Yes. Absolutely.
The Orthodox Church doesn’t see therapy as something that competes with faith. It’s a tool God gives us through medicine to help heal what’s broken. When you’ve got a chemical imbalance or trauma that won’t budge no matter how much you pray, that’s not a spiritual failure. That’s your body or mind needing help the same way a broken leg needs a cast.
Think of it this way: we’re not just souls trapped in bodies. We’re unified beings where body, mind, and soul affect each other constantly. Depression can make it nearly impossible to pray. Anxiety can keep you from experiencing God’s peace even when you’re standing in church. Trauma can convince you that you’re unlovable no matter how many times you hear about God’s mercy. Sometimes the spiritual work can’t happen until the psychological barriers get addressed.
The Church has always known this. St. Basil the Great wrote about our need to depend on both God and other people for healing. He didn’t see that as weakness. He saw it as how we’re made.
When Therapy Helps
Here’s where therapy becomes important: when spiritual efforts alone aren’t working. If you’ve been confessing the same struggles for years, praying hard, receiving communion regularly, and still finding yourself stuck in the same dark place, that’s often a sign you need additional help. Not instead of confession or prayer, but alongside them.
Dr. Albert Rossi, an Orthodox psychologist, pushes back hard against the idea that depression is just laziness or lack of faith. He says we need to stop telling depressed people to “snap out of it” and start recognizing they’re genuinely suffering. They need support, not lectures. Sometimes that support is professional counseling. Sometimes it’s medication. Often it’s both, working together with spiritual direction.
I’ve known folks here in Southeast Texas who wouldn’t go to therapy because they thought it meant their faith wasn’t strong enough. That’s like refusing to see a doctor for diabetes because you should just trust God more. God works through doctors. He works through therapists too.
How It Works Together
A good Orthodox approach uses both. Your priest isn’t a therapist, and your therapist isn’t a priest. They do different things.
Confession addresses sin and offers absolution. It connects you to God’s mercy through the sacrament. Therapy addresses trauma, teaches coping skills, helps you understand patterns in your thinking that keep you trapped. It can treat clinical depression or anxiety disorders that have biological roots. One Ancient Faith podcast puts it plainly: medication and counseling can lift the barriers that keep you from being able to pray or participate in church life at all.
Some issues need both simultaneously. If you’re dealing with intrusive thoughts that make you feel like you’re blaspheming God, a therapist can teach you how intrusive thoughts work (they’re not your real thoughts, they’re more like mental hiccups). Your priest can assure you that God knows your heart and you’re not committing sin by having unwanted thoughts pop into your head. You need both pieces.
The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops even maintains a directory of Orthodox mental health professionals. That’s not accidental. The Church recognizes this matters.
Finding the Right Help
You don’t necessarily need an Orthodox therapist, though it can help if they understand fasting, confession, and why you’re not eating before liturgy on Sundays. What you do need is someone competent who respects your faith. A therapist who thinks religion is inherently unhealthy won’t serve you well. But a skilled professional who understands that your faith is central to your life can work with that, even if they’re not Orthodox themselves.
And talk to your priest. Not instead of finding a therapist, but in addition to it. Let him know you’re seeking help. Most priests are relieved when someone gets professional support for serious mental health issues because they know their pastoral care, while important, isn’t the same as clinical treatment.
If you’re struggling, get help. The Church wants you whole. God gave us doctors, counselors, and medication for a reason. Use them. Keep praying, keep going to confession, keep receiving communion. But don’t let false guilt keep you from the help you need. Your brain is part of your body, and bodies sometimes need medical care. There’s no shame in that.
