Sacred Psychoanalysis - etheses Repository - University of ...

Figure 2. A dominant psychoanalytic interpretative framework
Psychoanalysts within this framework see religious or spiritual concerns as issues of
pathology or cultural expressions to be interpreted by a dominant psychoanalytic discourse.
Copper, an influential and respected analyst in the USA (Cooper 2006, 2005) commented,
In my opinion, religion and spirituality are appropriate topics for psychoanalytic
investigation, and totally inappropriate as foundational ideas within psychoanalysis.
As your note indicates, spirituality cannot be delinked from religious thought and,
once again, religion is an important topic for analytic investigation, but not a base
for analytic ideas. I find recent attempts to connect spirituality (religion) and
psychoanalysis deplorable, part of an attempt to replace scientific investigation by
mystical belief. The significant components of what most people mean by
spirituality - sensitivity, empathy, altruism, some sense of our limited place in the
universe, etc. - are each of vast importance in understanding human behavior (sic.)
and are not appropriately represented by religious belief, which as often as not
supports prejudice, tribalism, murder, etc. Obviously, I feel strongly (Cooper 2009).
Cooper is not unrepresentative in holding such views (Britton 2006). 513 A similarly strong
and diametrically opposed view is represented in figure 3 on the following page.
513 See also the interview and comments made by AN in chapters twenty-two and twenty-three.
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