Our Threatened Freedom

Are Psychology and Psychiatry Scientific? (03:04)

R.J. Rushdoony

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:01 Are psychology and psychiatry scientific? This is R.J. Rushdoony with a report on our freedom.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:08 Are psychology and psychiatry deserving of the classification of science? Is psychotherapy valid? Is it a genuine method of feeling and understanding? Quite obviously, some people have a great deal of faith in psychotherapy. Increasingly, public schools have staff psychologists or counselors trained in psychotherapy. Some doctors recommend psychotherapy for mentally troubled patients. The Veterans Administration and other civil agencies rely on psychotherapy. Court-ordered examinations of criminal offenders are an important part of many trials. Many seminaries and churches train their pastors in psychotherapeutic methodologies.

R.J. Rushdoony: 00:49 Increasingly, however, men from within psychology and psychiatry are challenging the basic premises of their disciplines. One of the key figures here has been the psychiatrist, Dr. Thomas [Zoss 00:01:02], M.D., who has attacked the very idea of mental sickness. More recently, Drs. Martin [Bogdan 00:01:09] and Deirdre [Bogdan 00:01:11], psychologists, have added their weight to this challenge. The problem, they point out, with others is not mental sickness, but sin.

R.J. Rushdoony: 01:21 Earlier, Hans J. [Isanct 00:01:25] study showed that psychotherapy is not effective at treating mental disorders. In fact, people are more likely to improve if they avoid all forms of psychotherapy. The evidence indicates that psychotherapy can be harmful. The [Bogdans 00:01:42] conclude that psychotherapy is not a science. Jay [Ziskin 00:01:46] a California State University psychologist, in discussing psychiatric examinations of criminals has said that such a diagnosis is more likely to be wrong than right and it is most likely to be wrong in trying to determine the mental condition of a criminal at the time of the crime.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:05 The [Bogdans 00:02:06], in their book, The Psychological Way, The Spiritual Way remind us that the biblical way of dealing with mental and moral problems is, and has always been the most effective, and the one enduring method of coping with man’s problems. Except where physical diseases create problems, thus calling for medical relief, man’s problems have, as their cause, a spiritual or religious problem. To seek relief from a moral problem in non-moral means it to aggravate the problem.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:41 But psychotherapy is powerful, because it is [inaudible 00:02:45] and our humanistic … people want to deal with us and our children by means of humanism. Psychotherapy is thus an alien plan of salvation, and an enemy to Christianity.

R.J. Rushdoony: 02:59 R.J. Rushdoony on our problems and freedom.