugs." ...
Green Pastures can accommodate up to 15 residents and will also provide rooms where family members from distant towns can stay. A day program housed in a separate cottage will provide counseling and other services for residents, using a counselor fluent in Pennsylvania German....
