Human Development / Stage Theory

Human Development / Stage Theory

The Relation of the Stage Theory to the Christian Life

The Goals of Development and Stage Theory

The goals of human development in Christian theory can be divided into the ultimate and the intermediate. The ultimate goal is to achieve life everlasting in the company of God and Christ in Heaven (Sermabeikian, 1994). The intermediate goal is to do God's will in one's daily life on earth. The behaviors that represent God's will have been defined in the Old Testament of the Bible mainly in the form of specific commandments and proverbs, often illustrated with examples from people's lives. Most prominent of these are the 10 commandments that warn against such acts as killing, stealing, telling lies, committing adultery, coveting others' possessions, worship- ping idols, misusing God's name, failing to respect one's parents, and improperly conducting religious rites (Exodus 20:4-26). God's will is reinterpreted by Christ in the New Testament in the form of more general principles of conduct, the chief of which are to love God and all mankind. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with thy entire mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is ... thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. (Mark 12:30-31)

The principle of treating others with love is illustrated with examples in the accounts of Christ's life and with suggestions in subsequent books, most of which consist of letters sent by the apostle Paul to various groups of Christian adherents. Hence, according to Christian theory, human development can be judged satisfactory when the individual's behavior increasingly matches the behavior described in God's commandments. Or stated differently, because the term sin identifies all behaviors contrary to God's will, human development is progressing satisfactorily when a person increasingly avoids sin. However, Christian theologians disagree on the question of the connection between (a) the intermediate goals of abiding by God's commandments and (b) the ultimate goal of the soul's ascending to Heaven after the death of the body (Nee, 1968). The question is: Will a person earn an after-life of everlasting joy in Heaven by having faithfully followed God's commandments while on earth, or earn an after-life of misery in Hell by having lived an earthly life of sin? Or is the soul's destiny after death dependent simply on God's inclination or grace, regardless of one's conduct during the years on earth? Can people who have lived sinful lives attain a Heavenly after-life by, at the time of death, confessing their sins and accepting Christ as their savior? While some Christians would answer yes and others no to such queries, all Christians endorse the belief that humans are obligated to follow the Lord's commandments, and child- raising and educational practices are directed toward such an end.

The Length of Development and the Christian Perspective

Defining the length of life and of development from a Christian perspective requires that the material being- the body-be considered separately from the non- material -- the soul or spirit (Sermabeikian, 1994). For the body, the beginning of both life and development occurs with conception, with the joining of the sperm and egg, and the end comes with physical death as the heart stops beating. For the soul, life is far longer, although the length of development may be the same as for the body. The decision about when the life of the soul starts depends upon which theory of the soul's origin is adopted. To people who subscribe to either the pre-existence or traducian theory, the soul originates at the time of conception, when the sperm and ovum merge. To those who subscribe to the creationist theory, the soul originates at whatever time between conception and birth God places the individual in the fetus. It is not clear in Christian doctrine whether the soul achieves any prenatal development, so the beginning of development of the soul appears indeterminate. However, it is clear that from birth until physical death the soul develops; that is, it changes with experience and knowledge.

One of the key tenets of Christian belief is that the life of the soul does not end with physical death but continues on through everlasting time. Hence, the life of the soul extends from the prenatal period into eternity. It is unclear, however, whether any development of the soul occurs after physical death (Nee, 1968). In the view of Jonathan Edwards, a seventeenth-century American Protestant theologian, 'An unbodied spirit may be as capable of love and hatred, joy and sorrow, hope or fear, or other affections, as one that is united to a body' (Simonson 1970), but the question of whether such an ostensibly sensate soul experiences any development while in its unbodied state following physical death is left unsettled.

Stages of Development and the Christian Perspective

For present purposes, a stage of development is considered to be a period of life which is marked by characteristics that differ from those of other periods. Passage from one stage to another is often indicated by a society's assigning responsibilities and rights not expected at an earlier stage. Sometimes passage is also signified by a formal ceremony. In view of this definition, there appear to be at least five stages of development in Christian theory -- the prebaptismal, the post baptismal childhood stage, the age of reason, the years of marriage, and the post- mortem period. In most Christian denominations the prebaptismal stage consists of the 9-month prenatal period as well as the early days or early months of infancy until the baby is baptized. During the baptism ceremony, the child is officially assigned the name that he or she will bear throughout life, and the ceremony shows the world that the parents dedicate the child to a Christian life. People who have not been baptized in infancy may be baptized at any later time in life. During the post baptismal period of childhood, which typically extends from infancy until around puberty, children are expected to gradually learn how to be good Christians.

