Richard Fitzgibbons, a psychiatrist and frequent commentator on marriage issues, was recently appointed a consultor to the Congregation for the Clergy.
Dr. Rick Fitzgibbons has practiced psychiatry for more than 30 years.As director of the Institute for Marital Healing near Philadelphia, Fitzgibbonsspecializes in helping married couples heal their relationships.
Hiswork extends beyond marital problems, however; he helps priests, religiousorders and seminarians deal with the challenges of celibate life, and hispatients also include singles and children.
Appointedas a consultant to the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy last December,Fitzgibbons shows a remarkable humility in spite of his accomplishments —humility apparently rooted in his own conviction that his success comes fromfollowing the teachings of the Church, particularly the writings of John Paul IIon the human person, marriage and family. He spoke with Register correspondentRobert Kumpel.
How did youfeel when you learned you were appointed a consultor to the Congregation forthe Clergy?
Verysurprised. Very thankful. I was honored. Over the last 33 years, I’ve had thepleasure of working with clergy in many dioceses and religious communities, aswell as formation teams at seminaries and seminarians, most recently inDenver. I address the topic of resolving conflicts in self-giving as spiritualfathers and spouses of the Church to priests and seminarians and to couples onovercoming these weaknesses in marriage. These issues are presented on ourwebsite, MaritalHealing.com.
Thepriest’s section at your website has topics like p*rnography, falseaccusations, adolescent males as victims of sexual abuse, and loneliness. Howprevalent is loneliness?
Oneof the major emotional challenges in priesthood, as well as in the sacrament ofmarriage, is that of protecting oneself from loneliness. There is, of course,no reason why a priest should feel lonely.
However, what can occur is that a priest canexperience loneliness because he is not giving himself enough in priestlyfriendships or to the Lord or because he has unresolved loneliness from earlierlife stages, including childhood and adolescence. This understanding can helpin addressing the healing of this pain, with the Lord’s help.
Self-knowledgeof one’s emotional weaknesses is very important so that one can work to resolvethem before priestly ordination and before marriage. We need newer programs tohelp both seminarians and engaged individuals to uncover conflicts whichinterfere with cheerful self-giving, particularly loneliness, insecurities andthe selfishness which permeates this culture. With more self-knowledge, thisemotional pain can be resolved.
Would you say that there is aproblem with hom*osexuality in the priesthood today?
I’ve written about the crisis in theCatholic Church and contributed to “hom*osexuality and Hope” of the Catholic MedicalAssociation. I am not aware of a difference in prevalence of hom*osexuality inthe priesthood compared to the rest of the population, which is between 1.5%and 3% in males. There are those who would say it may be higher in thepriesthood because of some of the problems in the seminaries in the ’70s and’80s.
Why is same-sex “marriage”something that we should be concerned about?
Weshould be concerned about it for a number of reasons. First, we want people tobe in loving, committed and exclusive relationships. Many research studiesdemonstrate that those in the hom*osexual lifestyle experience a lack ofexclusivity and commitment, and as a result, develop significant lonelinesswith depressive illness, difficulty in trusting and anxiety disorders, andsubstance-abuse disorders. In addition, many studies report that between 35%and 55% of people in hom*osexual lifestyles report being abused by others in thelifestyle; that also contributes to a high prevalence of psychiatric illnessand substance abuse.
Secondly,we should be concerned for cultural reasons. The basis of society is the familybased on a marriage between a man and a woman. Also, the gold standard forraising children is a home with a mother and father who are married. Children have the right to a father and amother; adults do not have the right to children. Same-sex unions are highlyunstable and, therefore, are dangerous to children. Pope Benedict has writtenthat to deliberately deprive a child of a father or mother in same-sex adoptionis an act of violence against a child.
You oncesaid that hom*ophobia is not the cause of these disorders. A number of peoplewould disagree and argue that the hom*osexual community suffers more rejectionthan the rest of the population.
Thecauses of the higher prevalence of psychiatric disorders in the lifestyle areprimarily the lack of exclusivity and commitment. One study cited by theCatholic Medical Association’s “hom*osexuality and Hope” revealed that thelargest number of new HIV cases in Amsterdam come from those in “unions” or“committed relationships.” Most studies on traditional marriages demonstratefidelity being between 75% to 85%. But fidelity is virtually unknown insame-sex relationships. In fact, many don’t want fidelity. McWhirter and Mattison’smajor study on relationships between males in same-sex unions, The Male Couple, found that out of 156 couples, only seven had exclusive sexualrelationships, most had been together less than five years, and those who hadbeen together longer had a provision for outside sexual activity in theirrelationship. Many reported feeling terribly lonely because of the absence ofcommitment.
That’s the second time you’vementioned loneliness. It sounds like the problem of loneliness afflictseveryone. Is that the case?
The first words spoken by God aboutthe human condition were: “It is not good for the man to be alone.” I believeGod could have communicated much more in Genesis about the severe difficultiesassociated with the pain of being isolated from others and God. (We could have10 more chapters in Genesis telling us all the problems that it causes.)Loneliness is the most common emotional wound that we address in children,teenagers, adults, married people, priests, nuns and seminarians.
Manypeople struggle with loneliness and don’t recognize its role in their lives.Why? Because we deny our emotional pain with our intellect with the result thatthe greater the emotional pain, the greater the impairment of the intellect,leading to difficulties remembering, concentrating or thinking clearly. The keyis recognizing our loneliness and, with God’s help, addressing it.
What kindof work are you doing to promote traditional marriage?
Wetry to help couples understand that self-giving is the essence of marital love,and then we attempt to uncover their weaknesses and work to resolve them. Werelate that if they want a happy marriage they need to have a healthypersonality. Our approach is in the field of positive psychology, which focusesupon growth in virtues to strengthen the personality and to resolve emotionalpain. Instead of just rehashing the past, we recommend the use of virtues tohelp people deal with their emotional conflicts.
I notice you use the term“virtue.” A lot of your writings also focus on forgiveness. Those terms arefrom a different lexicon than you’ll hear from most mental-healthprofessionals.
There is a great deal of wisdom inlearning the benefits of using virtues in addressing the human passions (byexercising virtues). Positive psychology is basically revisiting Westerncivilization’s major approaches to address character weaknesses. This is theapproach we take with marital healing. If you want a healthy marriage, thenwork on having a healthy personality. So how does one get a healthypersonality? A spouse can maintain a healthy personality by daily growth invirtues, which diminish the role of selfishness and emotional conflicts.
Unfortunately, much harm has beendone to marriage over the past 40 years by mental-health professionalsencouraging couples to always express their passions and to look out for No. 1.You obtain a healthy personality by learning how to control your passions. Thiswas one of Christianity’s gifts to the world, but it has been lost bymental-health professionals who say, “Oh no! You’ve got to express yourpassions or you’ll be a neurotic.”
Can you comment on the role offaith in your work?
Manypeople have areas of intense emotional pain — of sadness, anger, mistrust andanxiety and weaknesses in confidence or selfishness from childhood, adolescenceor young adult life that limit their marriages, priesthood and religious life.In John Paul II’s words, “They are prisoners of their past.” Medication andpsychotherapy is insufficient in healing these deep wounds. However, as in thetreatment of addictive disorders, if you bring in a spiritual component intothe process, remarkable healings can occur. The mental-health field needs torecognize that the increasingly serious emotional wounds we are dealing with inour culture are so profound that without a spiritual component, recovery andhealing are unlikely to occur.
Robert Kumpel writes
from Valdosta, Georgia.
