In psychology, there is a part of the underdeveloped person who falls into the category of being narcissistic labelled "narcissistic awe". Narcissistic awe may be described as the judgment of the narcissist who sees the parent or adult as either completely good and wonderful or completely bad. The person is incapable of seeing someone as a good person with faults and flaws.
This type of view is found among those with a narcissitic personality disorder. That person cannot see adults in authority as anything but in black and white terms.
A healthy child grows up realizing that his parents are good people but imperfect. He will not either demonize nor idolize the adult.
Now, I have been watching many people in the traditional camp of Catholicism turn against this present pope. They have demonized him to the point of denying any good in this man. Some of their judgment is based on faulty media reports, but some is based on the problem of "narcissistic awe".
Those who blame this pope for the evils of other priests and for the evils of the Church are exhibiting the downside of the "cult of personality", which, imo, grows out of "narcissistic awe." In other words, these people adore one pope unrealistically and hate another one unrealistically.
Popes, and, indeed, the Church of the past are idealized, into persons and institution which never really existed. I have written on the false romanticizing of the past concerning the Church before, but now I am writing about the root cause-narcissistic awe.
Very often, people who seem religious fall into this cult of personality growing out the inability to look at the adults in their lives realistically. One young person I know was abused as a child, but instead of demonizing the parent, she has fallen into deceitful idolization of that parent.
This may seem both impossible and amazing, but her own narcissism will not allow her to see the emotional truth of the situation.
So, too, with the pope blasters, who cannot see him as an imperfect man, chosen by the College of Cardinals, to be the pope. That he deserves the respect of office seems obvious.
Because of the decay of the healthy family, there seems to be more narcissists about than in the past. And, many of those in the Church are into papal blasting on a daily basis.
Time to look at narcissistic awe as the root of this cult of personality gone wild and on the negative side at this time in history.
to be continued....and see these posts
http://supertradmum-etheldredasplace.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-forgotten-past-has-been-romanticized.html
http://supertradmum-etheldredasplace.blogspot.com/2014/05/memoricide-and-memory-continued.html