However, during this first decade of life, children are considered too immature to fully under- stand Christian doctrine or the consequences of their behavior, so they are not held responsible for moral decisions. But around the time of puberty, they are thought to reach the age of reason and thus become capable of comprehending more completely the significance of Christian commitment. They are now considered to be accountable for their moral decisions and behavior. This passing from the state of irresponsible childhood into the fellowship of responsible, mature Christians is signified by a formal ceremony conducted before the church congregation. The ceremony in the Catholic Church is the confirmation rite and in most Protestant denominations it is the ritual of accepting the youth as a full church member with the right to partake of Holy Communion (Sermabeikian, 1994). During the period immediately preceding the ceremony, the youth usually engages in intensive study of key elements of church doctrine to help ensure that he or she enters the new stage of life with a truly enlightened Christian commitment. Entrance to the next stage, which traditionally occurs in early adulthood, is signified by a marriage ceremony during which the bride and groom publicly pledge to respect, love, and protect each other, forsaking all other potential mates 'until death do us part.' An important facet of marriage is that of achieving parenthood.

The final stage of development begins with death. Whereas physical death means the end of the corporeal self, for the soul it signifies the onset of life hereafter. Although there may be no change in the soul's condition during the after-life, passage into the final stage is itself a developmental change. A person's entering this last stage is marked by a funeral ceremony in which the soul of the departed is entrusted to the care of the Lord. In certain versions of Christian theory an additional stage, or perhaps sub-stage, during the period of adult- hood is postulated. It is that of the born-again Christian, a condition achieved when an adult experiences a spiritual reawakening, a revival of Christian insight and commitment, with the spiritual rebirth often occurring during the conduct of a religious ceremony. The four varieties of influence that shape development in Christian theory are heredity, the environment, supernatural acts, and human will.

Heredity, as set by the genes contributed by the two parents at the time of conception, determines the general structure of the human body and the basic pace of its growth throughout life. This is true in all forms of Christian theory. And as noted earlier, in the opinion of Christians who subscribe to either a pre-existence or traducian belief in the origin of the soul, heredity also accounts for the condition of the human soul at the time of birth. Environmental forces significantly affect the development of the body through nutrition, exercise, illness, and accident. The environment also strongly influences the contents of the soul or mind through the direct instruction of parents and educators, through the examples set by parents and by companions, and through the way life is portrayed in mass communication and entertainment media. As for supernatural acts, the primary sources of these are God and Satan. Satan or the Devil constantly urges the individual to adopt sinful ways, to behave contrary to God's directives. To combat Satan's influence, God is always available as a guide and supporter for people in moments of indecision, of spiritual weakness, and of temptation. God's guidance and strength may be sought directly through prayer and through reading passages of Holy Scripture, or sought indirectly through consulting a priest or pastor. Not only do Christians believe God serves as adviser and spiritual supporter, but also that he can intervene to change either the individual or the environment so as to cause an event to turn out as the individual has hoped it would. This conviction that God at any moment can manipulate events to affect a particular outcome is suggested in many passages of the Bible.

A familiar example is Psalm 23, which reflects the faith that both the individual's behavior and the influence of environmental elements-such as one's enemies -- can be controlled by God on any occasion (Nee, 1968). The Lord is my shepherd .... He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; he leadeth me beside the still waters. He ... leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for thou art with me .... Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies.... A passage from the oft-repeated Lord's prayer (Matthew 6:11, 13) reflects this same belief in God's ability to fashion events that influence the individual's development: 'Give us this day our daily bread .... And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.' The fourth force affecting development is human will or intention. In contrast to a belief in complete determinism, which holds that a person's development is entirely the result of hereditary and environmental factors that are beyond the control of the individual, Christian doctrine suggests that humans have a free will which permits them to make decisions about how to behave. Hence, people's conscious intentions and determination play an important part in deciding the direction their lives take. Expressing one common view of will within Christian doctrine, Strong (1907 p.509) has pro- posed that: Man is responsible for all effects of will, as well as for will itself; for voluntary affections, as well as for voluntary acts; for the intellectual views into which will has entered, as well as for the acts of will by which these views have been formed in the past or are maintained in the present (Derezotes, 1995). In summary, then, from conception until death, human development results from the interaction of forces of heredity, environment, God and Satan, and the individual's own will or determination.

