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30 2010/2011 . CSE Volume 14 Number 3 . Spirituality in Formation: The Spiritual Lives of ACSi Students
Plenty of studies have been done on what
happens to students during their four years of
high school: how their minds grow, how their
identities form, and how their relationships change.
But before now, very little research has been done
on what kind of growth is happening in their spiritual
lives. That’s where a partnership between two Todds
comes in—Dr. Todd Marrah, superintendent at Tree
of Life Christian Schools in Columbus, Ohio, and Dr.
Todd Hall, associate professor of psychology at Biola’s
Rosemead School of Psychology.
In 2003, Hall and a team of researchers launched a
groundbreaking study designed to track the spiritual
development of 500 Christian college students from
freshman to senior year. A year later, Hall began a
second project that allowed colleges to measure 22
indicators of students’ spiritual lives using the Spiri-
tual Transformation Inventory (STI) that he developed.
Then, in 2006, Marrah and Hall struck up a
partnership to study the spiritual development of
ACSI students in grades 6–12. This study provides a
fascinating snapshot of how students at ACSI schools
are doing spiritually—and some of the results may
surprise you.
Two of the most important goals of Christian
schools are to help students grow spiritually and to
develop their character. Likewise, one of the biggest
challenges we face is evaluating how well we are
fulfi lling these goals. The Spiritual Transformation
project, using the STI, is an ongoing project designed
to study the spiritual lives of Christian secondary
school students.
Spirituality can never be evaluated perfectly, but
a well-designed effort can offer useful indicators of
where students are in their spiritual development
process. Before we can begin measuring anything,
however, we need a theologically grounded and psy-
chologically informed approach to spiritual formation.
Spiritual formation, at its core, is a relational
process that results from a partnership between us
and God. Scripture says that God began the work and
will be faithful to complete it (Philippians 1:6). God
includes the one being formed in the work—“Continue
to work out your salvation with fear and trembling,
for it is God who works in you” (Philippians 2:12–13,
NIV)—and God’s Word calls us to “make every effort
to add to your faith goodness” (2 Peter 1:5).
This emerging approach to spiritual formation is being
called relational spirituality. The Reader’s Digest version is
that theology, psychology, and brain science are converg-
ing in suggesting that spiritual development is about loving
relationships with God and others, and that relationships
change our brain, our soul, and our ability to love.
Our journey with relational spirituality—in our own
lives and work—has led us to pursue research on the
spirituality of ACSI students in hopes of helping ACSI
schools assess and ultimately foster spiritual growth
among their students. This research is ongoing; how-
ever, the following refl ections are based on data from
more than 3,000 students in nearly 40 ACSI schools:
Spirituality in Formation:The Spiritual Lives of ACSI Students
By Todd R. Marrah and Todd W. Hall
Spirituality in Formation: The Spiritual Lives of ACSi Students . CSE Volume 14 Number 3 . 2010/2011 31
1. Students are connected to God through meaning and gratitude.
We assess 22 indicators of students’ spiritual lives. Of
these, students reported most strongly that their relation-
ship with Jesus gave them a sense of spiritual meaning.
This result is encouraging, especially because we live in a
culture that encourages our students to search for mean-
ing through the medium of technology and in individual-
ism and materialism. However, Scripture, psychology,
and neuroscience all indicate that meaning is found in
relationship with our fellow image bearers and with God.
We need to continue to build on this encouraging finding.
In addition to reporting a strong sense of meaning,
students reported feeling connected to God in grati-
tude. This is also encouraging, as gratitude should be
a central motive of the Christian life. In 1 Thessalonians
5:18, Paul says, “Give thanks in all circumstances.”
The more we have reflected on this, the more clear it
has become that gratitude is at the very heart of the
Christian life and is indeed intricately connected to
our sense of meaning in life. We need to build on this
strength by fostering and modeling an environment of
gratitude that will create the context for our students
to experience a deep sense of meaning in their lives.
2. Students are connected in spiritual community.
Students also reported a strong sense of connection
to God in spiritual community. Our students are part
of a “No Child Left Behind” generation that deeply
values living openly in community.
Several years ago, Tree of Life (TOL) admitted an
eighth grader who was extremely socially awkward.
One month into the school year, he had spoken to no
one. His parents forced him to go on the eighth-grade
wilderness retreat. It was a wet weekend, and because
of his lack of coordination, he could not climb up a
muddy ravine wall. I [Marrah] watched as the entire
class (even the “coolest” boys), most of whom did not
know his
name, formed
a human chain
to get him up
the hill. When
he arrived, he
was filthy from his many falls. Not wanting him to be
the only dirty one, about six of the “cool” boys ran and
dove in the mud. In my generation, I would have run
ahead to the activities, but this generation thrives in
community. We need to continue to find ways to foster
true Christian community among our students.
3. Relationships and theology play important roles in spiritual growth.
We asked students across the United States to
rate, from very negative to very positive, how various
aspects of the school environment and programs
affected their spiritual development. The top five
growth facilitators were times of praise and worship,
retreats, chapels, Bible classes, and faculty mentoring.
