DISCERNMENT IS ESSENTIAL

Today, many psychologists confuse spiritual problems with psychological ones, and this confusion ultimately harms the individual. Not every inner conflict stems from an emotional wound, childhood trauma, or a chemical imbalance. Some struggles are rooted in conscience, moral life, the relationship with God, and the ultimate meaning of life. When everything is psychologized, what is actually spiritual disorder, objective guilt, temptation, or a lack of inner life ends up being treated as pathology.

Modern psychology, having lost its holistic anthropology, tends to interpret all anguish as a symptom, all inner demands as repression, and all moral struggles as neurotic conflict. Thus, a person living in contradiction with their conscience is soothed instead of being helped to order their life. The discomfort is anesthetized without discerning its cause. But some suffering persists because it doesn't originate from a wound, but from an inner rupture between what is experienced and what is known to be right. This cannot be healed simply by talking;  Healing comes through conversion, ordering, and taking responsibility.

Saint Anthony the Abbot said that it is important to soberly distinguish between human frailty and spiritual combat. He taught that the devil acts primarily in our thoughts, taking advantage of laziness, pride, and lack of vigilance. If the problem is spiritual, the remedy is not exclusively psychological: it is prayer, the sacraments, inner discipline, and living truth. Treating this as a “disorder” disorients the soul.

This does not mean disregarding psychology or denying real disorders. There is clinical anxiety, pathological depression, and deep wounds that require serious professional intervention. The error lies in not knowing how to discern. When a psychologist does not believe in the spiritual dimension of humankind, they interpret everything from an emotional or behavioral perspective. And thus, the person becomes trapped in endless therapies for a problem that is not clinical, but existential and spiritual.

Knowing how to differentiate is an act of professional and human responsibility. Good accompaniment distinguishes between what is addressed with therapy and what is confronted with conversion, spiritual life, and moral order.  Not everything can be cured with techniques, just as not everything can be resolved through prayer alone. But when a spiritual struggle is confused with a psychological problem, the person is deprived of the remedy they truly need. True help integrates, it doesn't diminish; it illuminates the full reality of the person and doesn't mutilate an essential part of their inner life.

The Catholic Psychologist