Psychology, Religion, and Spirituality – serie

Experts from a variety of fields join forces to show what fuels a most horrific violation of trust—sexual abuse by priests—and how the Church and church structure play a role in this abuse. This riveting work includes chapters by a former Director of the premiere U.S. facility treating clergy who are sexual offenders, by a Jesuit psychologist who authored the largest study of clergy sexual abusers ever completed, and from a Vatican Correspondent explaining the issues as seen by the Vatican. The text also includes an opening chapter by Michael Rezendes, a Boston Globe investigative reporter and member of the Spotlight Team that won the Pulitzer Prize for breaking the story of sexual abuse by clergy. A statement by the Executive Director of SNAP, the national support group for victims of clergy sexual abuse, is also included.This is the first book that gathers experts from a variety of fields to offer thoughtful, objective perspectives regarding what we know about sexual abuse by clergy and what we can do to solve the problem. Attention is given not only to psychological aspects of both the perpetrators and victims, but also to canon law, clergy misconduct review boards, the sexual/celibate agenda of the Church, the challenges for treatment facilities, and barriers to resolution that exist within the Roman Catholic Church.

Today most people feel less interested in religion and more interested in spirituality. If you ask what they mean, they will tell you that organized religion tends to turn them off, but, nonetheless, they feel a hunger in the heart that they cannot seem to fill. They do not mean that they would rather have disorganized religion; they mean that institutional religion does not seem to satisfy their spirits and feel there must be something more, some better way of experiencing whatever that is for which they are hungry. Much new experimentation is going on as a result. Some of it is a search for the meaning to fill the soul and satisfy the spirit; much of it is a search for meaning on the spiritual level itself. Spirituality reaches always toward the question about the meaning of God, the meaning of relationships with others, the meaning of intimacy, and the meaning of soul gratifying insights into truth. Here, Ellens carefully and sensitively explores the full range of our spiritual natures and the variety of spiritual experiences of which we are capable, describing the way our souls and psyches work in our hunger and thirst for meaning. He explains in an enlightening and unconventional way why and how every human desires to reflect upon, learn, and share a heartfelt experience of God and of others.Readers will find in this book a description of the meaning of the biblical stories about spiritual experiences in addition to descriptions of the kinds of spiritual experiences that ordinary people are having, how they are achieving them, and the ways in which they are filling their lives with meaning that goes beyond the horizons of material life. The author paints this picture in such a way as to let us in on what biblically based authentic spirituality and spiritual experience really is, and why it may or may not necessarily have anything to do with traditional institutionalized religion. He carefully and vividly explains the notion of spirituality as it is illustrated in the Bible and discusses spiritual experiences such as prayer, epiphany, visions, and other experiences. He considers whether spirituality is mainly a connection with God, with others, or with both. Readers hoping to get a better sense of what it means to be spiritual will have many of their questions answered in these pages.

Whether they fly airplanes into the World Trade Center or Pentagon; blow up ships, ports, and federal buildings, kill doctors and nurses at abortion clinics, exterminate contemporary Palestinians, or kill Israeli soldiers with suicide bombs, destructive religionists are all shaped by the same unconscious apocalyptic metaphors, and by the divine example and imperative to violence. In this condensed edition of a multivolume set covering how Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all incorporate core metaphors that can spur violence, experts explain religious notions that fuel terrorism and other horrific actions. The contributors warn that until destructive metaphors are removed from the Western psyche, an end to religious violence will not be possible.Hailed in reviews as unsettling but thought-provoking, compelling, and critical coverage, the set from which these chapters were drawn has a core theme that demonstrates the three major religions share the ancient notion that history and the human soul are caught in a cosmic conflict between good and evil, or God and devil, which cannot be resolved without violence, a cataclysmic final solution such as the extermination of nations, the execution of humans, or even the death of God's own son. As Archbishop Desmond Tutu wrote, This is a groundbreaking work with tremendous insight.

The esteemed editor who brought us the acclaimed set The Destructive Power of Religion, turns his attention here to a similarly powerful, yet positive side of religion: how our concept of God can fuel healthy body and mind. This book contends that all health—mental and physical—is shaped, for good or ill, by our spiritual, theological, and psychological notions about the nature of God, and by the way we form an outlook on life as a result of these notions. Across history, a large percentage of people have believed that God is a threat, an attitude Ellens describes as sick gods created through pathological beliefs, or sick gods that make sick people. But Ellens grounds his brighter perspective in this text on God as a source of unconditional grace and goodwill, then illuminates the effect this perspective has on people who have incorporated it into their minds and lives.Ellens shows that people with firm faith in God's radical grace are psychologically strong and healthy. His offering of psychology interfacing with theology is reminiscent of Carl Rogers' teaching on unconditional positive regard and its ability to heal suffering persons. All readers, he explains, can benefit by this understanding that can inspire spiritual and psychological healing whether for ourselves, family, friends, or clients in counseling or therapy.

