In 2016, Pastor Michael Walrond stood in front of Harlem’s First Corinthian Baptist Church and shared his mental health struggles with his congregation. He said his sermon led many people to share their own stories.
“We have to normalize the conversation, take away that stigma and help people understand seeing a mental health practitioner is no different than seeing a doctor when you break your arm,” Pastor Walrond said. “It is about wellness. You can’t talk about wellness without talking about mental wellness.”
That same year, the church opened the HOPE Center to provide a space for people to heal and talk to licensed clinicians. The center offers a variety of mental health programs including individual therapy, medication management, addiction help and marriage and relationship counseling.
According to a Harvard Medical School study, only 25% of Black people seek mental health treatment, compared to 40% of white people. The center wants to help close that gap by destigmatizing depression and anxiety and offering clinicians who are also people of color to ensure trust.
“We’re happy that our communities can see folks who look like them, are from the same places that they’re from, but also they can walk into the office and think about the fact that someone knows my story because someone may have also lived my story,” said Dr. Lena Green, HOPE Center’s executive director.
The center’s goal is to meet Black people where they are, as data from the Pew Research Center shows nearly half of Black Americans attend church weekly and two-thirds pray daily.
“Equity means that everyone has access to quality, culturally sensitive and effective treatments when they need them and where they need them,” said Dr. Sidney Hankerson, HOPE Center’s medical director and director of Mental Health Equity Research at Mount Sinai. “I think that’s what’s exciting about the HOPE Center… because of its affiliation with the church, people trust it and people are able to get the care that they need.”
Greginald Spencer never expected to find both spiritual and mental healing at the Harlem church. The 40-year-old grew up in Mississippi and was taught to pray his problems away.
“I was the second oldest of five children,” he said. “I took on a lot of responsibility and a lot of childhood trauma took place from as early as age 5… I never really dealt with those issues.”
Dr. Hankerson says that although some of the stigma in Black and Latino communities is deserved because of a history of medical mistreatment, it’s important to show that patients have had positive outcomes. At the HOPE Center, they want to normalize therapy so that community members attend sessions not only when something is wrong, but also to keep things right.
“In many Black and Latino communities, people grew up with the notion of what happened in the house, stays in the house, or if you talk about going to see a psychiatrist, then you’re crazy,” Dr. Hankerson said. “There’s a tremendous amount of fear and shame.”
Last November, Spencer started attending therapy sessions with the HOPE Center and learned it’s okay to ask for help outside of prayer. Spencer says it gives him a space to open up and break down the walls he thought he always had to have up as a Black man.
“I needed something for me and I needed help,” Spencer said. “Forget the stigma, forget the fear, forget the talks. If I can’t show up whole for Greginald, I can’t show up and be present for my family, for my friends, for people who God entrusts me with.”
