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Stages of Faith

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Submitted By vermon
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Fowler wanted to give everyone a way to understand how faith related to our lives. He developed a list of stages or processes to try to clarify how and what we believe. No matter if you believe or practice a specific religion or just believe in spirits, it plays a significant role in shaping your life, one way or another. As we mature we can develop ‘’ a more flexible, dialectical, postformal faith” (Berger, 2014, p. 531).
As I look back over my own personal ‘faith history/development’ I see evidence of the stages described by Fowler. During the early childhood years an individual develops an intuitive-projective faith. In this phase a child continues to grow and begins to engage in symbolic thought and play. At this age faith is based on the stories they are given from parents or others. At this stage they are creating concepts of good and evil. Looking back on my childhood this is when prayer was first introduced and I did not understand its true meaning. My prayers were not thought out; they were an expression of thoughts and sometimes the simple prayer most children are taught; Now I lay me down to sleep. The second or mythic-literal stage, some children believe that the religious stories they have been taught have significance and beliefs. Moral rules and attitudes are interpreted literally, if we are good we go to Heaven and if we are bad then we go to hell. You begin to understand that not all bad people will be held accountable for their actions, and even good people may encounter suffering. Start to understand that just because you pray for something doesn’t mean you get what you want. For young adults the synthetic-conventional stage personality is key and representations of God, that he is a loving, understanding and is forgivable. We should do what is right, start to branch out and find their selves. This is the time when everything starts changing.

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