erikson, psychology, and religion

Pastoral Psychology, VoL 44, No. 6, 1996

Erikson, Psychology, and Religion

Robert C. Fuller 1

The writings of the late Erik H. Erikson (1) have contributed directly to the psychological study of religion, (2) were amenable to the efforts of others to develop normative theological arguments, and (3) might be seen as themselves examples of contemporary, nontheological accounts of the religious dimension of human existence. This paper begins by reviewing the principal contributions that Erikson made to the psychological study of religion, followed by a review of the uses that have been made of Erikson's work for normative~constructive activities in such areas as practical theology and pastoral counseling. I will then argue that Erikson's wri t ings- when viewed in the vein of William James's radical empiricism and functionalist accounts of human religiosity -- identify an irreducib~ religious dimension to normative human functioning. Erikson's functionalism constitutes a form of nontheological religious thinking that speaks directly to concerns presenting themselves in contemporary culture.

The passing of Erik H. Erikson on May 12, 1994 prompts reflection on his contributions to the academic study of religion. Indeed, Erikson's writings directly engage the kinds of conversations that interest scholars in the field of "religion and the social sciences." Erikson has, for example, been a major figure in the "psychology of religion" field for more than three decades (Wulff, 1991, pp. 369-410). His epigenetic theory of devel- opmen ta l stages has provided a useful calculus for assessing the psychological effects of religious belief or experience, while his studies of Luther and Gandhi engendered insightful new approaches to the psychohistorical study of religious individuals. No less important has been the appropriation of Erikson's work by scholars in the dialogical field of the "theological appropriation of psychological concepts." This second kind of

IAddress correspondence to Robert C. Fuller. Bradley University, Peoria, IL 61625.

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conversation has concentrated on the ease with which Erikson's theories lend themselves to the more normative or constructive enterprises associated with practical theology. Yet, more promising still is the way that Erikson's writings open up a third form of conversation by articulating an anthropological model in which it becomes possible to speak of a distinctively religious dimension of human experience without relying upon the categories of traditional theology. Erikson's functionalist account of human development, we shall see, has both epistemological and ontological implications for speaking meaningfully about the status of religion as a sui generis element of healthy human functioning.

ERIKSON AND THE PSYCHOLOGY OF RELIGION

Most scholars of religion are prone to view the modifications that Erikson introduced into psychoanalytic theory as in and of themselves contributions to the psychological study of religion (Homans, 1878; Wright, 1982). Thus, for example, the fact that Erikson strayed far afield from Freud's instinctual drive model (and toward a model emphasizing the causal role of the social environment) is generally thought to make his theory a less reductive approach to explaining the origins and functions of religious belief. So, too, is Erikson's greater attention to the ego credited with making it possible to assess the ideological and adaptive functions of religious belief in a way that goes beyond Freud's emphasis upon the mechanisms of projection and sublimation. And finally, unlike Freud who focused upon the cause and cure of neuroses, Erikson focused upon the developmental tendencies toward growth and maturity. His "master question" was that of understanding how humans might find the strengths necessary to handle life's challenges and, as a consequence, his treatment of religion tends to focus upon the potentially adaptive rather than potentially regressive dimensions of religion.

The structural modifications that make Erikson's theory more con- genial to the study of religion were ably displayed in his two major psychohistorical works, Young Man Luther (1958) and Gandhi's Truth (1969). Not only did these works have a major impact on the entire enterprise of psychohistory (Albin, 1980; Johnson, 1977; Pomper, 1985), but they in turn spawned several other valuable psychohistorical studies of religious persons (Capps, Capps, & Bradford, 1977; Moore, 1979; Hutch, 1983). Erikson's psychohistorical studies of Luther and Gandhi largely focused on the interconnection between an individual's personal ideology and the surrounding cultural ethos. In so doing Erikson highlighted the potentially adaptive and wholeness-making functions of religiously framed visions

