Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T05:08:51.707Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The transformative power of accepting God's love

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 November 2021

T. Ryan Byerly Open the ORCID record for T. Ryan Byerly [Opens in a new window]
T. Ryan Byerly*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Sheffield, 45 Victoria St, Sheffield, S3 7QB, UK
*
Corresponding author: T. Ryan Byerly, email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article develops an account of some of the central features involved on the human side in adopting a richly accepting orientation towards God's love. It then builds a conceptual and empirical argument for the conclusion that accepting God's love can enhance a person's mental health and can indirectly enable a person to cultivate or maintain moral virtues – whether or not God exists. Importantly, the article contends that these transformative benefits are available to both believers and agnostics, and an original secondary data analysis is offered to support this conclusion in the case of agnostics. The article explains how this transformative value of accepting God's love may serve as the basis for a novel pragmatic argument for theistic religious commitment.

Keywords

virtuepragmatic argumentsagnosticismmental healthGod's love
Type
Original Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 58 , Issue 4 , December 2022 , pp. 831 - 845
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ainsworth, MDS (1985) Attachments across the life span. Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine 61, 792–812.Google ScholarPubMed
Beck, R and MacDonald, A (2004) Attachment to God: the attachment to God inventory, tests of working model correspondence, and an exploration of faith group differences. Journal of Psychology and Theology 32, 92–103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boone, M (2016) The Conversion and Therapy of Desire: Augustine's Theology of Desire in the Cassiciacum Dialogues. Eugene, OR: Pickwick.Google Scholar
Bourne, K, Berry, K and Jones, I (2014) The relationships between psychological mindedness, parental bonding and adult attachment. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice 87, 167–177.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bowlby, J (1969) Attachment and Loss, vol. 1: Attachment. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Bowlby, J (1973) Attachment and Loss, vol. 2: Separation. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Bowlby, J (1988) A Secure Base: Parent-Child Attachment and Healthy Human Development. New York, NY: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Brady, M (2018) Suffering and Virtue. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Byerly, TR (2022) Being good and loving God. In Buchak, L and Zimmerman, D (eds), Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion, vol. 10. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Cole, JC, Rabin, AS, Smith, TL and Kaufman, AS (2004) Development and validation of a Rasch-derived CES-D short form. Psychological Assessment 16, 360–372.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davis, D, Hook, J and Worthington, E (2008) Relational spirituality and forgiveness: the roles of attachment to God, religious coping, and viewing the transgression as a desecration. Journal of Psychology and Christianity 27, 293–301.Google Scholar
Dwiwardani, C, Hill, P and Bollinger, R (2014) Virtues develop from a secure base: attachment and resilience as predictors of humility, gratitude, and forgiveness. Journal of Psychology and Theology 42, 83–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliot, AJ and Reis, HT (2003) Attachment and exploration in adulthood. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 85, 317–331.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ellison, CG, Mradshaw, M, Kuyel, N and Marcum, JP (2011) Attachment to God, stressful life events, and changes in psychological distress. Religious Research Association 53, 493–511.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fakhry, M (2012) Islam. In Meister, C and Copan, P (eds), Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Religion. London: Routledge, pp. 76–86.Google Scholar
Frank, D (2009) Jewish philosophical theology. In Flint, T and Rea, M (eds), Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 541–553.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Granqvist, P, Mikulincer, M and Shaver, P (2010) Religion as attachment: Normative processes and individual differences. Personality and Social Psychology Review 14, 49–59.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Graves, S (2014) God and moral perfection. In Kvanvig, J (ed.), Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion, vol. 5, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 122–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Guthrie, S (2006) Anthropological theories of religion. In Martin, M (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Atheism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 283–299.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Helm, B (2017) Love. In Zalta, E (ed.), Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available at https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/love/.Google Scholar
Horton, KJ, Ellison, CG, Loukas, A, Downey, DL and Barrett, JB (2010) Examining attachment to God and health risk-taking behaviours in college students. Journal of Religion and Health 51, 552–566.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howard-Snyder, D (2013) Propositional faith: what it is and what it is not. American Philosophical Quarterly 50, 357–372.Google Scholar
Howard-Snyder, D (2019a) Can fictionalists have faith? It all depends. Religious Studies 55, 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howard-Snyder, D (2019b) Three arguments to think that faith does not entail belief. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 100, 114–128.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jankowski, P and Sandage, S (2014) Attachment to God and humility: indirect effect and conditional effects models. Journal of Psychology and Theology 42, 70–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jordan, J (2018) Pragmatic arguments and belief in God. In Zalta, E (ed.), Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available at https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pragmatic-belief-god/.Google Scholar