Sources of Evidence and Investigative Methodology

To answer questions about sources of evidence and types of investigative methods used for generating and supporting Christian theory, it is useful to adopt Dunstan's (1961) three categories of Christians-conservatives, liberals, and mainstream Christians. The categories cut across denominational lines, so that conservatives, liberals, and mainstreamers are found within nearly all large Christian sects-Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Baptist, Anglican, and others. Conservatives, who sometimes refer to themselves as evangelical Christians, base their beliefs about human nature and development on the literal word of the Bible. If a theory derived from modern-day science is in conflict with Bible scripture, then there is no question that the scientific theory is false. A case in point is the conflict between (a) the description of the creation of animal life and of human life in the Bible (Genesis 2:7-22) and (b) Charles Darwin's theory that humans have evolved over time from simple forms of animal life. In the view of conservatives, no matter what evidence Darwinian evolutionists present in support of their case, Darwin's theory could not possibly be true because it deviates from the Biblical version of creation. To conservatives, the truth about any phenomenon is not discovered by humans through their own cleverness or the investigative techniques they devise. Rather, truth is revealed to mankind by God in messages sent through specially chosen people, such as Moses, David, and Solomon among the compilers of the Old Testament of the Bible and such followers of Christ as Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Paul for the New Testament. Since earliest Christian times there have also been other people credited with being authentic recipients of divine revelations. These have included Christian saints, the popes of the Catholic Church, and such individuals in Protestant denominations as Martin Luther (1483-1546), John Calvin (1509-1564), John Knox (1505-1572), Joseph Smith (1805-1844) as founder of the Mormon Church, and Mary Baker Eddy (1821-1910) as founder of the Christian Science Church. At the opposite end of the philosophical spectrum from the conservatives are Christian liberals who do not regard the Bible as the literal, infallible word of God (Sermabeikian, 1994).

The history we make occurs only in our lifetime, though it too has consequences for future generations. The epochal transformations that took place across millennia and the historical changes of past centuries and recent decades all come to bear in developments shaping the current generation. The epic and historic transitions from dogmatism to pluralism allow present-day Catholics, for example, to become responsible consciously and collectively for either reproducing the current form of priesthood or transforming the status quo. An individual's ability to assume that responsibility, however, is also acquired in stages that occur in one's lifetime. The facility to think rationally, for example, is achieved in roughly four stages, according to Jean Piaget (Derezotes, 1995). He describes them as sensorimotor intelligence, preoperational intelligence, concretely operational intelligence, and formally operational intelligence (Wuthnow, 1976). Only the last stage, which most children in developed societies reach by early adolescence, is considered full human intelligence. It includes the ability to operate with combinations, engage in propositional logic and hypothesis testing, and deal with potentialities or theoretical possibilities. Also among these skills is the ability to participate in creative religious symbolization. Researchers on human development assert that not all adults actually reach full operational intelligence. Although some may have the biological maturation needed, they may lack the necessary social experience, while others, through such deficiencies as malnutrition, may not even develop the biological potency.

And, I would add, to religious reform. The realm most intimate to self is the ground of one's being; the domain of religion. The magisterial works of Piaget on intelligence and his later studies on the acquisition of morality are matched by Erik Erickson's research on the stages of overall psychosocial development (Gruber & Voneche, 1977). His well-known model divides the human life cycle into eight stages, from infancy, early childhood, play age, school age, adolescence, young adulthood, and adulthood to old age. Each stage presents a developmental challenge that results in attaining a certain level of positive and negative ego quality. Most are not entirely successful in fully achieving either quality but emerge from each stage with some ratio of the two opposing trends. Corresponding to the eight stages are the following pairs of favorable and unfavorable outcomes: basic trust vs. mistrust, independence vs. disgrace and doubt, idea vs. guilt, industry vs. inferiority, identity vs. individuality confusion, intimacy vs. isolation, generativity vs. stagnation, and ego integrity vs. despair.

The pioneering work of Piaget and Erickson has been extended by Lawrence Kohlberg to the stages of moral development and by James Fowler to the stages of religious faith (Ricoeur, 2006). Kohlberg found three stages in his research on moral attitudes: the preconventional, the conventional, and the postconventional. Only in the third stage do children develop the ability to apply universalistic moral principles about justice and similar matters. Once again, further research shows that not all adults reach the level of development where they make moral judgments based on universal principles. Fowler's studies, which build mainly on the work of Piaget, Erickson, and Kohlberg, led to the formulation of six stages of faith. Fowler labels them intuitive-projective, mythic-literal, synthetic-conventional, individuative-reflective, conjunctive, and universalizing. The highest stage, characterized by an emptying of self and a universalizing relation to Ultimate Reality, was achieved only rarely by the people in Fowler's sample and usually only by those over 60. Many adults are permanently arrested in stage 3, which is marked by conformism to the opinions and authority of others.