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of the world. In Erikson's words, religion offers individuals an ideological synthesis that "make facts amenable to ideas, and ideas to facts, in order to create a world image convincing enough to support the collective and the individual sense of identity . . . . It translates into significant words, im- ages, and codes the exceeding darkness which surrounds man's existence, and the light which pervades it beyond all desert or comprehension" (1958, pp. 222, 21). Implicit in these remarks are two important implications of Erikson's assessment of the ideological function of religion. First, he sees in homo religiosi such as Luther and Gandhi the possibility of formulating ideological visions that embrace a global vision and thereby overcome the tendency to pseudospeciation (i.e., tribal allegiance to the superiority of one's own group) that threatens the human race. Secondly, Erikson also acknowledged the ideological function of religion in guiding humans through developmental challenges that defy solution in terms of prudential, ego-dominated reason.

This latter point, the fact that humans necessarily and predictably con- front developmental challenges that have a decidedly religious character to them, draws attention to Erikson's well-known epigenetic account of the eight stages of psychosocial development. At least three of the critical stages (e.g., trust vs. mistrust, identity vs. identity diffusion, and wisdom vs. despair) in the course of human development, and the adaptive strengths or virtues that hopefully emerge from them, are characterized as having religious dimensions. Thus, for example, when Erikson speaks of the need for basic trust, he insisted that he was "not referring to good manners or to the ni- ceties of personality, but to the minimum conditions for human survival itself" (Yankelovich & Barrett, 1970, p. 121). A fundamental trust in life is absolutely indispensable to the ability to seek out new experiences. And even though Erikson notes how significant social "others" (i.e., the nurturing parent) are prime mediators of basic trust, the continued affirmation of trust throughout life is inherently a religious task. The issue of basic trust is es- sentially religious because what is at stake is never the amount of informa- tion we have about this or that discrete event in our lives. The resolution of trust/mistrust issues engages our deepest responses to the whole of reality, not its isolated parts. We might also note that Erikson (1976) characterized the eighth of his developmental stages by suggesting that "every human being's Integrity may be said to be religious (whether explicitly or not). Each person engages in an inner search for, and a wish to communicate with, that mysterious, that Ultimate Other: for there can be no "I" without an "Other" and no "We" without a shared "Other '" (p. 11). To this extent Erikson's developmental theory not only accords religion a positive functional value, but it actually suggests that optimal psychological growth requires the adoption of a religious posture toward life.

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There is, however, some debate as to just what kind of conversation between religion and the social sciences is opened up by Erikson's writings. After all, the "psychology of religion" is an inherently reductive conversation. It privileges psychological concepts as the final arbiter of what religion is "really" all about. Erikson's contributions to this conversation are generally assumed to reside in the fact that his modifications in psychoanalytic theory permit richer and more nuanced arbitrations of religion's truth- claims than is possible with Freud's work. But just as scholars of religion generally note that because Erikson never fully articulated the extent of his theoretical break from Freud, his contributions to the field are ulti- mately hazy and ambiguous (Wulff, 1991, pp. 403-410). The highly regarded psychologist of religion Peter Homans (1978) concludes that Erik- son never finally moves the psychological study of religion further than Freud's projection model (p. 259). Homans argues that although religion for Erikson is largely "good projection," his positive valuation of religion does not cancel out its fundamentally projective character. While religion witnesses to the existence and activity of a transcendent reality, Erikson's theory must still treat its assertions about that reality as projections of intrapsychic mechanisms. Homans contends that even though Erikson stipulates that these projections contain some element of truth, he offers no evidence or discussion of how this might be so. Erikson's indebtedness to the psychoanalytic tradition equivocates any possible contribution to the psychological validation of religion's claims to lay hold of a transcendent reality. And thus even though Erikson's psychological concepts add new topics to the "psychology of religion" conversation, the structural dynamics of the conversation remain unaffected.

THE THEOLOGICAL APPROPRIATION OF PSYCHOLOGICAL CONCEPTS

Theology has always relied upon the intellectual models generated by secular culture. For example, dogmatic theology is frequently concerned with apologetic interests that require the appropriation of explanatory concepts expressing a culture's distinctive mode of self-interpretation. Practical theology is even more dependent upon secular understandings. As the theoretical foundation for the practice of the cure of souls, practical theology must utilize whatever psychological constructs it can avail itself of to con- ceptualize appropriate means of providing such pastoral functions as counseling, education, and community formation. A second kind of conversation between psychology and religion, therefore, is that of the theological appropriation of select psychological models to further its own


apologetic and pastoral aims. It should not be surprising that with the ex- ception of Carl Rogers (and possibly Cad Jung), Erikson has contributed more to the development of this dialogical discipline than any other twentieth-century psychologist.

