Psychohorror

“Respect only what brings joy, energy and purpose into your life.
Then follow your way, the way of magic and dream.”

„Hypnotherapy and relaxation technics are attractive primarily to those clients
who are looking for trance experiences.”

 

(quotations from sites of psychologists

 recommended on pszichologia.lap.hu)

As a Christian psychologist, for a couple of years I have pursued a therapy which integrates the tradition of Christian spiritual guidance with the knowledge of modern psychology. In this September I have included a description of it (at the moment in Hungarian only) on my page, and startlap.hu link portal.

I have sent it as a recommended link to a dozen of pertinent psychological pages of the

When I had sent the links of my gardening pages to the respective subpages of the same portal, about 80% included them, while 20% refused them. The excuses of refusal were not very plausible, but well, not everyone must like my cheek and pages.

Now I expected more or less the same proportion. However, it turned to be quite different. A lot of page owners have not even replied, and among those eight who did, two included my link while the rest refused it.

First I did not understand the reason. And then I, like the vodka in the joke, decided to go out and check who is this Ivan Ivanovich who keeps refusing me.

I found the following:

Conflict management page: “Dear Kata, thank you very much, I have included the link!”	1 esoteric link on the page – Both here and in the rest I only counted the explicitly esoteric links.
Parents page: “Dear link recommender. Thank you for visiting my page and recommending your link. I have included it, but in terms of my editorial principles, I have placed it in a different box.”	5 - 10 esoteric links
Consultation page: “Dear link recommender! The editor, in tems of the guideline concerning link recommendation, preferred not to include the link recommended by you.”	17 esoteric page and portal links
Health page: “Dear link recommender! The content of the page recommended by you does not have the necessary amount or quality of information which would make it really useful for the users visiting the Health page. And as the Health page does not have in view to function as a complete and exhaustive link collection, therefore I am sorry to say that I cannot include your link between the already existing ones.”	16 esoteric page and portal links, with an emphasis on esotericism and homeopathy
Psychological aid page: “Thank you for your recommendation, but the page proposed by you is no site, only a document (sic) which, in terms of the rules of our system, cannot be included in my page.”	50 esoteric page and portal links
Stress page: “Dear link recommender! Thank you for your proposal. Although your web page is pleasant, however, I cannot accept it, because its topic does not match the page edited by me.”	58 esoteric page and portal links
Self-knowledge page: “Dear link recommender! Thank you for your proposal. Although your web page is pleasant, however, I cannot accept it, because its topic does not match the page edited by me.”	66 esoteric page and portal links

All right. Now we already see who Ivan Ivanovich is. It is noteworthy that the better position he has, the more sneaky and insolent he is.

In the Consultation page he still clearly declares that he does not wish to include my page. I understand it well: if I opened a special section for esotericism, I would also not wish to include the link of a Christian on my page.

The editor of the Health page was impertinent enough to write about my exceptionally informative and well edited page (I can justifiably affirm this, after having visited the pages of several hundreds of psychologists) that it does not have the necessary amount and quality of information which would make it useful for the visitors of his page. Of course, if someone is looking for esotericism, the focus of his page, then he or she will certainly not find it on mine.

The editor of the Psychological aid page is more astute, and covers himself by referring to a never seen rule that stands above him. And he has all reason to cover himself, as he promotes oracle pages, horoscope and brain control as psychological aids. The one recommending all this is Imre Farkas, the president of the Győr-Sopron county branch of the Hungarian Psychological Aid by Phone for Children and Youth organization. Let us send oracles on the cell phones of every Hungarian children!

Krisztián Füredi, the editor of the Stress and Self-knowledge pages also edits the Hypnosis, Cognitive, NLP, Psychoanalysis, Psychodrama, Psychology, Psychotherapy, Personality and Social psychology pages. This means that he nailed more or less the complete field of psychology. Whoever is not included in his pages will not enter on the psychological web market which is increasingly covering the whole market.

So he does not strain himself to write that the topic of my site does not match that of the page edited by him. And the topic of his page is not what its title suggests, but what he likes. And he likes esotericism very much. This is not only indicated by the more than a hundred and twenty esoteric links on the Stress and Self-knowledge pages.

After having refused my link on the Psychology page with this excuse:

The content of the recommended page is relevant in every aspect, nevertheless I am sorry to say that I cannot accept it, as this topic is already completely covered by the other links on the page, so your link would not add extra information to the readers,

I thought, how great, if they completely cover it then I will easily find here all the other Christian psychologists. What I found, however, was the following:

About 20% of the psychologists linked by him exclusively follow some traditional clinical method, principally Freudian psychoanalysis. This is that 20% where the patient will suffer probably no injury, apart from eventually paying a lot of money for absolutely nothing. In any case, he or she will encounter a systematic, controlled and transparent method that does not intend to manipulate him or her, but to promote the evolution of his or her personality.

In the case of about 30% of the therapeutes on the page no information is given about their method. They only communicate to their future patient that if he or she will go to them then everything will be very good.

About 40% of the psychologists applies – either exclusively, or as a supplement – some manipulative technique, some sort of autogene training, relaxation, hypnose, katatim imaginative psychotherapy (KIP), neurolinguistic programming (NLP).

These manipulative techniques are usually recommended for a quickly relaxation to people suffering of stress. However, the relaxation basically works like a mild tranquillizer. It does not resolve the problem, only helps one in worrying less about it. If one continuously resorts to this solution, then the unresolved problem will look for another outlet. The patient will change symptoms, and from then on will go see the psychologist not about stress but about indigestion or computer addiction. If the psychologist manages to cure this on the level of symptoms again, then he can perfectly gain his living on a few patients until the end of his life.

The relaxation techniques are similar to mild tranquillizers also in that aspects that they are of no worth in the case of great stress. My psychologist friend who had learned autogene training, replied to me when I asked her why she did not use it in some really hard situation, that she could not relax when she was so nervous…

This is, however, the smaller problem. The bigger one is that what begins with the manipulation of the body, soon becomes the manipulation of the mind. The patient communicates with something – inner images, the subconscious, etc. – like with a person. However, our inner images and subconscious are no persons. There is nothing in your subconscious which was not put there by yourself. The contents of the subconscious can be uncovered, and this has therapic effect indeed. But you cannot communicate with it.

You can only communicate with the psychologist to whom you delivered yourself and who, for example in the case of NLP, applies techniques to go round the conscious resistance of the patient and to bring him in a modified mental state where his subconscious opens to the suggestions of the psychologists. And in the so-called katatim imaginative psychotherapy (KIP) the psychologist moves the patient to directly deliver him- or herself to various spiritual forces.

This means that with about the 40% of the psychologists on the Psychology page you are lucky if you only pay a lot of money for techniques that you cannot use for anything and do not receive hard esotericism by right of “psychology”.

Finally, it is exactly hard esotericism that is offered by a bit more than 10% of the psychologists on the Psychology page. Esotericism in every form, astrology, tarot, gurus and masters.

Everything is clear. No Christian psychologist is necessary here,

“as this topic is already completely covered by the other links on the page.”

One Mass offered for several persons

 “One Mass said for many persons can be just as profitable to each, according to the measure of his devotion, as if it were offered for one alone. The sun illuminates ten thousand people as easily as if they were but one person.” ¹


You should use this opportunity and to offer every Mass in which you participate for the most people possible. First I picked up at the beginning of the Mass the names of the people for whom I wanted to offer it. However, in this way half of them were omitted, and I spent the Mass by thinking about who was forgotten. So I began to compose various standard lists including their names, and I offer every Mass, besides my actual demands, for these lists. I have found this method quite useful for several years. Perhaps others will find it useful, too.

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¹ Reginald Garriogu-Lagrange: Life Everlasting. “26. CHARITY FOR THE POOR SOULS. How shall we exercise this charity.”In this book, Garrigou-Lagrange writes about the final things: the preparation for the death, the process of dying, the intelligence and will of the soul after its separation from the body, the individual judgement taking place in the moment of the death, the last judgement a the end of the world, the hell, purgatory and heaven.

Praying for those who will die

“Pray for those who will die during the Mass at which you are going to assist”, quotes Garrigou-Lagrange in his Life Everlasting ¹ an entry from the guest book of a French Carmelitan monastery.

The author of the entry did not explain it in detail, as at that time it was absolutely obvious, that the most effective intercession for the dead is the offering of the Mass. If you attend a Holy Mass, you can offer it not only for yourself, but for any number of requests and persons, and they too will have a share in the graces of the Mass just like him/her.

I think that this appeal is even more timely now than then. As there are less Masses and less people who offer them, therefore it is worth to offer the Mass on which you participate for all the people who die on that day, and – as so few people pray for them – also for the souls suffering in the Purgatory.

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¹ Reginald Garriogu-Lagrange: Life Everlasting. 7. FINAL IMPENITENCE. Deathbed Conversion. In this book, Garrigou-Lagrange writes about the final things: the preparation for the death, the process of dying, the intelligence and will of the soul after its separation from the body, the individual judgement taking place in the moment of the death, the last judgement a the end of the world, the hell, purgatory and heaven.

