The Subscription to Innocence

Modern therapy is the new Church of Shame. You confess your sins while the therapist-priest hands you absolution: “Your core self is pure. Have faith. You should not feel ashamed. Breathe.”

The rituals have changed, but the logic hasn’t. Yesterday it was candles, prayers, and avlatsbrev. Today it’s pastel walls, mindfulness bells, and above all a fee per 50 minutes. Forgiveness is on subscription.

And just like the medieval church, therapy thrives on the cycle: you come ashamed, you pay, you leave cleansed until the next relapse, when you must return for another round of purchased innocence.

So I have to ask; when does our Martin Luther arrive? Who will nail the 95 theses to the clinic door and declare: “Shame cannot be erased with mantras and metaphors! It must be faced, not outsourced to professionals selling absolution!”

Until then, the congregation grows, the collection plate fills, and shame, our most human compass is treated as pathology, cured one indulgence at a time. What a shame.