Each of these areas supports a relational view of
spirituality and the importance of students living in
community. Feedback from the open-ended questions
confirmed that each of these activities had a positive
impact that was due in large part to strong relation-
ships. Students reported the greatest contributors to
their spiritual development were relationships with
parents, teachers, Bible teachers, friends, and pastors.
To be most effective, chapel speakers, Bible teachers,
faculty mentors, and retreat leaders need to have a strong
ability to connect to students. These findings have actu-
ally changed our hiring priorities and practices. We have
begun placing as much emphasis on relational abilities
as on academic, content, and classroom capabilities.
4. Students are spiritually unpracticed.
The lowest results on the spiritual indicators
are perhaps more revealing than the highest means.
Despite the good news that students feel connected
to God, they are generally not practicing their faith in
a substantial way. Relative to all the scales, students
reported the lowest scores in practicing spiritual
disciplines (such as prayer and Bible reading) and in
feeling connected to God when they do (occasionally)
engage in these practices. Students indicate that they
are not spending time in the spiritual disciplines and
are not living with a daily awareness of God. Further
informal research at TOL confirms these results.
Obvious questions arise: What can Christian schools
do to increase a daily awareness of God? How can we
encourage students in their own prayer and Bible read-
ing? What responsibilities do Christian schools have in
training students in the spiritual disciplines? Among other
This generation thrives in community.
32 2010/2011 . CSE Volume 14 Number 3 . Spirituality in Formation: The Spiritual Lives of ACSi Students
attempts, we began asking a weekly question: “In what
ways have you seen the Lord at work in your life lately?”
We hope that these findings will stimulate an
ongoing conversation among our school leaders,
because improvement in this area will require sus-
tained reflection.
5. School-sponsored mentoring and extracurricular activities have less impact on spiritual growth.
One of the more surprising findings was also
revealed in the lower means. Students reported school
counseling programs, school-required mentoring,
athletics, and extracurricular activities as having just
neutral to slightly positive impacts. Christian schools
invest a great deal of capital (time, effort, and money)
into these activities for what appear to be minimal
results in the area of spiritual formation.
Strategic questions such as the following may
help: “What is the spiritually formation strategy in
the spring musical?” and “If athletics are really about
small-group discipleship, how do we become more
focused on opportunities for spiritual formation?”
6. Crises play a critical role in spiritual growth.
Among the other highest means, students reported
a strong sense of being transformed in relationship with
God through suffering. This is particularly important,
given one of the most startling results of the study—that
a full 70 percent of Christian school students in grades
6–12 reported a recent major life crisis, such as the
death of a loved one, sickness, boy-girl issues, loss of a
parent’s job, moving, parental divorce or separation,
friend problems, and more.
There is sadness in the pain that many of our students
experience in these times—but there is a tremendous
opportunity for crisis-related spiritual growth if our
schools can continue to find ways to help students deepen
their relationship with God through their suffering.
The high incidence of crises, along with the
finding that school-based counseling was among the
lowest means, should give Christian school leaders a
strong impetus to find strategic and formative ways in
which schools can be used by the Holy Spirit to foster
transformation in suffering.
Suffering is one of the most transformative oppor-
tunities in the Christian life because it often gives us
access to deep places in our soul that we would not other-
wise know existed. Trials shake up our negative gut-level
expectations of God and other important people in
our lives. Working through trials, however, always
occurs in the context of relationships and community.
A group of scholars recently developed the idea of
authoritative communities as the kind of community
that is necessary for human development. These are
communities that provide structure (e.g., morality is
embedded in the
community) as
well as love and
warmth. These
communities
have an idea,
even if implicit,
of what it
means to be a good person, and the leaders give love
to the younger members to help them become good
people.
Our students, like all of us, are loved into loving. At
their best, ACSI schools are authoritative communities,
and it is always what we should strive for them to be. We
hope these findings and the ongoing Spiritual Transfor-
mation project will spark a Spirit-guided conversation
and a renewal in relational spirituality for ACSI schools.
Note: For more information on using the STI individual reports and
curriculum and obtaining an assessment report for your students, visit
drtoddhall.com. You can also contact Dr. Hall at [email protected]
or on Facebook at facebook.com/drtoddwhall. Contact Dr. Marrah at
Todd R. Marrah, EdD, is the superintendent at Tree of Life Christian Schools
in Columbus, Ohio, where he has served for 21 years, and the minister
of preaching and teaching at Amazing Grace Christian Church. He and
his wife of 20 years have six wonderful children, ages 8–17. His greatest
blessing comes from being a child of the King of kings.
Todd W. Hall, PhD, is associate professor of psychology, director of
the Institute for Research on Psychology and Spirituality, and editor of
the Journal of Psychology and Theology at Biola University. He holds a
doctorate in clinical psychology from Biola and a doctoral specialization in
measurement and psychometrics from UCLA.
Relationships change our brain, our soul,
and our ability to love.