Sunday morning

Early Sunday morning, the sun just starts to shine in. On the days when it is too cold to drink my tea and pray in the garden, I sit on this bench and watch the garden from here.


This is what I see before me on this Sunday morning.



Opposite, the door to the garden.


This is what I see to the left. Between the two columns, a century old pine chest, and around the door, Afghan kilims. We bought them fifteen years ago in the Afghan carpet shop in Hajós street when nobody was interested in nomadic rugs yet. Probably they are the world’s cheapest nomadic carpet shop: some pieces are cheaper than on the spot, over there. It’s their secret how they do that.


Behind the gallery bar, our library.


The carpet to the left is made of a Qasqai camel foal hair rug and two Bakthiari flour sacks which I sewed together. The Qasqais and Bakhtiaris are two nomadic tribes in the western Iranian mountains, which, just like the other tribes in the area, produce fantastic hand-woven fabrics. We received them in Isfahan, in the bazaar, from the collection of Akbar Keshani with whom we spent a day and who asked us to take care of them as if he gave us his own children. The felt to the right was painted by me. If I remember well, it was in 1991 that we visited the exhibition of the ethnographic museum of Vienna on the carpets of an Afghan nomadic tribe. I wove for years, and I know a little bit about carpets. I was totally amazed by the incredibly high quality of their works. We spent several hours at the exhibition. Before exiting the room, we found a small table on the wall which explained that this tribe does not exist any more, they were destroyed during the war in Afghanistan. I made the felt in their memory, with a motif frequently used by them.


The beam of the gallery was carved by Tamás on the model of a mosque’s beam in Swat, a Northern Pakistani valley famous for its archaic wood carving. And the gallery bar was made by us and painted with medieval Armenian cross patterns.


This is the fireplace with the footprints left by Brumi. I usually repaint it every year after the heating season. I hope that I can do this year’s repainting next week.


The cabinets were found thrown out on the street in the seventh district twenty years ago, the straw hat is from the fair of Csíkszendomonkos/Sândominic in the Eastern Carpathians. The shawl on it from Southern India – Kerala –, where we were scanning medieval Syriac manuscripts in the jungle. The lute on the wall is a short-necked Afghan rubab used by one of our favorites, the Kurdish Kamkars Ensemble, formed by eight brothers. We bought it in the Istanbul Great Bazaar from Afghan merchants who, having seen how good owners of it we would be, gave it for a low price. The copy of a Serbian icon of the Christian Museum of Esztergom was made by Tamás’ sister for the inauguration of our house.


This is the front side of the cabinets found. I painted them over. On the right one there is, instead of a door, a woven katrinca from the archaic Hungarian group of Csángós living in Moldova. The table was made on the basis of Tamás’ designs by the same Northern Hungarian village carpenters who also made our roof, and it was painted by me.


And now the sun is finally out. Have a nice day everyone!

Contacting Him who we know loves us

 „…que no es otra cosa oración mental, a mi parecer, sino tratar de amistad, estando muchas veces tratando a solas con quien sabemos nos ama…” (Vida 8.5)


This is Saint Teresa of Avila’s famous definition of the internal prayer. As we are working on its new Hungarian translation, we have noticed that the hitherto latest version, made in the 1920s by the Carmelite father Ernő Szeghy, translates it like this::

„Because in my view the interior prayer is but an intimate friendship with God, inasmuch we often stay alone with Him, knowing that He loves us.” (Life 79.)

The phrase is nice and it includes the most important element of Teresa’s message, that the interior prayer is nothing else but an intimate relationship with God, who loves us. However, Teresa says more than what is mediated by the translation of Father Ernő. The definition of Teresa clearly includes the assertion that God is available and accessible already in this life, that one can experience Him and be in a real relationship with Him. The original sentence puts a very strong emphasis on human activity in this relationship. Teresa uses twice the verb tratar, which in various ways – from commerce to sexual relationship – refers to an intense contanct. Teresa does not simply say that the internal prayer is a relationship (although she could use an expression meaning exactly this), but she emphasizes that it is the maintenance of a relationship, tratar de amistad. And also the second half of the sentence does not simply affirm that during the prayer we are in the presence of God while we know that He loves us: but that we are in contact with Him, and in a very intense way at that: tratando.

„…because interior prayer, in my opinion, is but the maintenance of an intense relationship, taking time frequently to contact with Him who we know loves us…” (Life 8.5)

The difference affects the essence of our prayer and our relationship to God: whether we only think of Him or we also open ourselves to Him and collaborate with Him so He could transform our life as He wants. If we do not experience a transformation of our lives, then we are probably satisfied with the knowledge that God loves us, but we do not maintain a really intimate relationship with Him and we do not contact Him intensely enough.