Fowler's Stages of Faith

In light of the last several days’ posts, I thought I’d put together a quick summary of one person’s crack at stages of faith development.  I get my information for free, and pass the savings on to you!

 

Stage 1 (ages 3-7): Intuitive/Projective Faith: Fantasy and fiction and reality all blend together; no big difference between Santa and Jesus and mom and dad.  Developing a sense of trust, dependability of the world/authority (or lack thereof).

 

Stage 2 (7-adult): Mythic/Literal Faith: Begin to grasp grander story and their part in it, connection to church stories, God as superhero.  Reciprocity a key part of this stage: if I do good, good things come, if I do bad, bad things come.  Some people stay here their whole lives.

 

Stage 3 (Adolescent to Adult): Synthetic/Conventional Faith: Us and them is key, lots of group-think [there’s that word!], authority is external, we believe the same things and they don’t, tends to be dogmatic, clear and distinct lines between who’s in and who is out, beliefs are often tacit and not very examined or thought-out.  Most youth groups, campus ministries, and churches thrive on stage 3 people—we all believe the same thing.  Religious communities trade on this stage.

 

Stage 4 (Late Adolescent to Adult): Individuative/Reflective: No longer us/them but me and the rest of ya’ll.  These people often get outside of the community and throw rocks at it, ask annoying questions, no longer feel like they fit, can become angry or withdraw from fellowship.  This stage can be fun to be a part of as a minister or a complete pain.  In I.V. nationwide, our numbers drop with Juniors and Seniors because many of them are going through this stage.  At UNC, we have more students study abroad than any other public institution, and they often come back with this posture.  If they work through this process and are able to re-integrate with the community, these people are often the most phenomenal leaders in our fellowships—they think more deeply, understand faith in a deeper and more full way.  Some people never re-connect with fellowship after this stage.  Others fear this stage and so retreat to stage 3 because it feels safer.

 

The Wall (Hagberg and Guelich)

This isn’t a part of Fowler’s stages but it’s a helpful piece to the puzzle.  By the end of stage 4, people think they have everything just about figured out.  Then life happens.  We realize we don’t have it all figured out.  The systems we’ve re-constructed on our own don’t work either.  This frequently comes at mid-life.  People move to other things to try to find happiness other than the plan they originally had.  The options here: either pain/anger/regression or press into it and begin a more significant internal journey.  There’s a new realization that the real issues are inside for those who press deeper.

 

Stage 6: Conjunctive Faith (adult mid-life): Simplicity, less self-assurance, less aggressive, simply receiving the day for what it is, living in deeper tensions and paradoxes but more settled into them. Less certain about what is to come but more trusting and hopeful at the same time.  All of life becomes the learning ground for faith.

 

Stage 7: Universalizing Faith (adult):  Only a few ever get here, but life and death is all the same, a deeper abiding trust, a child-like faith all over again, all things are in God’s hands so we can engage God’s will without concern for our lives/destinies.