Pope Francis says seeing a psychiatrist helped himIs Pope Francis Denying Sin when he says Child Molesters
Pope reveals he had weekly psychoanalysis sessions
Max Weber and Sigmund Freud are
the two writers most responsible for Nietzschean language in America.
Few know that Freud was " profoundly influenced by Nietzsche," according
to Bloom. Freud, much more than Weber, profoundly changed America from a
Christian culture to a therapeutic or self-centered culture.
The
therapeutic approaches, which started with Freud, have a basic
assumption that is not Christian. The starting point is not the Catholic
worldview, which is summed up in the parable of the prodigal
son: a fallen and sinful world with persons needing God the Father to
forgive them so they can return to be His sons and daughters.
Unlike
the Christian worldview, the therapeutic starting point is that the
individual must overcome personal unconscious forces, in Freud, and in
Carl Jung the person must unite to the collective unconscious, which is
shared by all humans.
In both cases, the therapist assists his
client to change himself to 'become his real self.' Forgiveness and
returning to God are not needed. What is needed are not God and His
Forgiveness, but a therapist assisting a self to reach the fullness of
its self...
... The
failure of these Francis Catholic bishops is a failure to teach the faith and
moral teachings of Jesus Christ. Getting rid of a few priests will not
solve the problem if these basic assumptions stay, because more – only
cleverer – sex abusers will rise up to take their place.
I feel
sorry for these Francis bishops and other Church leaders if they don't take a
look at themselves and repent of these basic assumptions in their
dioceses. They must eventually come face to face with the Living God. He
is the Father of these little ones who have been scandalized and
abused. - The Catholic Monitor
Professor Allan Bloom, a philosopher who wrote "The Closing of the
American Mind," thought that Friedrich Nietzsche was the father of
modern America. He said, "Words such as 'charisma,' 'lifestyle,'
'commitment,' 'identity,' and many others, all of which can easily be
traced to Nietzsche ... are now practically American slang."
But the most important Nietzschean slang word is "values."
"Values"
are the death of Christian morality because values simply mean
opinions. If opinion is how things are decided, then might makes right.
One
must remember that whenever someone talks about values in modern
America – family values or religious values or
place-the-blank-in-front-of values – they are saying there is no real or
objective right or wrong – only opinions of the self and its will to
power.
Nietzsche's philosophy is summed up by Bloom as
Commitment
values the values and makes them valuable. Not love of truth but
intellectual honesty characterizes the proper state of mind. Since there
is no truth in the values, and what truth there is about life is not
lovable, the hallmark of the authentic will is consulting one's oracle
while facing up to what one is and what one experiences. Decisions, not,
deliberations, are the movers of deeds. One cannot know or plan the
future. One must will it.
As a philologist, Nietzsche believed there
was no original text and transferred this belief to reality, which he
thought was only pure chaos. He proposed will to power in which one
imposes or "posits" one's values on a meaningless world.
Previous to
Freud's psychoanalysis, Nietzsche's writings spoke of the unconscious
and destructive side of the self. In fact, Freud wrote that Nietzsche
"had a more penetrating knowledge of himself than any other man who ever
lived or was likely to live."
Max Weber and Sigmund Freud are
the two writers most responsible for Nietzschean language in America.
Few know that Freud was " profoundly influenced by Nietzsche," according
to Bloom. Freud, much more than Weber, profoundly changed America from a
Christian culture to a therapeutic or self-centered culture.
The
therapeutic approaches, which started with Freud, have a basic
assumption that is not Christian. The starting point is not the Catholic worldview, which is summed up in the parable of the prodigal
son: a fallen and sinful world with persons needing God the Father to
forgive them so they can return to be His sons and daughters.
Unlike
the Christian worldview, the therapeutic starting point is that the
individual must overcome personal unconscious forces, in Freud, and in
Carl Jung the person must unite to the collective unconscious, which is
shared by all humans.
In both cases, the therapist assists his
client to change himself to 'become his real self.' Forgiveness and
returning to God are not needed. What is needed are not God and His
Forgiveness, but a therapist assisting a self to reach the fullness of
its self.
Freud, under the influence of Nietzsche, moved
psychiatry away from the mechanistic and biological to the previously
"unscientific" model of the "symbolic language of the unconscious."
Freud's
pupil Carl Jung took the symbolic language of the unconscious a step
further. Unlike his mentor, Jung's unconscious theory is not just about
making conscious sexually repressed or forgotten memories. His symbolic
therapy used what he called the "active imagination" to incorporate
split-off parts of the unconscious (complexes) into the conscious mind.
He
believed with Freud that dreams and symbols are means to the
unconscious, but for Jung the dream and symbol are not repressed lusts
from stages of development. They are a way to unite with the collective
unconsciousness.
Many Christians thought this "language of the
soul" was a step forward from what they considered the cramped
scientific reality of modernity. What they didn't understand was that
Jung's theory was part of a movement that led to the rejection of
objective morality and truth.
Jungian (and Freudian)
psychoanalysis reduces Christian concepts such as God, free will and
intelligence to blind reactions, unconscious urges and uncontrollable
acts. Even more disastrous, Jung inverted Christian worship.
Leanne
Payne, a Christian therapist, considers Jung "not a scientist, but a
post-modernist subjectivist. Jung's active imagination therapy is
hostile not only to the Judeo-Christian worldview, but to all systems
containing objective moral and spiritual value. Within this world the
unconscious urge becomes god. What the unconscious urge wants is what is
finally right or moral. These psychic personae [complexes] are
literally called 'gods' (archetypes),' and so an overt idolatry of self
follows quickly."
Within the modern French Nietzschean schools
of thought, a type of Jungian unconscious urge is replacing the old
existential conscious self who chooses. The post-modernist is moving
from the idolatry of self to the idolatry of autonomous inner "beings"
that, according to Payne, are similar to pagan "gods."
As C.S.
Lewis predicted in "The Screwtape Letters," we are moving to a
"scientific" paganism. C.S. Lewis' name for the "scientific" pagan was
the Materialist Magician and the name of the autonomous inner "beings"
was the "Forces."
In "The Screwtape Letters," his character who is a senior evil spirit said:
I
have high hopes that we shall learn in due time how to emotionalise and
mythologise their science to such an extent that what is, in effect,
belief in us (though not under that name) will creep in while the human
mind remains closed to the Enemy [God]. The "Life Force," the worship of
sex, and some aspects of Psychoanalysis may here prove useful. If once
we can produce our prefect work – the Materialist Magician, the man, not
using, but veritably worshipping, what he vaguely calls "Forces" while
denying the existence of "spirits" – then the end of the war will be in
sight.
Some of the largest audiences for this "scientific"
paganism with its inversion of worship and the Judeo-Christian worldview
are followers of Christ. By using Christian symbols and terminology,
Jungian spirituality has infiltrated to a large extent Christian
publishers, seminaries, even convents and monasteries.
Many
Christians are using Jung's active imagination as a method of prayer.
Psychiatrist Jeffrey Satinover, M.D., thinks this is dangerous "because
this fantasy life has no moral underpinnings, because it helps to
reinforce an experience of autonomous inner 'beings' accessible via the
imagination, and because it is a defense against redemptive suffering,
it easily allies with and quickly becomes a Gnostic form of spiritually
with powerfully occult overtones."
If one is under the influence
of the autonomous inner "beings," uncontrollable urges can overpower
the self. One can go temporarily or permanently insane. And in the
Christian worldview, the autonomous inner "being" is not always just an
imaginary being, but can be a personal being, which then makes
possession a rare, but not impossible, occurrence.
In fact,
according to one Jungian therapist, Nietzsche himself went insane
permanently when an autonomous inner "being" (archetype) overpowered
him. So, unfortunately with the widespread acceptance of Jungian
spirituality, mainstream Christianity seems to be moving to post-modern
Nietzschean insanity and possibly, in some cases, possession.
Jung's
autobiography is full of insane or occult experiences. He was
continually hearing 'voices.' In his autobiography he said his home was
"... crammed full of spirits ... they were packed deep right up to the
front door and the air was so thick it was scarcely possible to
breathe."
During the Hitler regime, which itself was obsessed
with the occult, Jung edited a Nazi psychotherapeutic journal where he
said, "The 'Aryan' unconscious has a higher potential than the Jewish."
Keep that word "potential" in your mind. It will be used by American
psychology.
Once opinion is master, then might makes right. In
"Beyond Good and Evil," Nietzsche proclaimed a new morality, "Master
morality," which was different from Christian morality – or "slave
morality," as he called it. He thought the weak have the morality of
obedience and conformity to the master. Masters have a right to do
whatever they want; since there is no God, everything is permissible.
In
what Nietzsche considered his masterpiece, "Zarathustra," he said the
new masters would replace the dead God. The masters were to be called
Supermen, or the superior men.
After Freud and Jung came Alfred
Adler, also a follower of Nietzsche, with "Individual psychology," which
maintains that the individual strives for what he called "superiority"
but now is called "self-realization" or "self-actualization," and which
came from Nietzsche's ideas of striving and self-creation.
