The role of spirituality in formulating a theory of the psychology of religion

Zygon 41 (1):197-224 (2006)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

. I challenge the psychology of religion to move beyond its merely descriptive status and, by focusing on spirituality as the essential dimension of religion, to approach the traditional ideal of science as explanation: a delineation of the necessary and sufficient to account for a phenomenon such as to articulate a general “law” relevant to every instance of the phenomenon. An explanatory psychology of spirituality would elucidate the scientific underpinnings of the psychology of religion as well as that of the social sciences in general, all of which grapple with the issues of human meaning making. Three prevalent and debilitating errors preclude that achievement: the confounding of the spiritual and the divine and the importation of “God” into psychology, the uncritical association of any spiritual phenomenon with spirituality, and the attempt to eschew value judgments from the study of religion and spirituality. To confirm the possibility of avoiding these errors in the face of radical postmodernism, I build on Bernard Lonergan's analyses of intentional consciousness, or human spirit, and thus intimate a psychology of spirituality that is fully nontheological and potentially explanatory

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,616

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Minding spirituality.Randall Lehmann Sorenson - 2004 - Hillsdale, NJ: Analytic Press.
Spirituality, ethics, and care.Simon Robinson - 2008 - Philadelphia: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
The persistence of religion: comparative perspectives on modern spirituality.Harvey Cox - 2009 - New York: Distributed in the U.S. and Canada exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan. Edited by Daisaku Ikeda.
Virtue as a benchmark for spirituality in business.Gerald F. Cavanagh & Mark R. Bandsuch - 2002 - Journal of Business Ethics 38 (1-2):109 - 117.
Embracing mind: the common ground of science and spirituality.B. Alan Wallace - 2008 - [New York]: Distributed in the United States by Random House. Edited by Brian Hodel.
Jung and the New Age.David John Tacey - 2001 - Philadelphia, PA: Brunner-Routledge.

Analytics

Added to PP
2010-09-02

Downloads
59 (#244,651)

6 months
3 (#447,120)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?