Tyler J. VanderWeele is the John L. Loeb and Frances Lehman Loeb Professor of Epidemiology at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, and director of the Human Flourishing Program and co-director of the Initiative on Health, Spirituality, and Religion at Harvard University. He is author and co-author of several books, including Measuring Well-Being and the Handbook of Religion and Health. The University of Notre Dame Press is thrilled to publish his newest book, A Theology of Health: Wholeness and Human Flourishing (September 2024). He recently answered some of our questions about his research and writing processes.
When did you first get the idea to write a book on health from a theological perspective?
The idea for the book came while I was teaching a course on Religion, Wellbeing and Public Health at Harvard. The course focused on the empirical research on these topics, but as I was going through the material, I felt there was a need to reflect also upon how health was understood from a theological perspective, by churches and religious communities. I began to reflect more deeply and read on these matters, and began incorporating them into the course, and eventually thought it would be good to write a book-length exposition of what I took to be a Christian theology of health.
Certainly these are unprecedented times in the United States, Europe, and around the world. What can readers find in your book that will resonate with them during this era?
We are unquestionably living through a great deal of change and tumult in the world at present. Fundamentally, however, I do that think human nature, and what ultimately brings fulfillment, does not change. We certainly have to adapt to our circumstances, and try to alter them in ways that are positive. But I think returning to the question of what constitutes human flourishing—the health of a person—can be helpfully and refreshingly reorienting.
What research was required for this book?
There has been a lot written on the theology of healthcare—what it means to be a good clinician, for example—but much less on the theology of health itself. The book required seeking out the few articles and books that approach this topic more explicitly and to begin to try to synthesize some of this material. It also required drawing upon, and integrating, other part of the theological tradition that were perhaps more tangentially related but still of relevance to a theological perspective on health and well-being.
What did you learn while writing it?
I could list numerous specific points, but most fundamentally I would say that the process of reflection, reading, and writing deepened my appreciation, yet further, of the beauty of the Christian understanding of the human personal and the vision of human fulfillment. I have only been able to convey this very partially and imperfectly, but having the opportunity to contemplate these matters more deeply during the course of writing the book was profoundly enriching for me.
In what way is the book you wrote different from the book you set out to write?
The book does still follow the general structure that I had initially envisioned with one part on the nature of health as wholeness; a second part on ill-health, fallenness, and sin; and a third part of healing, restoration, and fulfillment—in theological terms: nature, sin, and grace. However, as the book took form, there certainly were sections that emerged, or that emerged differently, than what I had originally conceived. As I reflected more on the nature of health, wholeness, and flourishing, the scope of the book, and the topics that I felt I had to at least briefly touch upon, kept expanding. There is, for example, a lot more material on community, and on love, than was present in the first draft of the book. These topics were there in the original outline, but the emphasis on these considerably deepened over time.
Which theologian is the biggest influence on you and your work?
The theologian with the greatest influence on the book, and on my thinking in general, is unquestionably Aquinas. A quick glance at the footnotes of the book makes that very clear. His insights, clarity, breadth, and capacity for synthesis is astounding. While he only occasionally addresses the topic of bodily health in his writings, he has a great deal to say about flourishing, and our final fulfillment in God, which is of tremendous relevance to the arc of the book.
What is your writing schedule like?
I write best when I have long periods of open time—ideally a series of empty days all in a row. It can be difficult to find those stretches. Often this would entail not writing for a couple of months, and then making notable strides forward over the course of just three or four consecutive days. Because the content and coverage of the book kept expanding, it took me considerably longer to bring it to completion than I had hoped. It ended up requiring a great deal of patience.
What advice would you give to a writer who wants to start a book that deals with the intersection of two major fields?
I would perhaps give three pieces of advice to someone wanting to write at the intersection of two different fields. First, spend a great deal of time first trying to immerse yourself in both disciplines. It is not easy to build the necessary bridges and connections across fields, but the task becomes at least somewhat more manageable as one’s understanding of each of the two disciplines deepens. This task is never complete, but I think it is important to try to build the necessary foundations of knowledge and understanding. Second, while I think as much effort as possible should be made on building bridges and trying to connect the disciplines, one will ultimately have to accept that the language, methodologies, and conceptual frameworks will likely never be perfectly satisfactory to each of the respective disciplines. We’ve benefitted a great deal in the generation of knowledge by having more specialized discipline-specific practices, but it can be difficult then to re-integrate and speak across those differences. Third, seek out feedback, and critique, from both disciplines. I cannot tell you how much I benefitted from the numerous readers who went through earlier drafts of the manuscript and pointed out shortcomings, points that needed clarification, links that I had not seen, and challenges I had not noticed. I think this sort of feedback and critique is crucial in general, but becomes even more so when trying to approach the intersection of disciplines.
Who would you like to read A Theology of Health and why?
As per the book’s preface, I hope that the readership of the book is reasonably wide. Very clearly, I think any Christian reader involved in health or healthcare might find the book of interest. But I do hope that the readership would extend beyond that to anyone in medical, public health, or caregiving professions, regardless of their perspective, and also to Christian readers who may not be involved in healthcare or public health at all. The topic of health—both bodily health, and the health of persons, or human flourishing—is of course of importance to all people. While the book offers a distinctively Christian vision of health and human flourishing, I do think it is one grounded in who we are as persons. Even if someone does not agree with all of the various matters of Christian or Catholic theology, I do think there are insights in the book that are relevant to all people. In that regard, the book in fact concludes with a “Non-Theological Postscript” that describes what I see as some of the insights of the book that arise from a distinctively Christian viewpoint, but are arguably of relevance and interest to those to do not embrace the Christian faith.
Which theologian and books are you currently reading?
I continue to read Aquinas pretty much every week. I have also recently been reading some of Garrigou-Lagrange’s work. And I do try to intersperse more academic reading—whether in theology, or public health, or other disciplines—with novels as well—books by Charlotte Brontë, Willa Cather, and François Mauriac most recently.
What book are you working on next?
For the first time in twelve years, I am taking a break from book-writing. Some of the reason for this is to allow more time for writing specific focused articles, more time for reading, and more time for reflection. Some of this is because we have just received the first wave of data from our Global Flourishing Study which will require a lot of time for analysis and writing in the years ahead. And finally, some of this is that for the next two book projects I eventually want to pursue—a more popular work on flourishing, and a more technical work on measurement and causation—I still need to do a lot more research, reflection, and learning.