The dynamics of spiritual development
Date
2009
Authors
Cupit, C.G.
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Book chapter
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Source details - Title: International handbook of education for spirituality, care and wellbeing, 2009, pp.291-309
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Abstract
Dynamic Systems Theory (DST) allows a description of spiritual development, applicable across a range of definitions of spirituality, without the paradigmatic limitations of traditional linear developmental theories which fail to account for the complexity of the phenomena associated with “spirituality”. The concept of “Integrative Dynamic Systems” provides a powerful explanatory metaphor for “spirits” using concepts of “agency”, “top-down causality”, “emergence”, and “attractors” which have direct parallels to terms commonly employed to explain spirituality. A DST stance allows us to transcend reductionism without losing scientific rigour. Through a DST lens, spiritual development exhibits sudden phase transitions from less to more functional organisation of the whole person, driven by “system parameters”, ecological forces; organised by “attractors”, patterns of behaviour which emerge regularly without clear causal factors; and responsive to the child’s free choices. Children resist spiritual change, yet significant transitions may be precipitated by trivial events.