Pope Francis has revealed, for the first time, that he sought help from a psychoanalyst when he was younger.
He is believed to be the first Pope in history to have visited a psychoanalyst – or at least to have admitted to it.
In a new book, he says that at the age of 42 – decades before he was made Pope – he went to a psychiatrist in Buenos Aires in his native Argentina for six months.
Jorge Mario Bergoglio, as the Pope was known then, was at the time the head of the Jesuit order in Argentina.
“At a certain point, I felt the need to consult an analyst. For six months, I went to her house once a week to clarify a few things,” he revealed in the book, Pope Francis: Politics and Society.
He did not specify exactly what “things” he wanted to clarify or why he felt the need to seek psychiatric help but he did say the treatment was successful.
“In those six months, she really helped me,” he said. “She was a wonderful person,” the 81-year-old pontiff said.
In his professional life, Bergoglio had encountered resistance to his tough style of management as head of the Jesuit order.
He admitted a few years ago that “my authoritarian and quick manner of making decisions led me to have serious problems and to be accused of being ultraconservative.”
Full story at The Telegraph.
Probably to deal with his authority issues and problems with his father.
No joke. His father, a very conservative staid man, an accountant for an Argentine railroad, is never/almost never (maybe he’s mentioned him…once someplace?) mentioned by Jorge Bergoglio/P. Francis. His mother is mentioned .
It also “accounts” for his serious anger issues with tradition and authority = symbols of his father.
There, PF, that was free and I could have saved you a lot of pesos.
Some Dubia must be clarified.
I wish he’d clarify if he’s a Roman Catholic or not.
The best and most cleansing and helpful psychoanalysis that exists on this side of Heaven is heartfelt, repentant, and contrite sacramental confession to a Catholic priest. The Catholic sacrament of Confession, administered by an ordained priest, is the only thing that truly relieves one’s conscience and cleanses one’s soul of sin. No secular counselor can ever provide the relief and forgiveness of sin that a true, Catholic, sacramental confession can. I know from my own personal experience and that of relatives.
Reminds me of Tony Soprano and Dr. Melfi. How do you feel about this?
Interesting. This reveals that the pope is a human person…like the rest of us. A man with a superior intellect and a human heart in need of wise counsel. Perhaps, this news will encourage other Christians, including clergy, to get help when they need it.
Seriously, are you even Catholic? What are you exactly saying – that we should consider that some secularized mental health quack can offer us wisdom superior to that of the confessional? You’re in the wrong forum here. Solid Catholics don’t think that way and never will. We instead are humbled and counseled by the overwhelming mystery and mercy of God’s grace through the sacrament of penance and how it heals our souls and intellects. Yes, that’s right at age 42 this pope was a human person, probably more than he should admit. This article is just more propaganda to water down faith and replace it with materialism. Nothing to see here, move on.
This is not correct. Catholic clergy suggest that people and couples go to therapy all the time. Many priests go to therapy.
I think you do not understand what therapy is and what it is for. It does not replace confession and it does not substitute secular wisdom for divine. ( I do think you could find counseling like that but most Catholics are careful to seek counseling that is compatible with the Catholic Faith.) Good counselors work with a person’s faith.
I’d be willing to take a small wager Francis is the first to admit using a mental health professional. Others simply haven’t admitted so.
Saints preserve us! Wisdom and Prudence are gifts of the Holy Spirit! This is the Pope! Isn’t it more advantageous to millions of souls to simply clarify Church Teaching before you openly ignore brother Bishops and Cardinals to clarify that you have been previously psychoanalyzed for “a few things”?
Anonymous, I’d be willing to take a large wager that you’re the first to “anonymously” admit that you’re also not in favor of clarifying the Dubia! YOU, simply haven’t admitted so!
The word to focus on here is “psychoANALYST.” The Psychoanalytic School of psychology is dedicated to implementing the principles developed by Sigmund Freud. I was a subscriber to Ligourian Magazine during the 1980s when they printed a series on those whose ideas have inflicted the most damage on society. Among people like Karl Marx, Niccolo Machiavelli, and Marquis de Sade, was Sigmund Freud. The article stated that Freud expressed some of the most bizarre ideas, most of which are antithetical to Catholic teaching. Freud himself had to once say in an interview, “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.” It troubles me that Pope Francis had to consult a psychoanalyst to “clarify a few things.”
Well put. The Freudian reduction of all impulses to crude atheist materialism and mere primitive sexual urges has done so much to create chaos in modern “thought”. The Woody Allen approach.
Dr. Anthony Daniels (under pen name Theodore Dalrymple) wrote an insightful book:”Admirable Evasions – How Psychology Undermines Morality”
Well worth the read, he exposes Freud for the Fraud he really was. “His career, once he stopped looking in to the nervous system of Eels… Self Advancement – a Habitual Liar who falsified evidence in that way Henry Ford made cars – Plagarist – Self Agrandizing mythologist and shameless manipulator of people –
In Short he was to human understanding what Piltdown Man (a Fraud) was to physical anthropology
*BTW I once saw a replication of the ‘Piltdown Skull’ on display at Holy Names ‘college’ in Oakland, apparently buying the hoax
I hope the readers will pay close attention to the title of this article. Pope Francis, when he was Father Bergoglio, CONSULTED with a psychoanalyst. People familiar with psychoanalysis understand that Father Bergoglio did not undergo psychoanalytic treatment; a once a week session for six months would not be a sufficient amount of time for psychoanalytic therapy. More likely, Father Bergiio received counsel and suggestions regarding various issues he was facing. I believe Argentina was in the midst of political turmoil during this time period.
No. Reinterpretative narrative.
6 mos. is a serious time investment in psych work. And that is so much, so far, that he is admitting to. Jorge Maria doesn’t usually come clean on all his true personal narrative.
A Useful Analysis:
The Sick Man of the West
https://www.catholicjournal.us/2017/09/05/sick-man-west/
Human beings will always need to unburden themselves from the pangs of conscience. Sins create guilt and guilt seeks a healing confession. Those who find the confessional repugnant now look for inner peace in other venues. Some bare their souls to the local bartender. Others choose the unfettered freedom of the psychiatrist’s couch over the solemn privacy of the confessional. In this modern confessional, validation and approval substitute for penance and forgiveness.
The Psychiatrist encourages the sinner to focus, not on the evil or harm of the patient’s behavior but on the subconscious causes and nurture issues that have prompted his…
Mr. Real Ralph: yes I am a faithful and practicing Roman Catholic who lives in the real world, knows the earth is round and the sun is the center of the solar system. Reconciliation is a wonderful sacrament and I highly recommend it; however, most priests are not MDs nor trained in psychology. It’s time to grow up and realize we are living in the 21st century…not the 12th!