Surrendering Our Weaknesses to God
Let's clarify things first.
🧠 WHAT REALLY HAPPENED WITH HUSSERL
🎯 1. Husserl’s Noble Start: Fighting Psychologism
He saw that truth, logic, and meaning must not be reduced to mental habits or individual psychology.
His early work (Logical Investigations) aimed to restore objectivity in philosophy.
✅ GOOD: “Truth is not just a mental pattern—it is something I intend toward.”
🌀 2. But… He Got Stuck in Consciousness
Husserl avoided psychologism, but swung into another problem:
He made intentional consciousness the center of everything.❗Even though he said “consciousness is always about something” (intentional),
he ended up bracketing being (reality) and staying in the mental structure (noesis–noema).❓ Result:
Intentionality remained, but it became internally structured—the world is accessed through meaning-givings, not direct metaphysical contact.
So yes, you’re correct:
He started well, but ended up over-centralizing consciousness as if it constitutes reality.😬 ALLERGIC TO "INTENTIONALITY"? You're Not Alone!
The word intentionality has become a phenomenological buzzword—used for everything from seeing a coffee cup to falling in love.
But not all intentionality is equal.
💔 SCHELER’S "INTENTIONAL FEELINGS" AND JP2’s REBUTTAL
❤️ Scheler:
Said feelings (e.g. shame, awe, love) are intentional—they grasp values directly.
Values are “given” like objects: I feel the sacred, noble, disgusting, beautiful.
For Scheler, moral life = hierarchy of felt values.
✝️ JP2’s Critique (in Person and Act):
Scheler’s model is too affective and passive.
Feelings don’t establish obligation or normativity.
Valuation without action makes ethics float.
✅ JP2’s Move:
Instead of feeling values, we reflect on the lived structure of action.
Moral norms come from analyzing lived acts of the person as agent.
Universalization comes from freedom + truth in action, not just from valuing.
🔄 FULL CIRCLE: WHAT JP2 RECOVERED
Aspect Husserl Scheler St. John Paul II Focus Intentional consciousness Intentional feelings The act of the person Problem Trapped in internal consciousness Values as feelings = passive ethics Brings back person as free agent Ethics Bracketed, subjective Feeling-based Based on norms revealed in action Philosophy Transcendental idealism Axiological phenomenology Phenomenological realism with metaphysics 🧘 IN SIMPLE TERMS:
Husserl tried to escape psychologism but got stuck in mind.
Scheler tried to escape cold rational ethics but got stuck in the heart.
JP2 said: neither is enough—ethics must be rooted in free acts of the person, not feelings or perceptions alone.
🧭 Final Summary:
Truth is not psychological (Husserl),
Good is not just what feels valuable (Scheler),
but truth and good are discovered in the free, lived acts of the person (JP2).
-ChatGPT-4o 29 July 2025
With the help of the religious and mystical experiences of the saints and church teachings, we can now anaylze phenomenologically our career in the light of all those. Of course our phenomenology is not bracketing religious experiences now but just psychological explanations. We don't say psychology is inherently bad or has systematic flaws. As standard user of pop psychology without any training in its method, we can regress into psychologism and psychological reductionism. But this is also a discipline and a challenge or testing if we can bracket out pdychology for this time being, since we are learning what bracketing really is. There is the reality of the emotion but it is just taken at its face value as part of our human experience, which reason should guide, not the other way around.
🧠 1. What is Psychologism?
🧷 Husserl's target in starting phenomenology
Psychologism is the idea that logic, truth, or knowledge can be explained entirely by psychological processes.
🔍 Example:
“2 + 2 = 4” is true because most minds process it that way.
Or: moral truths are just products of emotions or brain habits.❌ Husserl’s Rejection:
Truths (like math or logic) are not relative to the mind.
Truth is objective and should not be reduced to how people think or feel.
He saw this as a threat to science and philosophy.
So psychologism ≠ psychological reduction, though they overlap.
🧪 2. What is Psychological Reductionism?
🧷 This is more modern, and happens often in today's psychology
Psychological reductionism means explaining everything—including meaning, truth, morality, or consciousness—only in terms of brain states, feelings, or behaviors.
💭 Example:
“Love is just a hormone surge.”
“Religious experience is a neural misfire.”⚠️ Why Bracket It in Phenomenology?
Because it hides the actual experience of the person.
Instead of letting things appear as they are, it jumps to biological or diagnostic categories.
Phenomenology suspends that and returns to the lived meaning:
What does it feel like to love? To hope? To suffer?
🧘 3. Where Does Carl Rogers Fit In?
🧷 He helps bridge psychology and phenomenology
Rogers was influenced by phenomenology and tried to avoid behaviorism and cold analysis.
✔️ He emphasized:
Subjective experience (what the client feels and knows)
Personal meaning
Client-centered therapy: the therapist doesn’t impose a theory but listens to the person’s lived world
Rogers didn’t fully bracket psychology, but he freed it from cold objectivism by turning back to experience, like phenomenology does.
-ChatGPT-4o 29 July 2025
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Parang wala. Pero meron, meron, meron. Di nga lang yung gusto ko ang meron ako. Meron nga akong mga natanggap na galing sa Diyos na gusto ko rin naman pala at dapat ipagpasalamat. Pero parang tigang na lupa na pinagkaitan ng langit sa loob ng 27 years ng gusto kong matanggap talaga. Para tuloy naiisip ko na kukunin ng Diyos ang meron na ako ngayon kapalit ng hinihingi ko sa kanya sa mahaba nang panahon. At natatakot ako. Hindi ko alam. Wala akong alam. Ayaw ko nang alamin. Kaya suko ako sa Dyos kahit ayaw ko na wala pa rin yung hinihingi ko sa kanya. At di pa natatanggap ang biyaya na hinihiling ko e puro problema ang dumarating bagkus.
