What has been your own understanding or “definition” of faith? Were you satisfied with it? Why or why not?
2. How does your understanding of faith fit into Frankl’s scheme (see the diagram
in this chapter) , and what does this tell you about any difficulties you’ve had with faith?
3. How is faith undercut by the search for absolute certainty or security? Give some examples of ”manipulative” religion.
4. Reflect on your own experience with “faith, hope and love” in life. How does human experience in these matters throw light on the theological insight (or the other way around)?
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Chapter 3: The Beginnings of Faith
“To live is to change, and to live perfectly means to have changed often”. (John Henry Newman)
Although it is commonly said that “the faith” remains timeless or changeless, the way or the life of faith is a process — it is a living, moving thing. Like so much else in life, faith that fails to develop and grow soon atrophies and perhaps even dies. This is not simply true of our individual commitment to the life of faith, but it is also true of the understanding of faith’s contents or our doctrinal convictions.
There is nothing new in this. The fifth century monk-scholar St. Vincent of Lerins, whose ideas greatly influenced Cardinal Newman, had written on the “growth,” “development,” and “progress” of doctrinal understanding. And Newman’s famous 1845 Essay on the Idea of the Development of Doctrine, in turn, greatly influenced the Second Vatican Council which clearly affirmed the idea of “a growth in understanding of the realities and words which have been handed down” (“Constitution on Divine Revelation,” section 8, paragraph 20).
We can trace this notion of growth back even further to the New Testament itself. Not only do admonitions for a greater faith, in the sense of loving trust, fill the gospels and the epistles, but we also have direct appeals for a growth in the knowledge and understanding of the faith. In the epistle to the Colossians the apostle speaks of his prayers “that through perfect wisdom and spiritual understanding you should reach the fullest knowledge of his will . . . until they [you] are rich in the assurance of their [your] complete understanding and have knowledge of the mystery of God in
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which all the jewels of wisdom and knowledge are hidden” (see Col 1:5 and 2:2-3). Obviously, then, the idea of growth and development in faith, both in one’s understanding and commitment, as well as in “assurance” or confidence, should be a major concern in Christian life.
Yet, oddly enough, while much has been written down through the ages on the stages of growth of Christian love and holiness, little has been done precisely on the idea of growth in or stages of faith. Recently, to our good fortune, the situation has changed.
The Stages of Faith
Among the most well-known studies on the subject of growth in faith have been those of the American theologian and religious researcher James Fowler and his colleagues. (See James W. Fowler, Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Human Development and the Quest for Meaning, New York, Harper & Row, 1981.) Fowler tested his theories by means of a series of exhaustive interviews of persons from many walks of life. Since then, The Religious Education Association of the United States and Canada commissioned further testing, first (as mentioned in the previous chapter) through The Gallup Association by means of a telephone survey of over one thousand persons, and again through exhaustive interviews, similar to those used by Fowler, of forty-one persons who were selected as being representative of the range of variations found in the larger poll. (See Constance Leean, Faith Development in the Adult Life Cycle, Module 2, Religious Education Association of United States and Canada, 1985.)
Fowler divides his stages of faith development into six or seven, depending upon whether one counts the earliest, beginning level as involving “faith” in any meaningful sense. In his first book he assigns numbers from 0 through 6 to what amount to seven stages, while in his more recent book Becoming Adult: Becoming Christian (1984) he speaks of seven levels, but avoids assigning numbers, although in a
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few other places the Roman numerals I-VII are used instead. Also, in this later book, Fowler changes the names of two stages, calling “undifferentiated” faith “primal faith” and “paradoxical-consolidative” faith “conjunctive faith.” Frankly, I’m not too happy with most of his designations, and in time we will consider more simple labels. But for the meantime, I will list Fowler’s stages (with both sets of numbers) as follows:
0 (I) Undifferentiated (or Primal) Faith
1 (II) Intuitive-Projective Faith
2 (III) Mythic-Literal Faith
3 (IV) Synthetic-Conventional Faith
4 (V) Individuative-Reflexive Faith
5 (VI) Paradoxical-Consolidative (or Conjunctive) Faith
6 (VII) Universalizing Faith
We may well ask: What is the basis for saying that a person is in this or that stage of faith? If one studies the charts that accompany much of Fowler’s work, one can see what he uses what amounts to seven basic criteria. We may at first wonder what they have to do with faith life, but it will become more evident as we look at each stage. To get an overall idea of what signs Fowler was paying most attention to, I’ve listed them as follows with a few comments (see also the chart in the Appendix):
a. Form of Logic (kind of thinking processes used)
b. Perspective Taking (how one relates to others)
c. Form of Moral Judgment (or why behave?)
d. Bounds of Social Awareness (who’s going to care?)
e. Locus of Authority (who’s in charge?)
f. Form of World Coherence or “World-view”
g. Role of Symbols
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Some of these items may appear to have little or nothing to do with faith, but if we were to study developmental psychology as Fowler has, we would find some of these things extremely revealing. For example, take the first — our “form of logic” or thinking process. In the earlier stages of childhood, reasoning, if it exists at all, has to be presented in very concrete terms, on the level of “apples and oranges” so to speak. Or take the last criterion, the role played by “symbol.” It is obvious that the ability “to see through” the familiar term “Father” as applied to God is a critical factor for many persons, particularly during this period when many Christians are searching for a more comprehensive or inclusive understanding of God.
Several other things also should be said at this point about Fowler’s “stages.” One is that there can be a considerable amount of overlapping from one stage to another and that a person ‘s ideas and attitudes in one or more categories may exhibit the characteristics of a faith stage that is either earlier, on the one hand, or more advanced, on the other, than the stage where he or she seems to generally be. Still, on the whole, it is typical of people to fall more or