This book describes the psychospiritual facts of life about the pervasiveness of sexuality in all aspects of human life. The energy developed by our libido is the dynamic source of all the forces that shape our experience, life, motives, thought, feelings, desires, and spiritual longings. No facet of life is untouched or unshaped by this dynamo. Whether we are sitting in church at worship, in a meeting for business, in a party for pleasure, we are always aware of the gender of those who are around us and of their level of sensuality, as it impacts us. If we are not aware of that, some wounding has produced an impairment in us that has forced us to repress the awareness inappropriately. This work is not a how to manual so much as a description of the deep meaningfulness that can be found in the spirituality of sex. It is designed to enlighten us about ourselves, to give names to what we all feel all the time and do not know quite how to describe. It is about savoring the spiritual flavor of sexual play and sexual union. This is a book for everyone, from the inquiring adolescent to the mature adult looking for what is missing in sex and relationships. This is not a book mainly for Christians or Jews. It is about the generic human spirituality in every one of us, true believer and atheist alike. It is about being human more fully and with greater satisfaction.Human spirituality is best defined as our irrepressible hunger and quest for meaning in all aspects of life. Human sexuality is best defined as our irrepressible hunger and quest for union with other persons and the meaning of life found in the wholeness that such union brings. Sexuality and spirituality are not two different things. They are two names for the same thing: the irrepressible human quest for meaning, fulfillment, union, and wholeness. They are not two different forces, nor are they in any way at odds with one another, as they have been made to seem in the polarizing attitudes about sexuality and spirituality popular in human society, thanks to the excessive and negative moralization of sex. Here, Ellens sheds new light on the interplay of sexuality and spirituality through the use of anecdotes, observation, and thoughtful analysis.

While nearly half of Americans identify themselves with a fundamentalist brand of religion, and a sizable minority has rejected religion altogether, there is a vast middle ground. This book is aimed at that huge group of people who describe themselves as spiritual but not religious. In other words, people who are open to encountering the divine and the transcendent, and indeed actively seek these experiences. The authors help readers improve their understanding of the religious nature of the psyche, the origins of myths and religions in the collective unconscious, and the ways in which organized religion has often worked to infantilize its followers. They leave the reader with an empowered ability to claim his or her own spiritual authority and lead a more abundant, authentic life.Many of those who have left organized religion have done so because it has hurt them in some way or because it failed to address their needs, yet they maintain a strong yearning to reconnect with the divine and transcendent level of human existence. As religious fundamentalism continues to influence so much of our national discourse, and as atheistic books rank high on bestseller lists, the time has never been more crucial for a book to address a third way between fundamentalism and atheism - a way that encourages readers to connect with their true religious nature, while at the same time maintaining their intellectual integrity and claiming their own authority. McGehee and Thomas offer that third way.

This enlightening analysis of the image of a cruel God sustained by conservative Christianity reveals how this image formed, the psychological effects of this concept, and the ways in which it has guided religious individuals—in both positive and negative ways.This book is born, in large measure, as a result of a writing by contemporary theologian J. Harold Ellens. In his essay "Religious Metaphors Can Kill" from Praeger's The Destructive Power of Religion, Ellens espouses that theological doctrines are rooted in a model of God that determines all the aspects of those doctrines, and strongly influences the cultures into which it is inserted. Conservative Christianity in the Western world, says Ellens, has at its center the image of a cruel and wrathful God. The juridical atonement theory of Anselm is a result of such an image of God, and has an important role in justifying the resort to violence in human interaction.Starting from these considerations, Cruel God, Kind God: How Images of God Shape Belief, Attitude, and Outlook analyzes three general topics: how two very different kinds of Christianities have emerged from these disparate images of God; how the doctrines of "original sin," "the plan of salvation," and "penal substitution" can be explained by psychological factors, as can the wide dissemination and acceptance of these doctrines; and how the image of a cruel God affects mental health, atrophies personality, and produces guilt and shame.

This book sums up 100 of years of research into the study of happiness—from 19th century scientific insights on the subject to the pop psychology perspectives of modern-day America.We all want to be happy, but what does that mean, and how do we get there? These questions may be a popular topic of positive psychology books in recent years, but interest in the subject stretches back over a century. Distinguished authors Nathan Carlin and Donald Capps examine opinions, research studies, and insights about happiness from the 18th century through today. 100 Years of Happiness: Insights and Findings from the Experts is organized into three sections—one that explores insights from philosophers, another part that reviews study results from researchers, and a final section that casts some skepticism on the study of happiness. The authors review what the experts have found, and explore such questions as: Is happiness the goal of life? Is it possible to measure happiness? Is it possible to become happier? What is the difference between unhappiness and depression? If humankind could eliminate unhappiness from the human condition, should we? This fascinating text provides a basis for readers to develop their own conclusions, and to continue humankind's ongoing discourse on the subject.

