This is the first article in our Lenten Meditations 2019 series.
As a therapist, when I read the story of the Prodigal Son, I know something has to have been left out. A real family has dynamics that are necessarily more complex than what this story describes. For example, my therapeutic instincts tell me there has likely been some trauma in the life of the younger son, prior to that self-inflicted trauma brought about by his leaving home, though the story mentions nothing of that. Also, the older brother’s behaviors betray the possibility that he is living in compensation of some real or imagined deficiency in himself. Finally, the father’s one-sided response to the younger son belies what, on the surface, appears to be pure and unconditional love.
Something is hidden. What, though, might that be?
Can we playfully explore these psychological questions while remaining faithful to the story as it is told? One way of doing this is to insert into the story a hypothesis that is plausible, from a textual standpoint, and that bridges the gap between the description of this family and what we see of families in real life. To explore one possible hypothesis, I invite the reader to imagine that this family has, at some point, lost their wife and mother, leaving the father as a single parent. If we posit this scenario, we have some basis for understanding the behaviors of this story’s cast of players, and particularly of the enmeshment that seems to typify their interactions with each other—whether it be seen in the desperate attempt of the younger son to find his independence, the exaggerated adaptation of the older son to the environment of his father, or the father’s immoderate embrace of his younger son, and his overlooking of behaviors that might reasonably evoke concern in a loving and wise father. Read More
ORTHODOXY IN DIALOGUE 