Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Human Development and the Quest for Meaning

Dr James Fowler talked with men, women, and children aged four to eighty-four, including Jews, Catholics, Protestants, agnostics, and atheists. Faith, as approached here, is not necessarily religious, nor is it to be equated with belief. Rather, faith is a person's way of leaning into and making sense of life. More verb than noun, faith is the dynamic system of images, values, and commitments that guides one's life. It is thus universal: everyone who chooses to go on living operates by some basic faith. Building on the contributions of such key thinkers as Piaget, Erikson, and Kohlberg, Fowler draws on a wide range of scholarship, literature, and firsthand research to present expertly and engagingly the six stages that emerge in working out the meaning of our lives - from the intuitive, imitative faith of childhood through conventional and then more independent faith to the universalizing, self-transcending faith of full maturity. Stages of Faith helps us to understand our own pilgrimage of faith, the passages of our own quest for meaning and value.