Understanding women's health promotion and the rural church

Many rural health resources are linked to community churches, which are often well attended, especially by rural women. We used interpretive phenomenology and the photovoice method to understand how the church influenced health promotion for rural women, whose health is often significantly compromised compared with the health of urban women. Our analysis of the data from individual interviews, group sessions, photographs, and logbooks suggested that the rural church significantly facilitated rural women's health promotion. The church supported the physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual health of rural women, facilitated social connectedness, and provided healthful opportunities to give and to receive. Implications included reframing religious places as health-promoting and socially inclusive places for rural women.