Emotional trauma/abuse and culturally-rooted "guilt" mindset in Catholic life

[iwillrisenowinfaith]

Blessings and peace to all you out there reading

If you clicked on this topic, you or someone you know may have experienced emotional abuse or trauma. I am currently on the long road to working through and healing in this area.

Something that’s come up in the work is that because an abuse of obligation and guilt permeated the traumatic relationship(s) that I’ve been exploring, “guilting” practices elsewhere (even when the intentions behind them are good), including Catholic parish life, have more of a negative impact on my mental health. While I think this type of “guilting” stems from the way some folks are raised within certain predominately Catholic cultures (and is, therefore, not necessary to living a Catholic life), it’s often a pervasive part of what we’re taught is for our own spiritual growth as Catholics (so we tend to think that it IS what being Catholic is about).

For those who have experienced this phenomenon (or something similar) - how do you work through it?

And a broader question for everyone: what helps you focus on what is truly Catholic beyond what comes from human cultures and perhaps something like intergenerational trauma rather than the Faith itself?

 

[mrsdizzyd]

Are you seeing a Catholic counselor?

I ask this because I have done and continue to do a lot of trauma work. In my experience, people who are not from a religious background are quick to blame the religion rather than focusing on the ways in which an abusive person might have manipulated the faith in order to continue their abuse.

 

[0Scarlett_nidiyilii]

Yes. I’ve found that Catholicism, properly understood and implemented, is a force for healing and sanity.

But used by unscrupulous or even well-meaning but ignorant people can be used as a stick to beat others into submission.

…Aaand this is why we lose so much when we become illiterate in our faith by bad catechesis and poor understanding of Scripture

 

[iwillrisenowinfaith]

Good thought. The counselor that I’m meeting with for the trauma therapy itself isn’t but I do know a Catholic counselor I can reach out to

0Scarlett_nidiyilii, yes, we lose so much and so many of the faithful this way too.

 

[PetraG]

I think one big thing is to come to a proper understanding of the function of the emotion of guilt.
Guilt is like a smoke alarm. When you feel it, you are being prompted to ask yourself if you are doing wrong. Once you’ve noticed it, you can, like a smoke alarm, ignore it. You can even learn to turn it off. Then you can go do what, if anything, is needed to turn yourself and the situations you’ve left in your wake to the right. You don’t need guilt blaring the whole time to do that! The thing to convince yourself of is that guilt does not help you to actually put anything right. It does no good except as a warning mechanism.

Guilt is damaging when people do not appreciate that it can give false positives–you feel guilty when you’ve done nothing wrong–and false negatives–you don’t feel guilty even though you have done wrong. The emotion of guilt is meant to inform your conscience. It was never meant to be your conscience.

The other thing to understand is that guilt is also like physical fire alarms in that some people like to pull it in order to get other people drop everything they’re doing to run around. You will learn, when you feel guilt, to ask if someone else is callously pulling your alarm in order to manipulate you. You don’t want to just ignore all fire alarms from the person, but you won’t let them upset you so much.

Shame? Shame is the work of the devil. Our Lord can deliver you from shame and teach you healthy and blessed contrition, which is full of hope and trust and not self-loathing, in spite of the necessity of coming to a knowledge of our sins.