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A new priesthood: Psychotherapists

For centuries in the West, there was a figure in society who fulfilled a

function that is likely to sound very odd to modern secular ears. He

(there were no shes in the role) didnt sell you anything or fulfill any

material need, he couldnt fix your ox cart or store your wheat, he was

there to take care of that part of you called rather unusually the soul,

by which we would understand the psychological inner part, the seat of

our emotions and sense of deeper identity. Im talking about the priest,

the stock figure of pre-modern western life, who would accompany you

throughout your years, from earliest infancy to your dying breath,

attempting to make sure that your soul was in a good state to meet itsmaker.

Because in many Western countries, the priesthood is now a shadow of

its former self, a key question to ask might be: where have our

soul-related needs gone? What are we doing with all the stuff we used

to go to the priest for? Who is looking after it? The inner self has

naturally not given up its complexities and vulnerabilities simply

because some scientific inaccuracies have been found in the tales of the

seven loaves and fishes.

The secular response to the needs of the soul has tended to be private

and informal: we find our own solutions, in our own time, we construct

our own salvations as we see fit. Yet there remains in many a desire for

more interpersonal, structured solutions to help us deal with the

serious issues life throws us. Probably the most sophisticated

communal response weve yet come up with to the difficulties of what

we might as well keep calling, with no mystical allusions whatever, the

soul is psychotherapy. It is to psychotherapists that we bring the samekind of problems as we would previously have directed at a priest:

emotional confusion, loss of meaning, temptations of one kind or

another and, of course, anxiety about mortality.

From a distance psychotherapists look like they are already well settled

in the priest-like role and that there is nothing further to be done or

asked for. Yet one could argue that there are in fact a number of ways in

which contemporary psychotherapy has failed to learn the right lessons

from the priesthood and might benefit from a more direct comparisonwith it. My suggestion is that society would benefit if therapists were

more explicitly reorganised along the model set by the priesthood; that

therapists should be secular societys new priests.

Alain de Botton

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7/27/2019 A New Priesthood_ Psychotherapists _ Alain de Botton

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For a start, therapy remains a minority activity, out of reach of most

people, too expensive or simply not available in certain parts of the

country. There have been laudable efforts on the parts of activists to

introduce therapy into the medical system, but progress is slow and

vulnerable. The issue isnt just economic. Its one of attitudes. Whereas

Christian societies would imagine there was something wrong with you

if you didntvisit a priest, we tend to assume that therapists are theresolely for moments of extreme crisis and are a sign that the visiting

client might be a little unbalanced, rather than just human. A

principally physical model of the self is popular, which leads to a

preference for problems to be addressed by pills rather than

interpersonal relationships. This isnt to say that drugs are not

important in many situations, simply to make a supplementary case for

therapeutic conversation with a sympathetic other.

Theres also, in a serious sense, an issue of branding here. Therapistsare hidden away. You dont see them on the high street. They still arent

regulated as they should be. We dont make a place for them among

other needs like those for bread or electrical goods. Imagine if the need

for therapeutic dialogue was as honoured and recognised as the need

for a haircut or a go on an exercise machine. Imagine if seeing a

therapist wasnt a strange and still rather embarrassing pursuit.

Imagine if one could be guaranteed a certain level of service. Imagine if

the consulting rooms looked better and were more visible, to make a

case for the dignity of the activity.

Modern psychotherapists understanding of how humans work and

what they need to cope with existence is, in my eyes, immensely more

sophisticated than that of priests. Nevertheless, religions have been

expert at creating a proper role for the priest, as a person to talk to at all

important moments of life, without this seeming like a slightly

unhinged minority thing to do. Many people may well say that the cafe

and a few friends are all they need; after one or two big challenges, a

great many more may feel that life is sufficiently complicated thattheyd benefit from regular dialogue with a sympathetic third party in a

stigma-free, well-branded reassuring location. For those interested in

the challenge, theres a long way to go before therapy really plugs the

gap opened up by the decline in the priesthood.

2013

ew priesthood: Psychotherapists | Alain de Botton http://alaindebotton.com/a-new-priesthood-psychotherapists/

2 4.10.2013. 18:19