Psychic Wholeness and Healing by Anna A. Terruwe and Conrad W. Baars

Abstract

Dutch doctor and psychotherapist Anna Terruwe (1911–2004) spent her career counseling Catholic priests despite occasional opposition from within the Church. She reoriented Freudian psychoanalysis through Thomistic moral theology. Her writings have remained largely unknown aside from the translations and work of Dutch-American Conrad Baars (1919–1981). Baars attributed the saving of his own psychiatric practice in the US to his reading of and subsequent collaboration with Terruwe. Psychic Wholeness and Healing brings together some of their writings, starting with sections of Terruwe’s updated doctoral thesis. Each chapter of the book builds on previous ones. The early discussion provides ample and clear background, and includes unique definitions and depictions of psychological processes, especially of neurosis and repression. Given how easily this body of thought may be misunderstood by both Catholic moral theologians and by non-Catholic psychoanalysts, this work of clarification is a key feature to Psychic Wholeness and Healing. Later chapters address the nature of repression and psychological issues, their treatment, the human drives, and emotional