Juffras, A (1972) Is theology a psychological crutch? International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 3, 251–256.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keefer, L and Brown, F (2018) Attachment to God uniquely predicts variation in well-being outcomes. Archive for the Psychology of Religion 40, 225–257.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kirkpatrick, LA and Shaver, PR (1992) An attachment-theoretical approach to romantic love and religious belief. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 18, 266–275.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knabb, JJ and Pelletier, J (2013) The relationship between problematic internet use, God attachment, and psychological functioning among adults at a Christian university. Mental Health, Religion & Culture 17, 239–251.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Learner, DG and Kruger, LJ (1997) Attachment, self-concept, and academic motivation in high-school students. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 67, 485–492.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Leman, JL, Hunter, W, Fergus, T and Rowatt, W (2018) Secure attachment to God uniquely linked to psychological health in a national, random sample of American adults. The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion 28, 162–173.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mikulincer, M (1997) Adult attachment style and information processing: individual differences in curiosity and cognitive closure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 72, 1217–1230.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mikulincer, M and Shaver, P (2015) An attachment perspective on prosocial attitudes and behavior. In Schroeder, DA and Graziano, WG (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Prosocial Behavior. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 209–230.Google Scholar
Miller, C (2015) Moral Character: An Empirical Theory. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Miller, C (2017) The Character Gap: How Good are We? New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Njus, DM and Sharmer, A (2020) Evidence that God attachment makes a unique contribution to psychological well-being. The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion 30, 178–201.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pirutinsky, SD, Rosmarin, H and Kirkpatrick, LA (2019) Is attachment to God a unique predictor of mental health? Test in a Jewish sample. The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion 29, 161–171.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Porter, S (2019) The evidential force of spiritual maturity and the Christian doctrine of sanctification. Religious Studies 55, 111–129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Porter, S and Baehr, J (2020) Becoming honest: why we lie and what can be done about it. In Miller, C and West, R (eds), Integrity, Honesty, and Truth-Seeking. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 182–206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Porter, S and Rickabaugh, B (2018) The sanctifying work of the holy spirit: revisiting Alston's interpersonal model. Journal of Analytic Theology 6, 112–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Poston, T and Dougherty, T (2007) Divine hiddenness and the nature of belief. Religious Studies 43, 183–198.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reiner, SR, Anderson, TL, Hall, MEL and Hall, TW (2010) Adult attachment, God attachment and gender in relation to perceived stress. Journal of Psychology and Theology 38, 175–185.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, R and Wood, J (2007) Intellectual Virtues: An Essay in Regulative Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenberg, M (1965) Society and the Adolescent Self-Image. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rowatt, WC and Kirkpatrick, LA (2002) Two dimensions of attachment to God and their relation to affect, religiosity, and personality constructs. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 41, 637–651.Google Scholar
Sandage, S, Paine, D and Hill, P (2015) Spiritual barriers to humility: a multidimensional study. Mental Health, Religion & Culture 18, 207–217.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schellenberg, J (2017) Divine hiddenness: Part 1 (recent work on the hiddenness argument). Philosophy Compass 12, e12355.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Snow, N (2013) Notes towards an empirical psychology of virtue: exploring the personality scaffolding of virtue. In Peters, J (ed.), Aristotelian Ethics in Contemporary Perspective. New York: Routledge, pp. 130–144.Google Scholar
Strenger, A, Schnitker, S and Felke, T (2016) Attachment to God moderates the relation between sociocultural pressure and eating disorder symptoms as mediated by emotional eating. Mental Health, Religion & Culture 19, 23–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stump, E (2018) Atonement. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tangney, JP, Baumeister, RF and Boone, AL (2004) High self-control predicts good adjustment, less pathology, better grades, and interpersonal success. Journal of Personality 72, 271–322.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Webster, L, Hackett, RK and Joubert, D (2009) The association of unresolved attachment status and cognitive processes in maltreated teens. Child Abuse Review 18, 6–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wessling, J (2020) Love Divine: A Systematic Account of God's Love for Humanity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, A, Haggard, M and Breuninger, M (2020) Feasibility of attachment-focused self-hypnosis to change insecure God attachment. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis 68, 246–262.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed