Psychology and Spirituality: Introduction

Psychology and Spirituality
Pastoral Ministries Program, Santa Clara University
(last taught Winter 2002)

Lecture 4: Fowler and Stages of Faith

Housekeeping: Papers due
Implications from last week/ issues— So what?
1. What difference does it make for us to recognize that people develop psychologically?
2. What are the implications, if any, of a theory of stages of development for sacramental life? For catechesis?
Fowler: Stages of Faith: drawing together Erikson (psychosocial), Piaget (cognitive) and Kohlberg (moral reasoning) to suggest six stages of "faith development" (Fowler, 1981, 1984 (revised edition 1999), 1991)
Piaget: cognitive development (Piaget, 1954a, 1954b)
1. Sensorimotor
  1. Thought as the coordination of action
  2. "Remembering" a missing object
  3. Presence/absence
  4. Prelinguistic and presymbolic
  5. Development of language leads to new stage
2. Preoperational or Intuitive
  1. Use of language enables distinction of self
  2. Self-centered; capable of only limited concern for others
  3. "Parallel monologues"
  4. Dominated by perception; thinking is in mental pictures
  5. Causality poorly understood; fantasy fills in the gaps-- "magical thinking"
3. Concrete Operational
  1. Around age 7-- first logical operations
  2. "Operations" patterned acts of transformation exercise on objects of knowing; they are generalizable and capable of being coordinated into overall systems
  3. Construction of linear, orderly and predictable reality
  4. Awareness of differences between own perception and that of others
  5. Concrete
4. Formal Operational
  1. Operations of previous stage become stuff for reflection of the next
  2. Formal operational is thinking about thinking
  3. Problem solving-- hypothetical- deductive thinking
  4. Able to imagine perfection or utopia
  5. Beginning of self-reflection; sense of identity, personality
Lawrence Kohlberg: Stages of Moral Development (Kohlberg, 1981, 1983, 1984,1986) (see chart) Developed through interviews with people of different ages and recording responses (see Kohlberg's dilemmas).
1. Level A: Preconventional Level
  1. Punishment and Obedience
    1. Obedience to rules and authority/ avoidance of punishment
    2. Avoid breaking rules; obey for obedience's sake
    3. Egocentric-- does not recognize difference or validity of other's interests
  2. Individual Instrumental Purpose and Exchange
    1. Making fair deals; serving one another's interests
    2. Following rules if of immediate benefit
    3. The right is what is fair, equal, agreed upon
    4. Concrete; individualistic
    5. Aware of others' interests, right is still relative; fairness in literal equality
2. Level B: Conventional Level
  1. Mutual Interpersonal Expectations, Relationships and Conformity
    1. Playing a good (nice) role; keeping trust in relations
    2. Living up to expectations
    3. Perspective of individual in relation to others
    4. Concrete "Golden Rule"
  2. Social Systems and Conscience Maintenance
    1. Doing one's duty in society
    2. Institutional maintenance; laws upheld except when conflict with other established duties
    3. "What if everybody did it?'
    4. Distinguishes societal point of view from interpersonal agreement
3. Level C: Postconventional and Principled Level: Moral decisions generated from rights, values or principles that are (or could be) agreeable to all individuals comprising a society designed to be fair and beneficial
  1. Prior Rights and Social Contract or Utility
    1. Upholding basic rights, even when conflicting with concrete rules of one's group
    2. Awareness of diversity of opinions; values are relative to group
    3. Obey laws because of social contact to uphold rules
    4. "The greatest good for the greatest number"
    5. Values are prior to social contracts; system of objective impartiality and due process
  2. Universal Ethical Principles
    1. Assumes universal ethical principles that all humanity should follow
    2. Laws legitimate as they accord with the universal
    3. When law violates principle, acts on principle
    4. One sees the rationality of principles and has become committed to them
Example of Kohlberg stages: Housing office situation (taken from Lande & Slade, 1979):

Suppose you are Ruth, a college senior on a large California campus. You've been a crusader, one of the leaders in student government. Among other things, you have led a demonstration for more student housing, and you were involved in setting up a student-run housing cooperative trying to assure living space for everybody.

You need a job to stay in school and your friend Tom, whom you met in your work with the cooperative, is head of the University Housing Department. He hires you as his assistant.

As one of your duties, you are assigned to deal with students on the waiting list for the limited on-campus housing. Over and over, you must inform disappointed applicants that their names are far down the list and there are no immediate prospects for them. Since off-campus housing is scarce and prohibitively expensive, many students are forced to cancel their plans to attend the university.

As the spring semester is about to begin, Tom tells you to put two new applicants' names at the top of the list. You protest, saying that it is unfair to the others who have waited so long. You've heard stories about this kind of thing but hadn't believed it really happened. Tom explains he's already made a strong objection, but the applicants are the son of a powerful alumnus and the son's friend, and the chancellor himself has ordered that preference be given them. Reluctantly yo comply with Tom's order.

While routinely sorting material for the housing file that afternoon, you discover the vice-chancellor's confidential memo instructing Tom to "suspend regular procedures as a favor to this important friend of the university." A local reporter, interested in printing an expose of political favoritism involving the university, calls the office to check some rumors he's heard about the housing department. You take the call.

Angry over the injustice of the situation, you've made a photostatic copy of the chancellor's memo, and you are strongly tempted to give it to the reporter. But, because of your friendship for Tom and your concern about your own job, which you really need, you hesitate. You tell the reporter to leave his number and you'll call him in a day or so if you have any information for him.

OPTIONAL ENDINGS

A. You really can't risk losing your job-- you have to have it to complete your senior year-- it would be hard to find another as good. You decide not to call the reporter. (Stage 2)

B. You decide that, even though you hate to lose your job, which will probably happen, and hate to harm Tom in any way, this kind of thing is against all the rules and policies of the university and shouldn't be permitted. You give the memo to the reporter. (Stage 4)

C. You make up your mind you can't sit by while an injustice like this takes place; you've worked hard on the problems of student housing and if you expose this kind of action it should make things better for all the students in the future. Every student deserves the same chance at housing as every other. You'll give the reporter the memo and risk the loss of your job. (Stage 5)

D. Unhappy as you are about the unfairness of the situation, you decide your first loyalty is to Tom, who is a decent guy, who gave you the job, and who is doing everything possible to protest this kind of favoritism. If you release the memo, you could get him in serious trouble. You decide not to call the reporter. (Stage 3)
Problems with Kohlberg: overly rational, no room for unconscious factors; based on male images of valuing (e.g. first self then family then wider society) See criticism by Carol Gilligan (1982)
Comparison of Erikson, Piaget and Kohlberg stages (see chart)
1. Note that Piaget only covers early development and is more "hard wired," that is, developmental stages more clearly defined and unvarying
2. Kohlberg only deals with later stages; slightly out of phase with other two as moral reasoning requires some level of development of both cognitive and psychosocial factors
3. Erikson's system is the most flexible and intuitive; we need to be careful about turning stages into rigid patterns or expectations
Stages of Faith: James W. Fowler, director of the Center for Research on Faith and Moral Development at Candler School of Theology, Emory University. Studied at Harvard, where Erikson and Kohlberg (and Gilliom) taught.
1. Faith/ Religion/ Belief
  1. Religion is "cumulative tradition"
  2. Belief as "holding certain ideas"
  3. Faith is "orientation to commitment and trust
2. Faith involves interplay of relationships:
  1. Examples of shared centers of value and power can be religious; "good will" "democracy" "monetary system" that make up the content of faith
  2. Commitments shape identity; relate to ultimate values
    1. Idolatry is not being faith-less, but betting one's life on what is not God
3. Faith as "imagination" (Archie Bunker: "Faith is believing what any damn fool knows ain't so.")
  1. "Imaging"-- is an activity, a way of knowing
  2. Fowler believes it is possible to describe "reasonably predictable turning points in the way faith imagines and the way faith's images interplay with communal modes of living" (1981, p. 31)
Stages of Faith-- (note: the following notes contain all the text of the overheads)
1. Faith is:
  1. People's evolved and evolving ways of experiencing self, others and world (as they construct them)
  2. as related to and affected by the ultimate conditions of existence (as they construct them)
  3. and of shaping their lives' purpose and meanings, trusts and loyalties, in light of the character of being, value and power determining the ultimate conditions of existence (as grasped in their operative images-- conscious and unconscious-- of them
2. Undifferentiated Faith-- Infancy
  1. Seeds of trust, mutuality in environment of love and care
  2. Danger of continued narcissicm (self-centered) or of inability to form relationship
  3. Origins of earliest God-images
  4. Transition: beginnings of language and thought; use of symbols in speech and play
3. Stage I: Intuitive-Projective Faith Ages 2-6 or 7
  1. new tools of language and symbolic representation: "what?" and "why?"
  2. Cognitive egocentrism-- assume their view is the "only" view
  3. Imaginative, not logical
  4. First steps in self-awareness
  5. Gift or strength: imagination
  6. Danger: images of terror or destruction "possessing" child's imagination
  7. Transition: beginnings of concrete operational thinking; Oedipal conflict; concern to know what is real and how things are
4. Stage II: Mythic-Literal Faith Age 8- Adolescence (example: Danny Dutton Explains God)
  1. Ability to "tell stories"-- binding experiences into meaning
  2. Attention to stories of the community
  3. Literal interpretation of symbols, rules and attitudes (concrete operational thinking)
  4. Increasingly able to take others' perspectives; seek reciprocal fairness
  5. Not reflective or conceptual
  6. Strength: story, drama and myth as meaning-makers
  7. Danger: seeking control, perfectionism
  8. Transition: contradictions in stories lead to reflection; developing ability for interpersonal perspective
5. Stage III: Synthetic-Conventional Faith Adolescence- Early Adulthood (though many stop here)
  1. Extension beyond the family; faith serves to orient and synthesize among family, school, work, etc.
  2. Many people stabilize at this level
  3. "Conformist"-- sensitive to expectations and judgements of significant others
  4. Deeply held beliefs, but not self-reflective; justified by authority figures or group concensus ("ideology")
  5. Strength: forming of personal myth of faith
  6. Danger: others' judgements can be internalized so as to prevent autonomy; interpersonal betrayal can lead to despair about God
6. Synthetic-Conventional Faith Transitional Issues
  1. Serious clashes or contradictions between valued authorities
  2. Marked changes, by official authorities, in things once held as sacred and unchangeable (e.g. Vatican II changes)
  3. Experiences and perspectives that call for critical reflection on one's own faith and how it has been formed in a particular context
  4. "Leaving home"-- physically or emotionally
7. Stage IV: Individuative-Reflective Faith Young Adulthood or into mid-thirties or forties
  1. Critical transition: taking responsibility for personal commitments, lifestyle, beliefs and attitudes
  2. Identity not defined by roles or meaning to significant others
  3. Self-aware "world view" distinct from others'
  4. "Demythologizing"-- translates symbols into concepts; minimal attention to unconscious factors
  5. Strength: capacity for critical reflection on self (identity) and outlook (ideology)
  6. Danger: excessive confidence in conscious mind and critical thought; "second narcissism": over- assimilating "reality" into one's own perspective
8. Individuative-Reflective Faith Transitional Issues
  1. Restlessness with self-images and outlook
  2. New attention to inner "voices"
  3. Stories, symbols, myths and paradoxes from one's own or other traditions break in on neatness of faith
  4. Disillusion with compromises and recognition of deeper complexity of life
9. Stage V: Conjunctive Faith
10. Conjunctive Faith Adulthood (unusual before midlife)
11. Conjunctive Faith
  1. Strength: "ironic imagination"-- the capacity to see the powerful meanings of self or group while recognizing they are relative, partial and limiting
  2. Danger: paralyzing passivity or inaction; cynicism or withdrawal
  3. Transitional Issue: tension between the untransformed world and a transforming vision
12. Stage VI: Universalizing Faith (Rare)
  1. Movement beyond the ambiguity of Stage V by actualization of the universal
  2. Inclusiveness of community, radical commitment to justice and love, selfless passion for transformed world
  3. Examples: Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Dag Hammarskjöld, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Abraham Heschel, Thomas Merton
  4. Experienced as subversive of existing order
  5. Danger: followers will focus on charisma, authority and even ruthlessness of leader and forget universalizing vision
13. Universalizing Faith
  1. Not "perfect" or "self-actualized"
  2. Not by choice or intent, but by call of God (grace) and demands of history
  3. Not normative for all human beings
  4. Stage VI and the "Kingdom of God"-- "absolute particularity"
    1. "absolute": "bearing the quality of ultimacy"
    2. Eschatology-- orientation to the future
Stages of Faith and Content
1. Spiral development: toward individuation through stage IV, then return to integration and oneness of earlier stages at higher level of complexity, differentiation and inclusiveness
2. Recontextualizing and overlapping previous stages
3. Widening of vision and valuing; deepening of sense of selfhood, increasing intimacy of self-others-world
4. Contents include:
  1. Centers of value
  2. Images of power
  3. Master stories
Conversion: "...a significant sudden transformation of a person's loyalties, patterns of life, and focus of energy" (Rambo 1993)
1. Significant recentering of centers of value and power and adoption of new master stories in commitment to community
2. Can happen within faith stages or in transitions between
3. Stage change and conversion; possible relationships:
  1. Faith stage change without conversion
  2. Conversion without faith stage change
  3. Conversion that precipitates faith stage change
  4. Faith stage change that precipitates conversion
  5. Conversion that is correlated to and works together with faith stage change
  6. Conversion that blocks or helps one avoid the pain of faith stage change
Next time:
1. Personality Type and Spirituality: Read Goldsmith, take self test. If you have taken the Myers-Briggs Personality Inventory, keep those results in mind.

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