Can drugs be used intelligently and responsibly to expand human consciousness and heighten spirituality? This two-volume work presents objective scientific information and personal stories aiming to answer the question.The first of its kind, this intriguing two-volume set objectively reports on and assesses this modern psycho-social movement in world culture: the constructive medical use of entheogens and related mind-altering substances. Covering the use of substances such as ayahuasca, cannabis, LSD, peyote, and psilocybin, the work seeks to illuminate the topic in a scholarly and scientific fashion so as to lift the typical division between those who are supporters of research and exploration of entheogens and those who are strongly opposed to any such experimentation altogether. The volumes address the history and use of mind-altering drugs in medical research and religious practice in the endeavor to expand and heighten spirituality and the sense of the divine, providing unbiased coverage of the relevant arguments and controversies regarding the subject matter. Chapters include examinations of how psychoactive agents are used to achieve altered states in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism as well as in the rituals of shamanism and other less widely known faiths. This highly readable work will appeal to everyone from high school students to seasoned professors, in both the secular world and in devoted church groups and religious colleges.

This introduction to media literacy from a Christian perspective provides the tools to find and assess the beneficial—or harmful—ideologies depicted in notable films, programs, and trends.Television and movies shape popular culture, with audiences often unaware of how media messages influence the way they think, act, and view the world. In this enlightening guide, author Jen Letherer interprets film and television shows from a Christian standpoint, revealing how beliefs and values portrayed on the big and small screens often impact the moral conduct of daily viewers. This book provides the tools for Christians to discern the implicit and explicit messages found within this medium, and shows how motion pictures can improve or erode religious principles and a spiritual way of life.In a conversational tone, the work combines classic film theory, an assessment of story structure, and faith-based film criticism to delve into meaning and interpretations of popular movies and shows. Highlighted television programs include Top Chef, Modern Family, Downton Abbey, and The Walking Dead. The book also features films like Citizen Kane, Thelma and Louise, Star Wars, Inception, and The Hunger Games. This fascinating critique prompts media consumers to analyze the messages that their favorite broadcast programs send, consider if those messages are in line with their own values, and align their viewing choices with their personal beliefs.

This unique book is an essential resource for interdisciplinary research and scholarship on the phenomenon of feeling called to a life path or vocation at the interface of science and religion.According to Gallup polls, more than 40 percent of Americans report having had a profound religious experience or awakening that changed the direction of their life. What are the potential mental, spiritual, and even physical benefits of following the calling to take a particular path in life? This standout book addresses the full range of calling experiences, from the "A-ha!" moments of special insight, to pondering what one is meant to do in life, to intense spiritual experiences like Saint Paul on the road to Damascus.Drawing upon the collective knowledge and insight of expert authors from Australia, China, Eastern Europe, Italy, the UK, and the United States, the work provides a comprehensive examination of the topic of callings suitable for collegiate students, professors, and professional scholars interested in topics at the interface of science and religion. It will also benefit general readers seeking the expertise of psychologists, neuroscientists, and theologians from various backgrounds and worldviews who explain why it is important to "do what you were meant to do."

Edited by two preeminent scholars, this book provides coverage of the policy issues related to the increasingly diverse treatments, practices, and applications of psychedelics.Hallucinogenic substances like LSD, mescaline, peyote, MDMA, and ayahuasca have a reputation as harmful substances that are enjoyed only by recreational users committing criminal acts. But leading international researchers and scholars who contributed to this book hold that the use of psychedelic substances for health, religious, intellectual, and artistic purposes is a Constitutional right—and a human right. Based on that conclusion, these scholars focus on policy issues that regulate the use of psychedelic drugs in medicine, religion, personal life, and higher education, arguing that existing regulations should match current and anticipated future uses.This volume has two parts. The first surveys research on the use of psychedelic drugs in medicine, religion, and truth-seeking, following these topics through history and contemporary practice. The second section treats government policices that regulate the psychological, physiological, biochemical, and spiritual aspects of research and experience in these fields. The Psychedelic Policy Quagmire: Health, Law, Freedom, and Society challenges medical and legal policy experts, ethicists, scientists, and scholars with the question: How can we formulate policies that reduce the dangers of psychedelics' misuse and at the same time maximize the emerging diverse benefits?

Written by two clinical psychologists with nearly a century of combined experience, this book explains how people who suffer from depression, anxiety, or undue anger can overcome these difficulties by allowing the normal process of grieving to occur.Sadness is generally characterized as a negative emotion, yet experiencing sadness plays a positive and key role in achieving and maintaining mental health and in avoiding anxiety, depression, and anger. Indeed, sadness can be understood as a normal and necessary feeling that always occurs when one loses something that is loved. The Positive Power of Sadness examines the experience of sadness, taking into account the personal, relational, and neurological factors of sadness; explains the cultural reasons that many resist feeling sad and consequently displace sadness into secondary processes; and provides a practical and systematic way to overcome anger, anxiety, and depression by allowing the normal process of being sad to occur. This simple paradigm of love and loss causing joy and sorrow in tandem is founded on solid research, carefully considered theory, and extensive experience and will serve to stimulate further thought and writing. Professional therapists, psychologists, counselors, teachers, and clergy who work with people in various settings will find this enlightening reading, as will general readers seeking self-help or possessing an interest in psychological functioning or relational difficulties.