An early installment in the theological appropriation of Erikson's psychology was Don Browning's Generative Man (1973). Browning finds a strong ethical dimension in Erikson's work that is at once consistent with scientific accounts of human nature (the "is") and capable of generating guidance in patterning our commitments in morally responsible ways (the "ought"). Although Browning does not directly link Erikson's writings with larger theological concerns prior to the book's epilogue, he is nonetheless singularly focused on arguing that there is a normative dimension in all psychological writings and Erikson's depiction of human development ad- dresses the religio-moral needs of our age better than any of its psychological competitors. Browning's subsequent -- and highly influential -- writings in the field of practical theology continued to make Erikson's writings central to contemporary models of how Christian churches might best go about their pastoral duties.

The volumes in the series on "Theology and Pastoral Care" that Browning edited for Fortress Press illustrate the kinds of influence that Erikson has had on recent practical theology. For example, the lead volume in this series, Donald Capps's Life Cycle Theory and Pastoral Care (1983), explains how Erikson's developmental scheme might substantively inform a pastor's role both as moral counselor and as ritual coordinator. First and foremost, Capps draws attention to the important way in which Erikson's eight-stage theory of human development provides a framework for understanding the goals of successful pastoral counseling. Pastoral care, Capps contends, can provide the kind of emotional and intellectual orientation that will enable individuals to navigate their way through the major crises of psychosocial development. Secondly, Capps notes how each of the eight virtues that Erikson designates as adaptive strengths has its counterpart in traditional Christian discussions of virtues and vices. Capps correlates Erik- son's schedule of virtues with his own improvised "schedule of vices" in order to help pastoral counselors relate their theological heritage to contemporary understandings of psychological health. And finally, Capps picks up on the ministerial implications of Erikson's development of the concept of "ritualization" in his Toys and Reasons (1977) and The Life Cycle Com- pleted (1982). Erikson noted how both special cultural rites and the ritualized customs of everyday life (e.g., the exchange of smiles between parent and infant) help assist individuals in acquiring the psychosocial strengths necessary for healthy adaptation to life. Capps uses Erikson's de- lineation of the ritual elements associated with each of the major stages

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of psychosocial development to suggest ways in which religious congrega- tions might ritualize the resources needed to provide proper support and comfort to one another.

In a similar vein K. Brynolf Lyon's Toward a Practical Theology of Aging (1985) and Evelyn and James Whitehead's Christian Life Patterns (1979) utilize Erikson's writings to thematize "the psychological challenges and religious invitations of adult life." Both books utilize Erikson's descriptions of psychological virtues to develop practical strategies for ministering to the lives of contemporary parishioners.

This second type of conversation, that of theological appropriations of psychological ideas, is also an inherently reductive one. In this case theology is the privileged partner and psychological ideas are appropriated only insofar as they advance preestablished agendas. For the most part, these have been the agendas of recent liberal Christian theology that hope to find descriptions of divine immanence lurking beneath the surface of contemporary psychological theories. Critical assessment of such theological ventures is beyond the scope of this paper as is the attendant issue of whether the appropriation of psychological ideas fundamentally coopts the entire theological enterprise. It is important to note, however, that Erik- son's writings surely invite religious/theological extrapolations of some kind or another. He repeatedly describes such issues as ritualization, integrity, and mutual activation in quasi-mystical language. Consider, for example, just two quotations. When describing the "ritualization" of the parent/infant encounter, Erikson (1979) -- somewhat obscurely -- emphasizes the

reassurance of familiarity and mutuality; while this first and dimmest affirmation, this sense of hallowed presence, contributes to mankind's ritual-making a personal element which is best called the numinous. This designation betrays my intent ion to follow the earliest into the last; and, indeed, we recognize the numinous as an indispensable aspect of the devotional element in all periodical observances . . . . The numinous assures us of separateness transcended and yet also a distinctiveness confirmed, and thus of the very basis of a sense of "I," renewed (as it feels) by the mutual recognition of all "I 's" joined in a shared faith in one all-embracing, "I Am." (p. 89)

