Abstract: Religion and Native American Faiths Essay

Submitted By randommnamez
Words: 588
Pages: 3

Abstract
The purpose of this research paper is to compare and contrast the beliefs on healthcare between the Bahai, Shintoism, and the Native American faiths. Next, this paper will explore the roll of the healthcare provider, and how he or she can care for those with different faiths than their own. Lastly, these three faiths will be compared to the Christian faith and views on healthcare.
Nurses are no strangers to diversity and variety. Every working shift puts us in contact with people of all backgrounds, cultures, and faiths. As professionals, our duty is to provide unbiased and non-judgmental care to patients with varying background, as well as religious or spiritual care. To be able to successfully do this, nurses must have a good understanding of their own faith and spirituality, and be able to lay that aside to be able to cater to special aspects of patient’s belief systems regarding their healthcare. In addition, nurses need to have an understanding of core values of different religions. Many nurses are aware of the more common faiths and practices, but do not have much knowledge of ones that are not as well known. Three less known religions include the Bahai, Shintoism, and the Native American faiths. These three religions share similarities and differences in their regards to healthcare and will be discussed in this paper. In addition, these three will be compared to the Christian faith as well. The Bahá'i is a newer faith that was founded by Bahá'u'lláh (1817-1892). Bahá'u'lláh is thought of as “the most recent in the line of Messengers of God that stretches back beyond recorded time and that includes Abraham, Moses, Buddha, Krishna, Zoroaster, Christ and Muhammad.” (Bahá'í International Community, 2014) Bahá'u'lláh, whose name means “The Glory of God,” experienced God’s revelation to him during an imprisonment. The revelation was a vision of God’s will to humanity, which set Bahá'u'lláh into motion to outline the “framework for the reconstruction of human society at all levels: spiritual, moral, economic, political, and philosophical.” (Bahá'í International Community, 2014) The beliefs of the Bahá'i promote unity and respect to all, which is also applied in their healthcare beliefs. Bahá'u'lláh’s published writings frequently address the use of medicine and physicians in the healing process. Bahá'u'lláh writes “Resort ye, in