45 How Shame Leads Us to Idolatry

Dec 7, 2020

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Intro: Welcome to the podcast Coronavirus Crisis: Carpe Diem!, where by God’s grace, you and I rise up and embrace the possibilities and opportunities for spiritual and psychological growth right now, in these days, all grounded in a Catholic worldview. We are going beyond mere resilience, to rising up to the challenges in our lives and becoming even healthier in the natural and the spiritual realms. I’m clinical psychologist Peter Malinoski and I am here with you, to be your host and guide. This podcast is part of Souls and Hearts, our online outreach at soulsandhearts.com, which is all about shoring up our natural foundation for the Catholic spiritual life, all about overcoming psychological obstacles to being loved and to loving God and neighbor -- it short, this podcast is all about relationships -- it's all about becoming much more relational in our lives and in our faith.
1. This is episode 45, released on December 7, 2020
2. Thank you for being here with me.
3. and it is the ninth episode in our series on shame.
4. and it is titled: How Shame Leads Us to Idolatry
5. We are now Diving into the spiritual dimension of shame.
6. This podcast is all about transformation -- fundamental transformation of all of us -- all parts of us. Even the parts we keep secret, hidden.
  1. This podcast is all about removing psychological obstacles to following the two great commandments
  2. Not entertainment. Not about having a good time, just enjoying a entertaining podcast, funny and distracting.
  3. No this podcast is about developing a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, a personal relationship with the Holy Spirit, a personal relationship with God our spiritual Father, and a personal relationship with the Blessed Virgin Mary, our spiritual Mother
  4. Any psychological obstacles you have to relating with others, you will have in relating to God.
    1. You will bring those relational inhibitions, those relational problems into your spiritual life because they are formed into you and they have not been healed through experiencing throughout your whole being who God really is.
    2. Spiritual realm is not some special place where the relational limitations you have are just dispensed, you're no longer trouble with them. No, you are still you in the spiritual realm.
  5. Any psychological issues you have with your earthly father and mother you will bring into your relationship with God as Father and Mary as Mother.
    1. Child psychologist -- transferences
Two major assumptions in the natural realm for why we don't have a personal relationship with a loving God.
1. Assumption 1. We do not believe that we are worthy to be in relationship with God -- driven by shame
1. Assumption 2. We do not believe that God is worthy to be in relationship with us -- driven by negative God images -- see episodes 23-29
  1. Idolatry. We are not worshiping God as He is.
1. And here is the more tragic part: We stay with those assumptions, even though they are so manifestly problematic and harmful. We don't seek, we assume that assumptions one and two are true.
1. Her is the great offer I am making to you. I am inviting you on an adventure, an adventure to discover who you really are, an adventure to discover who God really is, and adventure in learning to relate and to connect with our God, our God who is personal, who is relational, who is loving, who is Love Himself.
1. If you really knew who God was and you really knew who you are, and you really knew how God truly saw you -- you would always run to His loving arms. You really would.
1. But you don't know these realities at a deep, integrated level. We know them to some degree in our heads, in a theological way, in an abstract way, we can quote the Catechism. But not in our hearts, our souls, and our bones.
1. In fact, at a gut level, at an intuitive level the vast majority of us have varying degrees of certainty or confidence in very warped assumptions about ourselves and assumptions about God. These assumptions are wildly different from what God reveals to us about who he is and who we are through Scripture, through Tradition, and through the perennial teachings of our Catholic Church. In our hearts, in our bodies, in the depths of our souls, in our unconscious, We believe in lies. This is so common. And it's deadly and so much of it is driven by shame.
Review of Shame
1. Definition of Shame
  1. Explored this in a lot of detail in Episode 37, the first in our series on shame. Shame is:
    1. The primary problem we have in the natural realm -- foundational problem. Grace perfects nature, if our natural foundation is infused with shame, it makes the foundation for our spiritual life shaky, unreliable, uncertain.
    2. That gives birth to so many secondary problems -- we tend to focus on the secondary problems, the problems that are further downstream -- so we are not getting to the root.
2. 1. Shame is: a primary emotion, a bodily reaction, a signal, a judgement, and an action. (Click to episode 38 for a summary)
3. 1. Qualities of shame
    1. Shame is hidden. Hidden from others, hidden from God, often hidden from the therapist, hidden from self.
  2. 1. Shame inhibits positive emotions
4. 1. Strategies for coping with shame
1. Chronic shame needs to be attenuated, reduced, titrated, ordered, regulated.
  1. Chronic shame develops when a little boy or little girl has a sense of being rejected, unwanted, a burden.
  2. When the child changes behaviors, does what he can to be better in the eyes of the adult and still is rejected, he can conclude that he just is a bad kid.
  3. The difficulty is in the response of the others -- the caregivers.
  4. But the child bears the burden of shame caused by the shaming of the caregivers.
  5. Child sees parts of himself that are unacknowledged and unacceptable
  6. Ostracized or invaded.
1. And we assume that God responds to us like our shaming caregivers -- soulset. We generalize from our experiences of shame and assume that God is like those caregivers. This is called a transference.
  1. Transference is a phenomenon within psychotherapy in which the feelings a person has about their parents, as one example, are unconsciously redirected or transferred onto the therapist. It usually concerns feelings from a primary relationship during childhood.
1. Ubiquity of Shame.
Shame as the silent killer -- Episode 37
1. Shame can lead to spiritual death.
1. Shame is the Silent Killer who Stalks you from inside (episode 37) and despair is the murder weapon.
1. Spiritual view on this
  1. Primary struggle is against powers and principalities.
2. 1. Satan's goals -- personal relationship with you.
    1. Satan is real, folks. Big effort in certain very mainstream Christian c...