Catholic guilt
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Catholic guilt is the feeling of remorse, self-doubt, or personal responsibility that results when a Catholic or Lapsed Catholic engages in sinful acts. Habitual obsessive guilt over trivial or imagined sins is the error of scrupulosity.
It must be noted that the term Catholic Guilt is controversial: for some Catholics, lapsed Catholics and even non-Catholics, the term is used to express a sense of "liberation" from what they see as a misguided, outdated, or misinterpreted moralism; for others, it connotes a dismissive or belittling attitude toward traditional Catholic moral teachings, or an attempt to "psychologize" or "secularize" what they see as authentic spirituality. The term is often seen, therefore, as either a disparagement of traditional Catholicism or as a statement of psychological maturity.
See also
- Guilt society
- Lapsed Catholic
- On the Genealogy of Morality
- Obsessive compulsive disorder
- Religion and sexuality
- Scrupulosity