Vicarious Trauma versus Pastoral Ministers

By Father Onyema Okorie

Counseling Intern

Idaho Catholic Charities

For the ICR

The recent tragic shooting of innocent schoolchildren during a Catholic school Mass in Minneapolis sent a chilling shockwave through the minds of American Catholics.

Fr. Onyema Okorie

Then the arrest of a Catholic priest for sexual battery of a minor in the city of Nampa, Idaho, left all Catholics in the Treasure Valley in shock and caused a ripple of emotions, including feelings of disappointment and embarrassment. In both cases, the U.S. Catholic Church and church officials responded in fervent prayers for the victims and their families and collaborated with law enforcement officials in the investigations.

I want to invite us Catholics to a deeper reflection on the side effects these tragic events had on us, precisely the psychological impacts.

I would like every one of us to think of him or herself as a victim of secondhand smoking. I will use the word “priests” to refer to all those involved in pastoral ministries, including parish staff and volunteers.

There is no doubt priests are jack of all trades. People come to us with all kinds of problems, thinking we are experts and hoping for some resolutions.

I often tell parishioners jokingly, “I am not Jesus and I don’t perform miracles.” But he (Jesus) promised to remain always with us and assured us we will perform mighty deeds in his name (John 14:12).

The primary vocation of every priest is to save souls — salus animarum est suprema lex (the salvation of souls is the supreme law). But, in our vocation of saving souls, we priests ended up doing more in the service of God and humanity. I also served as a military chaplain in the U.S. Air Force — 20 years of active-duty service with four deployments.

While on active-duty military service, I was exposed to traumatic situations. One of my experiences was receiving an emergency call right before celebrating Sunday Mass to give last rites to a victim/soldier whose body was 80% burned from an IED blast in Iraq.

Afterward, I remembered celebrating Sunday Mass with my hands still smelling strong from the burn (refer to an article by Kevin Dougherty, Stars and Stripes, “Chaplains: Near to soldiers wherever they go,” June 14, 2008).

I returned home from my deployments needing psychiatric and counseling help to help me process my wartime experiences and exposures.

Priests deal with so much in our ministries, making our lives so busy and susceptible to stress. According to Dr. Judy Berry, chair of psychology at Tulsa University, “Stress is an inevitable part of life and keeps us from being bored, but too much stress makes life difficult and can threaten health and psychological well-being” (My Clients, My Students, My Patients, Myself: Self-Care Advice for Caring Professionals, Center for Learning and Leadership/College of Medicine, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, 2012).

Also, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, “In recent years much research has been carried out showing that stress is one of the truly major health problems facing Americans. Priests and bishops are by no means exempt from this problem” (The Bishops’ Committee on Priestly Life and Ministry, United States Catholic Conference, The Priest and Stress, 1982).

The workloads for most priests come from dealing with parishioners’ life issues and concerns and traumas like accidents, illnesses, deaths, suicides and natural disasters like fire, flood, hurricanes and tornadoes.

Priests are often the first people most parishioners turn to in desperate times. Unavoidably, every parishioner we serve leaves behind an indelible footprint of their problems in our memory. Priests are very compassionate by nature and undeniably affected by the stories of those we serve — vicarious (or secondhand) trauma.

Vicarious trauma describes the side effects of every encounter we have. Those involved in human services like doctors, nurses, first responders, priests and pastoral ministers suffer vicarious trauma.

Vicarious (secondhand) trauma is evident in physical, emotional, mental and spiritual fatigue and burnout, often suffered in silence. This is where seeking counseling help becomes very critical in helping us process our traumatic experiences and side effects.

The USCCB exhorts, “A priest may find, too, at critical times in his life, professional counseling to be valuable. For example, a priest should be aware that during certain periods of life, such as middle age, he may experience some emotional problems or crises which may take some form of depression or mood change. Counseling can be of great help at such times and should not be considered extraordinary. Such crises often accompany transition periods between stages of adult development. They are normal growth problems and not pathological.”

Mental health concerns such as burnout, chronic stress, frustration, irritability, lethargy, depression and alcoholism can develop and need to be addressed in professional counseling.

“We believe that admitting the seriousness of the problem of stress in the life of the priest today is the first step toward an answer” (The Catholic Priest in the United States: Psychological Investigations, 1971, by Eugene C. Kennedy and Victor J. Heckler).

I cannot overemphasize the need for self-awareness and seeking self-care in professional counseling.

Often it takes those around us to notice such symptoms as anger, irritability, impatience, emotional outburst, etc. These are easily noticeable in military personnel (and in civilians) following their return home from deployment.

It is important to listen and make proper notes of honest feedback. Every priest needs to have a counselor he can talk to on a regular basis. When I was a newly ordained transitional deacon, my bishop asked me: “Onyema, do you play golf?” I said, “No.” Then he said, “What kind of a priest are you going to be? Either you choose a healthy habit or you will turn to scotch and become an alcoholic.”

There are healthy and unhealthy habits. Continued self-growth of priests is critical and totally depends on each of us. Self-evaluation should be an ongoing process throughout our priestly career.

An article published by the National Library of Medicine revealed frontline health care workers experienced detrimental mental health impacts during the COVID-19 pandemic, including anxiety, emotional distress, fatigue and burnout (www.pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov). It is said that those who work in health care professions are the worst at taking good care of themselves. They give so much in taking care of others, but invest little or no time in taking care of themselves.

It reminds us of the wagging tongues of the chief priests, scribes and elders at the foot of the cross while mocking Jesus — “He saved others but cannot save himself” (Matthew 27:41-42). We priests are the worst at taking good care of ourselves.

We often relegate our need for self-care while taking care of others (like biblical Martha), and in the process, we pay heavy prices of stress and burnout. Self-care is the individual priest’s responsibility. Self-care is all about the well-being of the priest — Nemo dat quod non habet (“You can’t give what you don’t have” by St. Augustine). There is no room for not practicing what we preach. A Greek philosopher, Socrates, is known for his exhortation: “Man know thyself, an unexamined life is not worth living.”

The primary focus of mental health counseling is cognitive recalibration (positive psychology) — a shift from pathological (drug) treatment to psychotherapy (counseling). The healing of my mental health, including PTSD, took place at the spiritual level — putting my faith and trust in God, engaging in spiritual and religious devotions, and my ministries as a priest in the celebrations of the sacraments, the celebration of the Mass and the reception of the Eucharist.

Father Onyema Okorie is a retired chaplain in the U.S. Air Force and is a part-time administrator at St. Joseph Station in Melba, Idaho. He holds a master’s in mental health counseling. In 2008, the U.S. Air Force named him a “Premier Combat Chaplain” and recognized him for “Amazing ministry to isolated forces,” including Special Forces units. He is currently a counseling intern at Catholic Charities of Idaho.