Or when, in his conclusion to Young Man Luther (1958), he reflects on "the main religious objects" that present themselves to us in the course of life:

One may say that man, when looking through a glass darkly, finds himself in an inner cosmos in which the outlines of three objects awaken dim nostalgias. One of these is the simple and fervent wish for a . . . sense of unity with a maternal matrix.

. . . . In the center of the second nostalgia is the paternal voice of guiding conscience, which puts an end to the simple paradise of childhood and provides a sanction for energetic action. . . . . Finally, the glass shows the pure self itself, the unborn core of c r e a t i o n . . .

�9 This pure self i s . . . not dependent on providers, and not dependent on guides to reason and reality. (p. 263)


It is almost impossible to be sure what all Erikson intended by such phrases as "hallowed presence," "I Am," "unborn core of creation," or "the pure self itself." It is certain, however, that he was not intending to convey specifically Christian theological concepts. This is why, I think, that Erik- son's corpus must be seen as engaging yet a third kind of conversation that might exist between psychology and religion: that of extrapolating a nontheological account of human religiosity from a scientifically grounded model of human nature.

ERIKSON'S RADICAL EMPIRICISM

Erikson produced more than a psychological theory. His writings develop the rudiments of a philosophical anthropology capable of delineating wide ranges of human experience. Erikson grounds his interpretation of human nature in an evolutionary-adaptive model of how we interact with the surrounding environments: natural, social, moral, and even ontological. He therefore identifies the "key" to human growth and well-being in terms of acquiring the adaptive skills to interact with these environments in mu- tually enhancing ways. In so doing he opens up what I deem an important third kind of conversation between religion and the social sciences; a conversation that is, moreover, capable of offering a "soft claim" for the veridicality (i.e., real, genuine, not illusory) of religion as a causal factor in optimal human development.

Erikson's use of the epigenetic model explicitly links his work with evolutionary-adaptive theorists such as Konrad Lorenz, Julian Huxley, C. H. Waddington, and C. H. Stockard (Browning, 1978). Erikson employed the epigenetic principle as a way of showing how the various parts of the developing personality, each arising in its time of special ascendancy, work together to form a "functioning whole" (1959, p. 52). In doing so Erikson aligned himself with the functionalist paradigm that is dominant in evolutionary-adaptive biology and twentieth-century American psychology. It is important to note that functionalism in general, and Erikson's particular brand of functionalism in particular, is wedded to specific epistemological and ontological commitments. Functionalism per se has nothing to say about the intrinsic nature or essence of the universe or any of its constituent parts. Put differently, functionalism concerns itself not with what a particular object is, but with how its functions enable the acting organism to adapt to its wider environments. It is thus easy for us to see how the questions Erikson brought to his work were functionalist through and through. He concerned himself with understanding how people manage to function in

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their environments, how they cope with environmental challenges, and how they care for the world about them. His principal concern was to discern the causal influences that, as he put it, "inspires individuals with active properties" that serve optimal adaptation. We might also note that Erik- son's writings are typical of functionalism's (usually implicit) commitment to the principle of meliorism. That is, functionalist theories tend to espouse a certain confidence in the wholeness-making tendencies in the universe. Thus functionalism in general and Erikson's functionalism in particular tend to focus on the functions that contribute to the organism's quest to live, to live well, and to live better.

Understanding the functionalist underpinnings of Erikson's work is critical to an appreciation of the conversation he opens up between religion and the social sciences. Whereas "psychology of religion" conversations typically privilege intrapsychic categories as the final arbiters of truth and "theological appropriation of psychology" conversations typically privilege theological categories, functionalism privileges empirically based concep- tions of those activities that foster adaptation and healthy functioning. Functionalism is uninterested in the question of what religion/s, but rather with how it functions in the lived experience of an organism's quest for survival and enhanced existence. Epistemologically, then, functionalism is in a position to make judgments about the value of religion, but not -- at least directly -- about its truth. For functionalism, then, the issue of veridicality (i.e., being real, genuine, not illusory) is that of value, not that of establishing the transcendental essence or truth of an object.

The functionalist underpinnings of Erikson's theory give his psychology a distinctive causal language. For Erikson, acting causes are to be found in the sells relationship to an environmental "other." J. Eugene Wright (1962) puts the matter succinctly when he observes that "in contrast to Descartes Erikson says, in effect, ' I relate to social others, therefore I exist. I am acted upon and I respond, therefore I exist. I have a history, a family, and a culture into which I am born, and therefore I exist'" (p. 148). Throughout the epigenetic sequence, specific forms of relatedness to the surrounding environment exert specific causal influences upon the developing self. Relationships with a nurturing parent, peer group, or political ideology have functional influence on the individual's ongoing interactions with the world.

What is important to note is that Erikson's causal claims have principally to do with the value, not the truth, of our various modes of relationship with the surrounding world. True, psychological effects imply an acting cause. But Erikson's functionalist orientation made him far less interested in what various modes of relationship to the environment are; than with what they do in terms of promoting optimal adaptation. This becomes a particularly important dis- tinction when we move from assessing our acquisition of skills necessary for


adapting to the physical or social environments to our acquisition of skills that are more properly ontological than psychological in nature. Thus, for example, when Erikson discusses our acquisition of the functional capacities for basic trust and integrity, he attributes causal significance to experiences that lack the subject-object character traditionally associated with psychological analysis. Erikson maintained that the acquisition of these essential developmental strengths are frequently caused by a relation or connection to something nu- ruinous, to something that Erikson variously called the "I Am," the "shared Other," or the "pure self." The important point is that, for Erikson's functionalist psychology, the issue of "veddicality" is not that of ascertaining the essence of an acting cause but its reliability for performing adaptive functions. And, in this case, such numinous modes of relating to the surrounding environment have a decidedly functional veridicality to them and thus causally connected with the production of optimum human functioning.

Attention to Erikson's functional orientation to psychological analysis helps clarify the causal claims associated with his distinctive notion of "actuality." Actuality, we might recall, is a mode of psychological functioning which Erikson contrasts sharply with "reality." While psychological reality more or less corresponds to Freud's conception of reality testing, actuality connotes "the world verified in immediate immersion and interaction," or that which "feels effectively true in action." Erikson himself acknowledges the distinctively religious character of actuality and that religious or numinous modes of relationship create conditions of actuality. As Homans (1978) puts it, Erikson does not address the traditional issues of the essence of religion, "but instead reflects upon the psychological effects of religion. These reflections led him to the conclusion that religion creates actuality, so described, or rather that religion produces actuality in the face of a situation that would otherwise be comprised entirely of 'mere reality'" (p. 246). The key here is that, to Erikson, actuality is asmuch a phenomenologically discernible fact of experience as the mode of relationship he terms psychological reality. When trying to pin down preciseIy what kind of "truth claim" Erikson was making with such loosely worded descriptions, Homans and others have finally concluded that these feelings of connectedness to a "shared Other" or "I Am" are projections in the classic psychoanalytic sense. Yet this was clearly not Erikson's intention. Erikson insisted that the fact that humans add specific shape or interpretation to their sense of relatedness with a "shared Other" does not justify concluding that these feelings of connection are only psychological projections. As he put it, persons are "probably projecting something onto reality which is actually there. There may even be an interaction between man's projection and this reality" (Wright, 1982, p. 183). Similarly, he repeatedly stressed that religion, as with actuality generally, "elaborates what feels profoundly true even though it is not demonstrable" (Erikson, 1958, p. 21).

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Erikson's contention that there probably is a numinous aspect to reality surely supports those who see Erikson leaning in epistemological directions similar to those staked out by Husserl, Heiddeger, and White- head CYankelovich & Barrett, 1970; Capps, 1977). I would, however, like to suggest that the phenomenological, empiricist, and functionalist commit- merits that led Erikson in this direction share a much deeper affinity with William James's articulation of radical empiricism. James argued that the task of constructing a comprehensive model of human experience finally requires abandoning the kind of empiricism usually associated with the natural sciences for what he called a radical empiricism. For James, a radical empiricism does full justice to the "conjunctive relations" that present themselves in human experience:

To be radical, an empiricism must neither admit into its construction any element that is not directly experienced, nor exclude from them any element that is directly experienced. For such a philosophy . . . any kind o f relation experienced must be accounted as "real" as anything else in the system. (1971, p. 25)

Among other things, James was trying to develop an epistemology/ ontology that turns our attention away from traditional concern with deter- mining the nature of the objects "before" the mind. Instead, James wished to focus upon how we use what is "before" the mind. His interest was in deciphering how such experiences of an object function in our ongoing attempts to adapt to the surrounding world. Thus, for example, James was able to deny that the word "consciousness" stands for a distinct, separate entity and yet then proceed to explain how consciousness does stand for a function within the world of pure experience. James, while denying that consciousness must stand for some type of distinctive entity, nonetheless demonstrated that it most certainly stands for a distinctive way in which experience may be taken. James used this same principle in treating God (the MORE to which humans feel connected in some modes of experience). It was for this reason that James was thoroughly content to give us a form of religious naturalism rather than any kind of theology. James didn't feel the need to go beyond the phenomenologically given facts of humans connectedness with a MORE. From his functionalist perspective, God is real because God (i.e., the MORE with which we feel intimately connected in experience) produces real effects. The only questions of truth James felt obliged to ask of religious experience were the pragmatic tests of its immediate luminousness, ability to combine with other known "working truths," and its adaptive value in getting us in satisfactory or melioristic relationship with other parts of reality.

All of this, I think, is applicable to a final assessment of the conversation that Erikson opened up between religion and the social sciences. For all the contributions he made to the conversations connected with the psychology of


religion and theological appropriation of psychology, his greatest contribution was the articulation of a phenomenological and functionalist model of human experience that leaves these other kinds of conversations behind. Erikson em- braced a doctrine of pure experience remarkably similar to that of James. He repeatedly argued that humans axe in some way connected to -- and have an interaction with -- a nurninous ground of experience that inspires us with active impulses and carries us into the current of life's melioristic actlMties. Erikson's references to a "shared Other" axe thus much like James's treatment of consciousness; they discriminate a specific function within humanity's experience epistemologically incompatible with the attempts of psychologists or theologians to ascertain whether such a "shared Other" has existence as a separate entity. It is sufficient for Erikson to note that the numinous is a way in which experience can be taken and that such ways of taking experience perform vital functions (i.e., inspire active strengths) in the epigenetic sequence of human development.

Previous commentators are correct in noting that Erikson offered no psychological or philosophical principle for establishing the objective and transcendent veridicality of the "objects" to which we are connected in religious experience. But his functionalist model dispensed with such questions in the first place. His accounts of "pure experience" exclude no connections or sense of relatedness on a priori grounds. That is, his functionalism makes no a priori commitment to the privileging of intrapsychic or theological categories; only the categories of the quest that organisms display to live, to live well, and to live better. Erikson's accounts of the numinous character of those experiences of relationship that impart the functional strengths of basic trust or integrity are radically empirical; rather than trying to look "behind" (privileging psychological categories) or "beyond" (privileging theological categories) such feelings of relatedness, they focus instead on the functions such feelings perform in experience. Erikson, then, was content to demonstrate the value of certain religious ways of taking experience (note: he was equally content to imply that there are also religious ways of taking reality that subvert such active properties as initiative, purpose, autonomy, etc.). Asking more -- or less -- is to miss the point of his entire theoretical endeavor.

In his concluding assessment of Erikson's influence for the psychology of religion, David Wulff (1991) maintains that "whatever shortcomings his work may have or whatever correcting and supplementing it may require, it will long remain essential reading for the psychologist of religion" (p. 410). I would like to add that he will also remain essential reading for those in our culture who eschew theology in favor of the religious naturalism associated with Emerson/Jamesian strain of American religious thought. The cultural importance of such analyses can hardly be overstated. Even those contemporary Americans who do belong to formal churches display

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decreasing loyalty to any one institution or theology; instead, they sample from a smorgasbord of religious ideas, many of which emerge from secular rather than ecclesiastical sources. Consider, for example, the influence of such works as The Road Less Traveled, The Celestine Prophecy, or Care of the Soul All indicate the cultural hunger for descriptions of a religious worldview that focuses not on the nature of God, but on the function of God in our pursuits of meaning and happiness. Not only does Erikson's work speak to this cultural need, it does so with remarkable sensitivity to the ethical demands of the human ecosystem. But one need not rush to point out Erikson's ethical or academic seriousness in an effort to justify his place in modem religious conversations. His functionalist account of the role that religious sensibilities have in procuring human wholeness is in and of itself sufficient to make his writings an enduring contribution to the empiricist/pragmatic strain of American spirituality. What separates Erikson's developmental theory from that of other academic psychologists is that he delineated those critical experiences that have what David Tracy would call a pronounced "limit dimension." By this I mean that Erikson's most distinctive theoretical notions, such as actuality, trust, and integrity, reveal his conviction that any effort to study human nature empirically must acknowledge the fact that humans regularly, and even predictably, face developmental challenges that cannot be resolved through ego-dominated adaptive strategies. Erikson recognized the recurring existence of mental, emotional, moral, and even ontological challenges that require distinctively religious modes of "taking," "connecting with," or "relating to" the surrounding world. His functionalist model, by assigning these religious modes of relationship a positive adaptive value, bestows a certain nonreductive veridicality to the role of religion in normative human functioning. And thus while not constituting a theology or even a religious philosophy, Erikson's writings nonetheless constitute an original contribution to the empiricist/pragmatic outlook that h a s - at least since Emerson -- had a persistent influence on American religious life.

REFERENCES

Albin, M.Ed. (1980). New directions in psychohistory. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books. Browning, D. (1973). Generative man: Psychoanalytic perspectives. Philadelphia: Westminster

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Ed., Childhood and selfhood: Essays on tradition, religion, and modernity in the psychology of Erik H. Erkson. (pp. 264-292). Lewisburg, PA: BuckneU University Press.

Capps, D. (1979). Pastoral care: A thematic approach. Philadelphia: Westminster Press. Capps, D. (1983). Life cycle theory and pastoral care. Philadelphia: Fortress Press. Capps, D., Capps, W., & Bradford, M. G. Eds. (1977). Encounter with Erikson: Historical

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Capps, W. (1977). Erikson's orientation as process philosophy. In D. Capps, W. Capps, and M. Bradford. Eds., Encounter with Erikson: Historical interpretation and religious biography. (pp. 401-419). Missoula, MT: Scholars Press.

Erikson, E. (1958). Young man Luther:..4 study in psychoana~,sis and history. New York: W. W. Norton.

Erikson, E. (1959). Identity and the life cycle. New York: International Universities Press. Erikson, E. (1969). Gandhi's truth: On the o~gins of militant nonviolence. New York: W. W.

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Hutch, R. (1983). Emerson's optics: Biographical process and the dawn of religious leademhip. Washington, DC: University Press of America.

James, W. (1971). Essays in radical empiricisr~ Now York: E. P. Dutton. Johnson, R. A. (Ed.). (1977). Psychohistory and religion: The case of young man Luther.

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York: Columbia University Press. Spitz, L. W. (1977). Psychohistory and history: The case of young man Luther. In R. A.

Johnson (Ed.), Psychohistory and religion (pp. 57-87). Philadelphia: Fortress Press. Whitehead, E. and Whitehead, J. (1979). Christian life patterns: The psychological challenges

and religious invitations of adult life. Garden City, N J: Doubleday. Wright, J. E. (1982). Erikso~" Identity and religion. New York: Seabury Press. Wulff, D. (1991). Psychology of religion: Classic and contemporary views. New York: John Wiley

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erikson, psychology, and religion

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