In this you rejoice, although now for a little while you may have to suffer through various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire, may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. -1 Peter 1:6-7
Parang nakikita ko na na hindi career imbroglio itong nararanasan ko kundi krus na binibigay ng Diyos. Di lang magpasalamat at kausapin ang Diyos upang mawala ang krus ng ating career, kundi tanggapin din ang krus na ibinibigay ng Diyos sa ating personal na buhay. Wag kang mag-alala kaibigan, kasi di naman lahat ng oras ay krus ang buhay. Meron nga na pahinga at nagbibigay din ng ginhawa ang Diyos pag di na natin kaya. At kung ikaw ay katulad ko na parang nasa cloud of unknowing o dark night of the soul man for 27 years now, at di ka naman nagkulang sa pakikipag-usap sa Diyos at pasasalamat, tanggapin mo kaibigan. Tama ka kaibigan katulad mo rin akong perfectionist, idealist, at di matanggap ang sariling kahinaan at kasalanan.
Eto ang isang simpleng article sa baba upang ituro sa atin kung papaano iyan ginagawa, the Catholic way. Invalid nga ba ang Catholic way dahil nakabase sa Diyos na di nakikita. Napabulaanan na natin iyan paulit-ulit. Di ba valid ang reflection sa baba dahil di scientific. Pero naipaliwanag na natin na kahit walang science of modern psychology muna iyan e valid pa rin iyan scientifically through the rigor of correct phenomenology and extracting personal truths. Iyan po e habit of faith na ng mga christian believers kung bakit mas mabilis silang nakararating sa ganyang conclusion. They have the ease of thinking that way because faith is not nonrational. Faith has a reason of its own based on revealed truths.
I will not fear my weaknesses and imperfections because Jesus is with me. But what does that really mean?
Don’t give up. Don’t spiritualize your way out of embodiment. Let Christ meet you in the flesh, in the hunger, in the ache. Let Him teach you how to love your body—not as a god, not as a prison, but as a vessel of communion. -Copilot Quick response, 1 Sept. 2025
And thus we learn.
St. Thérèse of Lisieux — The Beauty of Being Weak
By Hannah Peters, UF student
“Do not let your weakness make you unhappy. When, in the morning, we feel no courage or strength for the practice of virtue, it is really a grace: it is the time to ‘lay the axe at the foot of the tree,’ relying on Jesus alone,” — St. Thérèse of Lisieux.
As we celebrate the feast day of St. Thérèse of Lisieux, we are reminded of our weaknesses and ultimately of God’s strength. St. Thérèse was a Carmelite nun who lived joyfully and virtuously until her death at the age of twenty-four. Recently, I have been reading her autobiography, The Story of a Soul, and I am amazed at the childlike faith she exhibited in every aspect of her life.
St. Thérèse said, “My little way is the way of spiritual childhood, the way of trust and absolute self-surrender.”
In my Bible study, we talked about childlike faith and total dependence on God. It is simple in theory but much harder to practice in our daily lives. How can we walk in St. Thérèse’s “little way” in a world where self-sufficiency is celebrated? Can we rely on Jesus alone for our joy, or must we continually seek happiness in earthly pleasures?
I am learning that true happiness is found in the presence of Jesus. St. Thérèse knew that her weaknesses brought her to Christ, and therefore, she was perfectly content with being weak and little. She also longed to bring praise to God through the little things and small surrenders in her life. This is the “little way,” a Heavenly way to which we are all called.
Our weaknesses should lead us to Jesus. As a first-year student here at the University of Florida, I am being made aware of my weaknesses daily. I’m learning that it’s impossible to love people, avoid negativity, or elude loneliness by my own power. At first, my weaknesses used to frighten me. Now, after reading about St. Thérèse of Lisieux, I am grateful for the weakness of my heart because it reminds me that I must rely on Jesus alone.
I used to wonder what will make me happy in this world. Perhaps it is the security of my future and a passion for my career. Perhaps it is the consolation of friendships and the knowledge that I am valued. Perhaps it is the feeling of independence and self-reliance. Or perhaps it is none of these things.
I am beginning to understand that God created me to love and to be perfectly loved by Him. My heart was made to rely on Him alone, not depending on earthly pleasures or personal achievements. By acknowledging my littleness and relying on Him, I am praising Him. Here is where I find my happiness.
My weaknesses do not keep me from Jesus. I am weak, but still Jesus comes to me. He comes to me because He loves me. This makes me want to praise Him wholeheartedly through all the little things in my life. I love to gaze upon the Lord at Mass, rejoice in the beauty of His creation as I walk to my classes, and speak to Him in prayer in the solitude of my dorm. St. Thérèse did every little thing in life out of love for Jesus, out of gratitude for His mercy. All of us can live in such a way.
If God can use even our weaknesses to strengthen us and bring us closer to Him, then what do we have to fear? We can live each moment of our lives in sweet freedom, overflowing with gratitude and praise, just as St. Thérèse did.
May we, like little children, always run to the safety of our Lord’s embrace, trusting that He will fill our empty hearts with His strength, love, and joy. St. Thérèse, pray for us!
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