The psychological impact of authentic Catholic teaching should lead one to out-right reject any character formation based on improving a person’s self-esteem. Any self-esteem character formation will only lead people to narcissism or nihilism. Either way you’re forming a god-complex amongst a pantheon of defeatists.
As a proud, educated Catholic, I abhor the whole notion of having a “healthy self-esteem.” And I am one who has been accused as having quite the healthy self-esteem. Of course, I retort, “How could this be, I surely do not abhor myself?”
Faith is very influential in a person’s perception on reality. And a person who holds dearly the teachings of the Catholic Church as fundamental to their faith understands that we are to align our subjective reality with that of objective reality. In other words, what I see as real, better in fact be real. If I honestly believe the sky is down and not up, then others will find me rightly “not right in the head.”
Same goes for the whole notion of self-esteem. If I honestly believe that I find myself in high regards, but in fact I am a lying, cheating, stealing, murdering, self-promoting evil-doer then honestly what good is “self-esteem?” The greatest imagery for the logical end result of a self-esteem character formation program can be found in the movie, Being John Malkovich. By the end of the movie, everyone is Malkovich, saying only one word, “Malkovich.”
If on the other hand, I “look myself in the mirror” and realize that I am a lying, cheating, stealing, murdering, self-promoting evil-doer then I am left facing reality—an objective reality in the person standing before the mirror and a subjective reality in the image of the person in the mirror.
So I argue that self-esteem leads one to never see the “True Self” but only the “Self-perpetuating Person.” Yet if I focus on a character formation that takes self-image seriously, then I am compelled to confront reality. The person in the mirror I see needs to be a person who sees beyond oneself to a higher authority.
Therefore when focusing on self-image, I must ask myself which image am I to be like? Being Catholic, I believe that I am created in the image and likeness of God. So I am in my self-image to be an image of God. What does God look like? Not John Malkovich.
