Some of the blogs I have been looking at recently come up with incredibly lucid analyses about certain topics. Here is an independent priest on mental illness. Naturally, I read anything with a critical spirit and do not automatically endorse every word. I have no qualifications in psychology, but I have an enquiring mind and have read quite a lot about neuroses and real psychiatric pathologies like schizophrenia, personality disorders, bipolar disorders, depression and others. So, when such articles come up, they draw my attention.
This one looks into mental illness in the clergy, and this is nothing new. I have read allegations of some problems Pope Pius IX may have had in several perhaps not impartial sources. Fr Hans Bernard Hasler, who wrote Wie der Papste unfehlbar würde (how the Pope became infallible) in 1979, wrote about the possibility that Pius IX was mentally ill. Of course, it is utter folly to try to diagnose a man who has been dead for more than a hundred years! There is also a cultural difference. People were more grandiose in the nineteenth century without it being thought of as crazy.
I wrote about Saint Benedict Joseph Labre who was certainly more delusional than many of the cranks and crackpots who hang around traditionalist chapels looking for liturgical faults or something else they can attribute to the Great Conspiracy. But, let us not become waspish! It remains that the line between mental illness and holiness may be all too brief.
Again, in a world that seeks guarantees, do we have to subject all candidates for the priesthood to psychological tests? Perhaps it would be enough to send only those who seem to be “not quite right” – not just for screening, but that they might find the help they need. Mental illness comes in degrees, from serious personality disorders to depression and stress-related difficulties. Not all “crosses” people have to carry would disqualify a man from a priestly ministry.
Of course, our author fears the consequences to communities that don’t have the means to pay for proper psychological tests, and that having dangerous persons in the clergy would lead to legal problems engaging the civil liability of the bishop. On the other hand, some illnesses make the person in question dangerous to himself and the faithful, and necessitate professional treatment. Again, it is all up to an experienced and street-wise bishop to get it right.
We do well to inform ourselves as much as possible about these issues and concerns.
The Blue Flower 
Just how far does secular psychology reflect spiritual realities? How relevant are concepts such as ‘normal’? What exactly IS ‘mental health’ or ‘mental illness’? Might it be that much of what is labeled illness is merely a lack of conformity to a fallen world. Perhaps what society perceives as normal is from a spiritual viewpoint seriously dysfunctional. I’m not sure there are any truly rational consistent answers to any of these questions. Yes, psychology and psychiatry certainly have their place, but too much reliance on them could have serious consequences for the life of the church. A study of the lives of the saints (in other than the sugar-coated versions often presented) will reveal very many who would not pass present-day psychological tests. Benedict Joseph Labre has been mentioned, Catherine of Sienna may have been anorexic, Jerome had great difficulty getting along with people, and the list goes on, to say nothing of the Orthodox category of Fools for Christ, of whom there are many, see: http://orthodoxwiki.org/Fool-for-Christ#List_of_Holy_Fools-for-Christ. Why, it would appear from several writers that St. Paul himself would not fare well in Freudian analysis.
All I can say is that such matters require a degree of discernment the secular world cannot supply, a wisdom that comes only from the Holy Spirit. Will we mishear? Of course we will, but to go ahead without seeking divine guidance, even against the common wisdom, is also fraught with danger.
Wonderful reflection. Thank you.
Atheists call all religion a sign of mental illness. The Soviets used to put people in psychiatric hospitals for Nazi-style experiments for their beliefs. Psychiatry is far from being an exact science (a science? – because scientia is certain knowledge arrived at from deduction) and its observations are subjective.
How “normal” are any of us? 🙂