This research study investigated how Evangelical Christians ministers conceptualize and respond to psychotic disorders as well as their willingness to refer to secular mental health treatment. Following approval by the California State University, Long Beach Institutional Review Board (IRB), this study used a qualitative method that consisted of personal one-on-one confidential interviews that were audio recorded. Data were analyzed using thematic coding methods, and findings were explained using an interpretive approach.

This research found a broad range of responses on a continuum between “Medical” and “Religious” interpretations and the willingness to make a referral to secular mental health treatment. Upon conducting the one-to-one interviews, the participants disclosed a variety of concerns that are considered unanticipated findings. The unanticipated findings include ministers as frontline mental health workers, mystical experiences, a process of verifying, the direct encounters with psychotic disorders and some skepticism and antagonism towards secular mental health treatment.