Writing on a VTX

The way psychiatrists are most accustomed to understand human beings is in terms of health and disease. This viewpoint is known as the medical model. It is a very useful and effective way of looking at people. (M. Scott Peck, People of the Lie, “Toward a Psychology of Evil” )

Scott Peck tries to lay the basis the treatment of evil in a person’s life through the medical model in People of the Lie. Published in 1983, Peck takes a look how evil affects our lives as individuals and our common life together. The chapter “Mylai: An Examination of Group Evil” should be required reading to make sense of some events in the last 10 to 20 years of American life.

I’m not sure what event triggered my thoughts about this book, long gathering dust on my shelf.

My thoughts started with Peck wanting to treat evil in a person’s life as a mental disorder. Borderline personality. Obsessive-compulsive disorder. Paranoia. Possession by evil.

Peck describes evil he has dealt with in his psychological practice (which was far from common). He tells of a person who has been through an exorcism needing care from a psychologist. But, evil as something that should be in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual?

Read the book if you want his take on it.

My thoughts is that it does not work to treat matters of the spirit are not the same as, say, depression. Depression is not the same as a physical ailment, such as a cancer. A person with cancer can be depressed, but both require integrated but separate treatment.

Peck was drawn to this subject because of how evil affected his psychological practice. His problem was that, as a mental health professional, he saw the solution of spiritual problems in terms of a person’s mental health.

Pathologists do not compile the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual used by mental health professionals. Why should psychiatrists compile a manual to define spiritual disease? The experts in each domain take responsibility for their own domain.

We need a manual to define spiritual disease. But who is competent to do it?

Some may think that I am thinking about group evil done by some in the name of religion. There is some of that, true. I am thinking about something else, though.

A person is diagnosed with cancer. Places such as the Providence Cancer Care Partnership in Everett do ask spiritual questions of those coming into their system. They do not force answers upon patients. They ask if you want help with your questions. But, the overall tone seems more like mental health care.

Could a way be devised to diagnose spiritual illness and trauma in your life? Could specific treatments be targeted to specific spiritual ailments?

Scott Peck was interested in diagnosing evil with a medical model in a mental health environment. I think it would be better to develop a separate spiritual domain of practice, one that could and should be coordinated with the medical and mental health practices. That would be the truly useful tool.

Just don’t tell me to say three Hail Mary’s and to call my priest in the morning.

Related posts: