Oh, it's a disease
A rather long quote from G.K. Chesterton and some commentary from me.
“But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong an element of will, of what theology calls free will. You cannot finish a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one Differential calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed Romeo he might have married him to Juliet’s old nurse if he had felt inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly because it has insisted on the theological free will. It is a large matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. The fallacy of the while thing is that evil is a matter of active choice whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, “Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be profligates.” A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must not lie still if he wants to be cured of sin; on the contrary, he must get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; “”patient” is in the passive mood; “sinner” is in the active. If a man is to be saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from forging, he must be not a patient but an impatient. He must be personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the active not the passive will.”
-G.K. Chesterton
I won’t get into the aspects where Chesterton props up “free will” as a viable option in dealing with people’s salvation but the concept that I think he is trying to bring out is the aspect of people’s ability to have control over their actions. I put in this whole quote to give some background to what I thought was the most important part. And that important part is treating “crime as disease”. I attended and graduated from Kansas State University with a degree in Psychology and from this I have learned all the enemies’ plays. One of those plays is what Chesterton is hitting here, and that is calling sin a disease. Modern, and for that matter all modes of psychology, employ methods that try to lessen sin. Sin is actually a taboo word, and more so in those who claim to use “Christian” psychology.
If you are talking to or in some way dealing with a “Christian” psychologist you ought to ask them; “What makes this Christian psychology?”. The answer is surprising in that there really isn’t one. All they can come to is that they are Christian and in some way this comes through. And to a certain extent that is true. Since we live our theology if they are truly Christian then their brand of counseling would employ some biblical aspects, but since they are building upon a foundation of humanism (psychology) then at the root of what they are giving is poison. They would be better off being honest and say that they are just like everyone else than to claim that they are trying to be Christian.
I worked at a place for three years that claimed to use “Christian” psychology and sadly they didn’t see what I was talking about. For instance, if a news reporter were talking about teenage mothers who are crack-heads it would be really startling if when turning over the story they said, “Well Jim, what these kids really need is repentance. Back to you Jim.” That is of course the furthest thing from reality. The blame either gets shifted from the children to the parents from the parents to society and from society to education. In the end education becomes the savior and Christ is left out. Psychology, in an amazing step to leave Christ completely out of the whole mix, says that this sin of immorality is really just an “addiction” and the person can’t help it anyway. Therefore since it is an addiction, and that is just a slow step towards disease, then the person needs “counseling” and medication to supplement the “chemical imbalance”.
This is all just another rehash of the Garden of Eden where Eve blames the serpent for causing her to sin, then her husband also Adam, in a dramatic display of manliness, blames his wife of causing him to sin and then ultimately God. Blame shifting has been our way since Genesis chapter 3 and it is no different now, except now we blame our parents, genes, environment, social economic status, minority status, “addictions”, or _______. Yet despite all this God still holds us responsible for our sin and we will have to give an account for every idle word we have spoken. And at the same time this is true, God, in his infinite mercy has sent his son and out of His love for us he has died for us so that we will be made free. So, in the end God is more compassionate than we are and at the same time more just than we are.
“But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong an element of will, of what theology calls free will. You cannot finish a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one Differential calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed Romeo he might have married him to Juliet’s old nurse if he had felt inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly because it has insisted on the theological free will. It is a large matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. The fallacy of the while thing is that evil is a matter of active choice whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, “Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be profligates.” A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must not lie still if he wants to be cured of sin; on the contrary, he must get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; “”patient” is in the passive mood; “sinner” is in the active. If a man is to be saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from forging, he must be not a patient but an impatient. He must be personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the active not the passive will.”
-G.K. Chesterton
I won’t get into the aspects where Chesterton props up “free will” as a viable option in dealing with people’s salvation but the concept that I think he is trying to bring out is the aspect of people’s ability to have control over their actions. I put in this whole quote to give some background to what I thought was the most important part. And that important part is treating “crime as disease”. I attended and graduated from Kansas State University with a degree in Psychology and from this I have learned all the enemies’ plays. One of those plays is what Chesterton is hitting here, and that is calling sin a disease. Modern, and for that matter all modes of psychology, employ methods that try to lessen sin. Sin is actually a taboo word, and more so in those who claim to use “Christian” psychology.
If you are talking to or in some way dealing with a “Christian” psychologist you ought to ask them; “What makes this Christian psychology?”. The answer is surprising in that there really isn’t one. All they can come to is that they are Christian and in some way this comes through. And to a certain extent that is true. Since we live our theology if they are truly Christian then their brand of counseling would employ some biblical aspects, but since they are building upon a foundation of humanism (psychology) then at the root of what they are giving is poison. They would be better off being honest and say that they are just like everyone else than to claim that they are trying to be Christian.
I worked at a place for three years that claimed to use “Christian” psychology and sadly they didn’t see what I was talking about. For instance, if a news reporter were talking about teenage mothers who are crack-heads it would be really startling if when turning over the story they said, “Well Jim, what these kids really need is repentance. Back to you Jim.” That is of course the furthest thing from reality. The blame either gets shifted from the children to the parents from the parents to society and from society to education. In the end education becomes the savior and Christ is left out. Psychology, in an amazing step to leave Christ completely out of the whole mix, says that this sin of immorality is really just an “addiction” and the person can’t help it anyway. Therefore since it is an addiction, and that is just a slow step towards disease, then the person needs “counseling” and medication to supplement the “chemical imbalance”.
This is all just another rehash of the Garden of Eden where Eve blames the serpent for causing her to sin, then her husband also Adam, in a dramatic display of manliness, blames his wife of causing him to sin and then ultimately God. Blame shifting has been our way since Genesis chapter 3 and it is no different now, except now we blame our parents, genes, environment, social economic status, minority status, “addictions”, or _______. Yet despite all this God still holds us responsible for our sin and we will have to give an account for every idle word we have spoken. And at the same time this is true, God, in his infinite mercy has sent his son and out of His love for us he has died for us so that we will be made free. So, in the end God is more compassionate than we are and at the same time more just than we are.
posted by T A Lucas | 12/30/2006
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home