This is an old article by I found on the history of how the church dealt with the awful reality of scrupulosity and religious despair
Religious despair is the overwhelming loss of hope in God’s mercy and forgiveness. It is the conviction that one’s sins are too great to be pardoned, that salvation is impossible, or that God has utterly abandoned the soul. In Christian thought, despair is often linked with the sin of unbelief because it denies the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice and the boundless nature of divine grace. It is not simply sadness or grief but a spiritual hopelessness that paralyzes faith and drives the heart into torment.
Scrupulosity is a form of religious and moral anxiety where the mind is plagued with constant fears of sin, guilt, and condemnation. It manifests as obsessive self-examination, intrusive thoughts, and an inability to rest in God’s forgiveness. Those afflicted often misinterpret ordinary temptations or minor faults as signs of damnation, leading to cycles of confession, doubt, and inner torment. Historically described as “the doubting disease of the soul,” scrupulosity binds the conscience in fear rather than freeing it in the assurance of grace.
The context of this article examines the experience of Christians during the Renaissance, an era in which Calvinism was the dominant theological influence. Calvin taught that God has sovereignly elected some to salvation and left others to reprobation (consigned to damnation and there’s nothing you can do about it). To many believers this teaching produced a relentless spiritual anxiety: they wondered whether they were among the elect or among the reprobate. Accounts from church history record Puritans and other devout men and women who were so overwhelmed by such fears that they took their own lives. This is a tragic reality.
I, too, have wrestled with this torment. I tried to take my life twice. My particular anguish centered on Matthew 7, where the fearful thought is that a man might hear from Christ, “I never knew you.” I cannot imagine a greater torment than contemplating one’s own eternal damnation. Fear, mixed with torment, is a cruel companion.
Historically the church condemned suicide as a damning sin. This judgment came centuries before anyone understood obsessive compulsive disorder or modern diagnoses of mental illness. In earlier centuries what we would now call OCD or clinical depression was labeled “religious melancholy.” The result was that many suffering believers were treated as morally culpable rather than as sick. They were sick—and many died in the grip of that sickness.
I do not believe suicide is automatically proof of damnation. I believe that if a person had genuine faith in Christ, God’s mercy and grace are not limited by the tragic actions of a tormented mind that was ill. With that conviction I want this article to shed light on historical responses to suicide and mental illness so we can better understand how the church once viewed these matters. When I first discovered what OCD was, I poured over historical sources to see how earlier Christians suffered and how they were treated. I hope this research helps others understand both the past and the present.
Thankfully, care and understanding have improved. The church’s approach to mental illness has changed dramatically, and many congregations now offer practical care and compassion. I am deeply grateful that my church paid for my inpatient hospital stay through their insurance when I sought help. My heart breaks for those who do not have such resources—those who wake up every day feeling condemned and utterly alone.
I write raw and honest because I want to give readers insight into what goes on in one’s mind that is not “stable”—not only with OCD, but with anything “Madness” means to be severely or mentally ill one could say, pandemonium or chaos of the mind He does not promise to remove every ailment but he does promise salvation. My mental health has never been worse than it is now, in many ways life before Christ was easier. and my mind was at rest That is not Christ’s fault. I would rather share in the sufferings of Christ than sink into the pleasures and filth of the world. Better to suffer with hope than to suffer without it. The very hope that tortures. God I want to die
Between the Bridge and the Brook: Suicide and Salvation in England, c. 1550–1650 By EK HUNTER
Source: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/13610
Abstract
Suicide was a damnable sin in Reformation England. This is what has been emphasised so far in the historiography of self-killing, but in practice the clergy were equivocal over the question of whether all self-killers were damned. This article re-examines English Protestant beliefs about suicide and salvation from the mid-sixteenth to the mid-seventeenth century. It suggests that clerical statements about the damnableness of suicide need to be understood in the context of the threat posed by Stoic philosophy. Religious writers rejected the notion of noble suicide and reiterated Augustinian theology that premeditated self-killing was a form of murder. However the harsh rhetoric was mitigated by a number of factors that brought into question the idea that all suicides were destined for Hell. These included changing medical opinion about mental states, evidence of the good character of many suicides, belief in the overpowering influence of demonic forces and basic Christian charity.
Keywords: suicide; Hell; predestination; melancholy; puritan
Introduction
In the eighteenth chapter of Life’s Preservative Against Self-Killing (1637), the Scottish Calvinist John Sym set out to prove “that they all, and every of them that so murder themselves; are certainly, and infallibly damned soule and body for evermore without redemption.” This was the first treatise published in English dedicated entirely to suicide. Although Sym was unusual in writing at length on the subject, his views were not idiosyncratic. Voices from across the theological spectrum had been consigning the souls of suicides to the fires of Hell for decades, in keeping with centuries of Church tradition.
Heterodox Opinion
Suicide left troubling spiritual questions. The concept of a “good death” was central to early modern thinking. In orthodox Christian thought, suicide was the worst kind of sudden death. Yet there was a dissenting strain that considered whether suicide could, in certain circumstances, constitute a “good death.”
Stoic philosophy justified suicide to escape tyranny, illness, poverty, or dishonor. Early Christian martyrs sometimes chose death to preserve chastity. Sixteenth-century humanists revived these ideals, and Neo-Stoicism blended classical thought with Christianity. Writers like John Donne in Biathanatos objected to the assumption that all suicides were acts of cowardice or despair. Sir Walter Raleigh expressed similar doubts, hoping that not all suicides were damned.
Orthodox Opinion
Most Protestant writers upheld Augustine’s view that suicide was murder. They rejected Stoic ideals and urged believers to endure suffering with patience. Christian martyrs, not pagan heroes, were the models to follow.
William Vaughan, William Whitaker, and John Sym each reinforced this teaching. To them, noble suicide was pride, impatience, or despair. Stories of ancient suicides, they feared, tempted others into sin. Even sympathetic figures like Foxe and Burton distanced themselves from Stoic praise.
Sudden Death and Repentance
The idea of last-minute repentance offered hope.
“Betwixt the stirrop and the ground,
Mercy I askt, mercy I found.”
Examples circulated of suicides expressing sorrow and pleading for mercy in their final moments. Writers speculated whether even the brief instant between act and death—“betwixt the bridge and the brook”—could allow for salvation. Some were cautious, others urged charity and left judgment to God.
Defining Self-Murder
John Sym distinguished between self-killers and self-murderers. Madness, fever, or melancholy could excuse responsibility. Medieval law had allowed for such distinctions, and by the seventeenth century melancholy was increasingly recognized as a factor.
Belief in demonic influence also softened judgment. Luther taught that those overpowered by the devil were more like murder victims than willing sinners. English writers such as Thomas Beard agreed. Accounts like that of Nehemiah Wallington, who saw his suicidal thoughts as battles with the devil, elicited sympathy rather than condemnation.
Elect or Reprobate?
Calvinism complicated matters. Suicide seemed a sign of reprobation, yet despair could also mark the elect under satanic attack.
The case of Judge James Hales troubled many: a godly man who nevertheless ended his life. Puritan writers wrestled with whether such deaths disproved the perseverance of the saints. Some, like William Perkins, counseled leaving judgment to God’s mercy.
Autobiographies and letters show believers taking comfort in the possibility that even suicides could be forgiven if truly among the elect. Predestination sometimes weakened the link between suicide and damnation.
Conclusion
Harsh denunciations of suicide reflected fears of Stoic influence more than absolute certainty about damnation. While law remained severe, pastoral writing revealed seeds of compassion. Suicide was increasingly explained not as rational choice but as the result of illness, melancholy, or temptation.
By the seventeenth century, voices suggested suicides should be pitied rather than condemned. Though suicide was not decriminalized in England until 1961, early Protestant discussions show a tension between stern warning and Christian charity—a tension that shaped later attitudes toward suicide and salvation.
MY STORY OF RELIGIOUS OCD 