Not Too Hysterical

If what the Rev. Michael Kane writes about New Standards for Pastoral Care (4/10) is true, I wonder, as a psychiatrist, why any man would even venture to become a priest. The priestly role is already a lonely one in our day, but according to him things are likely to make it even lonelierwith his bishop becoming an advocate for the diocese, and not a support for the priest, and his parishioners so likely to jump on him because something goes amiss in his counseling role that he had better get himself some malpractice insurance.

Frankly, I think the author is being carried away, perhaps because he may really be overly identifying the priest’s role with that of a psychotherapist, whose professional role is so much more clearly defined, while the role of a priest is much broader and not to be guided by rigid boundaries (the buzz word these days for mental health workers).

As I read the Virtus Model Code of Pastoral Conduct,I really get no sense of the doom and gloom he implies to be there. Rather I get a good picture of very reasonable principles to guide a priest in his counseling role, some rather common-sense principles that I assume are easily followed by men with the level of education enjoyed by current priests. Nor do I sense a stage being set for bishops to abandon their supportive role to the clergy. Please, let’s not get too hysterical in the aftermath of the sexual abuse debacle.

Donald J. Carek, M.D.