The
"human potential movement" and humanistic psychology of Abraham Maslow
and Carl Rogers are imbedded with these types of ideas. The
psychologists of "potential" teach the superior man.
Edvard Munch said:
Alfred
Adler translated Nietzsche's philosophical idea of "will to power" into
the psychological concept of self-actualization. Thus, Nietzschean
thought forms the foundation for and permeates Alfred Adler's Individual
Psychology, Abraham Maslow's Humanistic Biology, Carl Rogers's
Person-Centered Psychology, and has influenced many other psychological
ideas and systems. ... Alfred Adler was the first psychologist to borrow
directly from Nietzsche, making numerous references to the philosopher
throughout his works. Adler took Nietzsche's idea of "will to power" and
transformed it into the psychological concept of self-actualization, in
which an individual strives to realize his potential.
Mary Kearns,
in an address to the Catholic Head Teachers Association of Scotland,
spoke of the Nietzschean ideas now being taught in Catholic schools in
the name of "scientific" psychology. Kearns said:
The methods
are based on "the group therapy technique" first developed in America in
the 1970's by two psychologists, Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow. They
described how emotional conditioning should be carried out by a group
"facilitator". The facilitator does not impart knowledge like the old
fashioned teacher. Instead he/she initiates discussions encouraging
children to reveal their personal views and feelings. The facilitator's
approach is "value free". There is no right or wrong answer to any
religious or moral question. Each person discloses what is right or
wrong for them. All choices are equally valid even if they are
opposites. Everything depends on feelings or emotions. Reason and
conscience are discouraged. If anyone attempts objective evaluation,
they are to be treated as an "outsider" and there will be a strong
emotional reaction against such "judgemental intolerance".
If it
is true that Catholic education now uses these techniques in "teaching
religious and moral education," then the Catholic education system has
entered into the Nietzschean insanity. If these are the techniques being
used in education and in the seminaries, then sexual misconduct charges
against priests are a symptom of "scientific" paganism replacing
Christianity.
Santa Rosa priest Don Kimball, who is charged with
sexual misconduct, is an example of someone whose "approach" was "value
free" – that is, there was "no right or wrong answer to any religious
or moral question."
In 1996, Karyn Wolfe and Mark Spaulding of
Pacific Church News said, "THE WEDGE! You can't do youth ministry (any
ministry for that matter) without it. ... Basing his theory on
psychologist Abraham Maslow's 'Hierarchy of Needs', the Rev. Don Kimball
developed this model for the growth and maturity process of a group."
Another
example of the value-free approach is Thomas Zanzig, a major leader in
the Catholic Church for youth ministry, plus an editor and writer of
Catholic textbooks.
According to Marks S. Winward, Zanzig, in a
book on youth ministry, "bases his 'Wedge Model' on a similar model
developed by Fr. Don Kimble." Homeschool leader Marianna Bartold said,
"Sharing the Christian Message by Thomas Zanzig has students come up
with as many slang or street words as possible for penis and vagina in
three or four minutes."
Now, many might say these are only
isolated cases of misuses of Maslow and Adler until one reads the
original text. According to William Coulson, a former collaborator of
Carl Rogers,
Maslow was always a revolutionary. ... In 1965,
working a radical idea about children and adult sex into his book about
management, "In Eupsychian Management: A Journal," [Maslow said]: "I
remember talking with Alfred Adler about this in a kind of joking way,
but then we both got quite serious about it, and Adler thought that this
sexual therapy at various ages was certainly a very fine thing. As we
both played with the thought, we envisioned a kind of social worker ...
as a psychotherapist in giving therapy literally on the couch."
As
one can see, the basic therapeutic assumption leads to certain results
in the real world. These thinkers don't believe in the basic Christian
assumption that there is a need for forgiveness from God. Instead, they
believe there is no sin, only selves needing to reach the fullness of
themselves.
It is understandable that atheists such as
Nietzsche, Maslow and Adler could hold these basic assumptions, but that
Christians and priests hold these assumptions is a disgrace. The denial
of original sin and personal sin is, in large part, behind the
headlines of the sex-abuse catastrophe and other dioceses.
The
failure of these Francis Catholic bishops is a failure to teach the faith and
moral teachings of Jesus Christ. Getting rid of a few priests will not
solve the problem if these basic assumptions stay, because more – only
cleverer – sex abusers will rise up to take their place.
I feel
sorry for these Francis bishops and other Church leaders if they don't take a
look at themselves and repent of these basic assumptions in their
dioceses. They must eventually come face to face with the Living God. He
is the Father of these little ones who have been scandalized and
abused.
Pray an Our Father now for reparation for the sins committed because of Francis's Amoris Laetitia.