Susan Eastman, M.Div., Ph.D., is Associate Research Professor Emerita of New Testament, Duke Divinity School. She presented "Christian Flourishing and Reimagining Healthcare: An End to Magical Thinking" for the TMC Virtual Seminar Series on January 24, 2025. "Magical thinking" is "if-then" thinking, which plays an important role in medical research and care, but falters in the face of mystery and the infinite diversity of human beings, and leads to a truncated version of human "flourishing." Christian thinking is "because-therefore" -- because God in Christ has entered into the depths of what is humanly unfixable, therefore we can articulate a vision of flourishing that includes even failure and finitude, and acknowledges the mysteries that elude our grasp. We will probe the differences such a reframing of "flourishing" might make for the care of persons.
Duke Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative