Règne de la Mère ou fonction du Père ? Une approche psychologique structurale de la dynamique religieuse

Résumé En

Using a case study of spiritual paternity in the context of a monastic community, this article attempts to show how the paternal fonction, in the psychoanalytical meaning of the term (Lacan) — a symbolic function to be distinguished from that of the agent - is fundamental in the psychological structuring of religious experience. Next to a first basic framework provided by the maternal atmosphere of the ecclesial community (cf. «Mater Ecclesia»), the paternal function takes the religious man away from the hold of the immediacy of the material world, which is typical of the reign of the mother, and allows the articulation of several psychological realities of religious life and thus becomes a factor of spiritual progress. Finally the psychoanalytical theory concerning paternity shows itself to be useful in order to distinguish between the necessity of this function and the various ways of exercising it and its deviations and also in order to formulate new hypotheses for the psychological understanding of contemporary forms of religiosity.