Life Span Development and Personality Critical Essay

Introduction

The Healer of the World – Karol Wojtyla, gave a breakthrough of acceptance in the world’s aim for peace, prosperity and unity.  His belief on religion was considered to be flexible as to believing that all people are created equal in blood, color, race or belief (Weigel, 2001).  The differences of such religions must not serve as a wall to hinder one from crossing the line of faith but rather, to give respect to the God being served and hailed.  “We all believe in one God” (Weigel, 2001), remarked the Saint.  His enthusiasm and love for humanity built a bridge which not all Popes were able to fulfill.  Criticized by some followers of Christianity, his motivation on reaching his prayers even to the extent of other religions gave a positive impact on those individuals who have long felt that Christianity, being the most dominant religion in the world, must reign over.

Challenges faced by the Pope

His influence to the masses made him a negotiator in uniting the archipelagos of different countries; he had an amazing view of life, like a philosopher who cared for other people more than himself.  Death threats and vicious plans for assassination haunted his living daylights, but he remained calm, his deep sagacity of forgiveness lurked in every pore of his system, believing that people who have gone astray, must not be punished but be guided (Weigel, 2001).

Environment’s role in molding his belief

The factual argument to support such questions on why his perceptions, character and views were “godly” and unselfish can be traced with the kind of life he was raised, living in Poland, a “privacy-oriented” country armed with a raging belief on war, his quest in search for unity indulged him to do good, instead of enrolling in a realm where blood is shed (Weigel, 2001), believed that God was calling him for priesthood, to serve with gospels and not with armors.

The institutions where he enrolled also played a large factor in molding his character, as human behavior stresses “the environment by which one is raised and the people surrounding the individual will most likely be the reasons of what you are today” (Freud & Strachey, 1962).  His family, friends and experiences in life are the main reasons why he possessed the highest level of concern for others.

Psychological Theory in his behavior

According to developmental psychology, the sense of faith of a person is an acquired form of skill or ability, not an innate one.  It is an inherited acquired phenomenon; given the fact that a new-born baby at the time of birth is non-moral, non-thinking and non-aesthetic, all tantamount to innocence (Dimitrius & Mazzarella, 1991).

Therefore, such character is gradually acquired through experience.  It can be then taken to assumption that a family, inclined with scriptures and rituals or of religion, will most likely raise religious offspring.

However, a deliberative argument of such belief would disprove its validity given the fact that change is most likely to happen, since that the kind of environment which will later be experienced and dwelled upon to by the individual will make abrupt changes in his belief, adaptation would be suitable term (Freud & Strachey, 1962).  Not unless the atmosphere also tames such religiousness.

Conclusion

Instinct Theory and Learning Theory are evident in the life of the Pope, his belief, that he was being called portrays the first kind and his sense of mimicking priests illustrate his form of motivation in venturing to priesthood (Freud & Strachey, 1962). Such theories are the hugest well supported evidences why the Pope, possess the exceptional characteristic of a human being.  Concluding the existence and the explanations in his life clearly shows that there lived a person, influenced with humanistic theories, but utilized what he has acquired in the “godliest” way possible.

References:

Dimitrius, J.-E., & Mazzarella, M. C. (1991). Reading People: How to Understand People and Predict Their Behavior- -Anytime, Anyplace (1 ed.). New York: Ballantine Books.

Freud, S., & Strachey, J. (1962). The Ego and the Id. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.

Weigel, G. (2001). Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II (1st Cliff Street Books Paperback Ed ed.). New York: Harper Perennial.