Everyone, regardless of heritage, education, or vocation, must come to terms with his or her own human imperfections and physical mortality.
To do this, one must bring one’s limitations into consciousness. For some persons this can be done through the scientific approach of psychology and its clinical application in psychotherapy. For other persons, this can be done through prayer and religious devotions.
And yet many psychotherapy clients find it a great relief to be able to incorporate religious practices into their psychological treatment. In fact, one only has to read the mystical writing of Saint John of the Cross, such as the The Ascent of Mount Carmel,[1] to understand all of the spiritual and physical benefits that result from emptying oneself in devout humility before God.
Unfortunately, many psychological schools of thought are atheistic or naively misunderstand or misinterpret spiritual experiences. And many psychotherapies can become a “religion” unto themselves.
Sigmund Freud, for example, in his philosophy of psychoanalysis, tried to reduce all religious impulses to biology and sexuality. If you think that sounds strange, just walk into any American shopping mall and you will see, seductively displayed on every shelf, the results of our culture’s wholesale purchase of Freudian biological-sexual atheism. And then realize that the money we use to pay for all this seduction has “In God We Trust” written all over it. So, we might wonder, who is fooling whom?
Freud, after all, died of cancer—oral cancer (in the photo above, note his ever-present cigar)—and not just that, but he died through a suicide assisted by his physician Schur. What does this show us except the absolute spiritual emptiness of Freud’s own philosophy? And it shows precisely how a person can unconsciously “fill” the void of the empty spirit with a cancerous, consuming illness.
In contrast, back in 1219, during the Fifth Crusade, Saint Francis of Assisi crossed the battle lines at Damietta in an attempt to convert Malik al-Kamil, the Ayubid Sultan of Egypt, to Christianity. Francis hoped that the Sultan’s conversion would put an end to the fighting, but the Sultan did not convert, and the fighting did not stop. Nor, surprisingly, did the Sultan kill Francis on the spot. Instead, he was so impressed with Francis’ genuine spirituality and lack of interest in materialism that he spared his life and sent him home to preach to his own people, that he might convert them.
In the end, Francis brought about a true conversion in the hearts of only a few. We might put statues of Saint Francis in our gardens, but how many of us are willing to follow his example by living chaste lives, trusting completely in God, free from argumentativeness and hostility, seeking always the good of others? Well, not many—so anger and violence remain rampant in all cultures to this day. But think about this a bit. If America truly was “one country under God,” and truly trusted in God, and truly endorsed the spiritual values that Saint Francis preached, then maybe we wouldn’t have terrorists plotting to attack us all the time.
Working therapeutically to provide healing for religious persons therefore requires a respect for spiritual aspirations as well as an astute psychological insight that will neither minimize psychological problems nor withdraw from them in fear.
www.GuideToPsychology.com Raymond Lloyd Richmond, Ph.D.
