Religion and the Human Sciences: An Approach via Spirituality - Hardcover

Helminiak, Daniel A.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0791438058 ISBN 13: 9780791438053

Publisher: State University of New York Press, 1998

Synopsis

Proposes a new paradigm for interdisciplinary studies by applying the thought of Bernard Lonergan to define spirituality as the missing link between religion and theology.

About this title

Review

"This brilliant, scholarly, and breakthrough book is a tour de force in the solid establishment of a scientific spirituality. Helminiak's encompassing mind, using the complex constructs of Lonergan, frames a vision of a scientific revolution in spirituality and the human sciences. In this process, Helminiak is at his best in a thorough and well balanced critique of the Evangelical integration project of Crabb, the religio-ethical analyses of psychologies by Browning, and the transpersonal psychology of Wilber." -- Merle R. Jordan, Th.D., Professor Emeritus of Pastoral Psychology, Boston University School of Theology

"Helminiak is the West's answer to Ken Wilber--encyclopedic and incisive in his treatment of cutting edge spiritual/psychological trends, their insights and distortions. He offers to all the players, scientific and religious, Eastern and Western, his own profound and challenging synthesis. I am especially appreciative of his theoretical grounding of counseling and psychotherapy, in both their secular and religious expressions." -- Homer A. Bain, Ph.D., Director of Education, Ecumenical Center for Religion and Health, San Antonio, Texas

"At last someone has given us a framework for 'precisely and coherently interrelating religious concerns and the human sciences.' Daniel Helminiak has done what Lonergan dreamed and challenged us to do: give flesh to general empirical method in interdisciplinary dialogue. Those working in the area of spirituality cannot afford to miss chapter two's 'theotic viewpoint.' The text is clean, clear, and direct. It will afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted who have been seeking a way out of a maze of ambiguity." -- Carla Mae Streeter, O.P., Th.D., Associate Professor of Systematic Theology and Spirituality, Aquinas Institute of Theology

"By positing spirituality as the link between psychology and theology, Helminiak carries the effort at integration of religion and the human sciences beyond its current impasse. But the reader beware--Helminiak's provocative analysis will cause you to examine long-held and cherished beliefs. This book is a must for those who are unreservedly authentic in their commitment to the truth. Ironically, this book demands even greater notice by those who are less genuine in that commitment." -- Peter Hill, Ph.D., Editor, Journal of Psychology and Christianity

"A critical dialogue in transpersonal psychology seeks to delineate the relationship between religion, spirituality, and the human sciences. Building on the work of Bernard Lonergan, Dr. Helminiak gives that dialogue a powerful western philosophical perspective. The book contributes to foundational discussion by offering a new and stimulating analysis of Ken Wilber's thought. It adds a significant new voice to East-West discussions. It offers an effective model to situate within the human sciences the study of religion and spirituality. Thank you, Dr. Helminiak. This book, together with your other volumes, offers a valuable contribution to an extremely important topic." -- Bob Schmitt, Ph.D., Academic Dean, Institute of Transpersonal Psychology

From the Author

Author's summary of the book
Ever since Socrates raised questions about the gods, facets of religion have been branching off and claiming independence. This emanicapation process is particularly difficult in the case of the human (or social) sciences, for they deal with the human being, about which religion has much to say. There is little clarity about how these two parties relate.

With a focus on psychology, this book proposes a new approach. Three other approaches are commonly invoked. There is the call for dialogue (the Evangelical "integration" project), but specifying the ground rules for dialogue is precisely the challenge. There is Dilthey's classic distinction between the human or social sciences (Geisteswissenschaften) and the natural sciences (Naturwissenschaften), but this distinction allows that both religion and psychology fall under the human sciences, so specification of the ground rules for dialogue remains the challenge (Don Brownings's "revised critical correlation"). Finally, there is appeal to the "perennial philosophy" (Ken Wilber), but identifying the divine with the innermost core of the human, it blurs the distinction between theological and social-science matters from the start.

As a methodological study, a companion to The Huma Core of Spirituality, this book defines spirituality as a human-science specialization intermediary between psychology and theology. This definition provides a new key to the interdisciplinary problematic. Bernard Lonergan's notion of "higher viewpoints," ever expanding horizons of explanation that incorporate one another, is the conceptual undergirding for this new interdisciplinary position. Chapter Two elaborates this position as the book's main contribution. The remaining chapters detail contrasts with those other three approahces.

The overall argument is that refined attention to spirituality clarifies the relationship between religion and the human sciences, for "religion" is too fuzzy a concept to allow for precise! interrelationship. This study stretches toward a consensus that might structure a global community in the new millennium.

About this edition

• Publisher: State University of New York Press
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0791438058
• ISBN 13: 9780791438053
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 332