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Resilience In The Logic Of The Spirit
- 1. Matthew Rehbein & Karin H. K. Wondracek Resilience in the logic of the spirit: a process for overcoming crises according to James Loder
- 2. Professor of the Philosophy of Christian Education at Princeton Theological Seminary (1962-2001). Educated in philosophy (Carleton College), theology (Princeton Seminary and Harvard University), history and philosophy of religion (Harvard), clinical psychology (Massachusetts Mental Health Clinic), psychoanalysis & psychiatry (Menninger Foundation), and pedagogy ( Institut Jean-Jacques Rousseau ). Developed an “ interdisciplinary and fundamental practical theological science of the relation of divine to human action with extraordinary generative capacity .” -- Dana R. Wright, biographer Who was James Loder?
- 3. James Edwin Loder (1931-2001)
- 4. (1965). Religion in the Public Schools. (1966). Religious Pathology and Christian Faith. (1979). Transformation in Christian Education. (1982). The Transforming Moment: Understanding Convictional Experiences. (1990). The Transforming Moment (revised 2nd edition, including two additional chapters and a glossary). (1992). The Knight’s Move: The Relational Logic of the Spirit in Theology and Science. (co-authored with W. Jim Neidhardt) (1993). The Holy Spirit and Human Transformation (Korean translation of The transforming moment). (1998). The logic of the Spirit: Human Development in Theological Perspective. (unpublished). Educational Ministry in the Logic of the Spirit. (unpublished). Transformational Dynamics in Christian Education: A Study in Practical Theology. Loder’s Primary Works
- 6. Logic : The relationship among elements, or between an element and the whole, in a set of objects, events, individuals, principles. Ex: operations in intelligence, grammar in speech (structures of knowing). Spirit : A quality of relationality, or “A way to conceptualize the dynamic interactive unity by which two disparate things are held together without loss of their diversity.” Ex: a “spirited” discussion among persons, and the contrast between the letter and the “spirit” of the law. Spirit is, in anthropological terms, “the central driving force in human development that separates humanity from the rest of nature. It is inherently relational, self-transcending, the basis of choice…generating and inspiring human intelligence.” Core Concept: The “logic of the spirit”
- 7. For Loder, the human spirit is the “uninvited guest” in all social science research, due to the “isms” (functionalism, structuralism, and empiricism) that tend to keep such research in a dualistic world, where the scientist as person is bracketed in order to “objectify” results. Loder wanted to bring social science on par with the “hard sciences,” where even in quantum physics, it is now accepted that the observer is an irreducible part of scientific inquiry. Influenced by Polanyi’s concept of personal knowledge, and Torrance’s updating of Barthian Christology , Loder put social science research in a larger (theological) frame of reference, to take full account of human uniqueness and meaningfulness. Core Concept: The “logic of the spirit”
- 8. Logic of the spirit : “a coherent, patterned process of transformation that occurs whenever, within a given frame of reference, hidden orders of coherence and meaning emerge to alter the axioms of the frame and reorder its elements accordingly.” Transformation (a term widely used yet widely misunderstood according to Loder) is not merely improvement or movement in a generally positive direction. It is “a change in form from lower to higher order along a continuous line of intention or development.” This transformational logic is discernible in a generic five-step process, explained as follows… Core Concept: The “logic of the spirit”
- 9. 1. Conflict : An experience of dichotomy, incoherence, or fragmentation in knowledge that will not let us rest until it is satisfactorily resolved. 2. S canning : the ongoing conscious and unconscious search for a solution to the conflict. 3. Insight : a solution “appears” with intuitive force as a union of two frames of reference previously seen as incompatible, creating a new, more comprehensive context of meaning. 4. Release : The energy bound up in the conflict is liberated for testing and repatterning. 5. Verification : The insight is interpreted back into the conflict for confirmation (congruence), and submitted to a public test (correspondence). Process: The transformational “logic of the spirit” in 5-step sequence
- 10. X X X X X X X X X Draw four continuous lines through the nine dots arranged in a square without taking your pencil off the paper. Difficult? An exercise in human “spirit”
- 11. X X X X X X X X X In the process of solving this puzzle, we can observe the five steps of the transformational “logic of the spirit” in action. An exercise in human “spirit”
- 12. 1. Conflict : Archimedes had a dilemma - verify that King Hero’s newly crafted crown was made of gold without melting it down! 2. Scanning : He begins the task of searching for a solution, and in the process heads to the public baths of Syracuse to relax. 3. Insight : As he perceives the dispersion of water when his body enters the bath, he realizes that he can measure the crown’s volume and compare this amount to the amount of weight per volume (specific gravity) of gold. 4. Release : “Eureka!” The world’s first recorded streaker... 5. Verification : He verifies his insight in the privacy of his own home (congruence) and then proudly presents his solution to the king (correspondence). A Classic Case Study of the “logic of the spirit”
- 13. Once the energy bound up in the conflict is released, it “ puts us back into our context with eyes to open us to that context in a richer, sharper way.” The process is a “linear gestalt...it has a kind of narrative quality . Something in you wants to unfold the sequence from beginning to end.” (Tick - ) (Bow - ) It is possible to enter the process at any point , working backward and forward. Ex: Einstein, upon reading Newton’s Principia Matematica, entered at insight and began working out the theory of relativity. The process takes place across all realms of human knowning: scientific discovery (theoretical breakthrough), artistic expression (image as mediator), personality formation (stage transition dynamics), psychotherapy (therapist-client relationship), and religious experience . Process: The Power of the 5-Step Sequence
- 14. The self : the irreducible, relational “I” of human being. The lived world : the socio-cultural reality of being that our self constructs for itself. The void : nothingness, the threat of non-being, manifested proximately in absence, suffering, evil, and ultimately, death. The Holy : God, the mysterium tremendum fascinans, wholly Other, Being-Itself, transforming unto new being. Context: Human being in 4 Dimensions according to the “logic of the spirit”
- 15. Context: Human being in 4 Dimensions according to the “logic of the spirit” The self , the “knower,” and the lived world , the context of “knowing,” are always present as we socially construct reality. Human beings maintain a two-dimensional existence at all costs in order to “remove the intrusive threat of nothingness.” The face of the void invading two-dimensional existence is “conflict” (crisis), which puts the sequence of transformative knowning into action. All efforts of two-dimensional human being eventually succumb to the void in both its proximate and ultimate forms. Yet... The Holy Spirit, interacting with our human spirit as it struggles for meaning and coherence, opens us to the possibility of proximate and ultimate transformation in human being.
- 17. The Phenomenon of the “Face” and the Birth of the Ego: The Triumph of Negation Loder, inspired by Jung’s research on archetypes and Spitz’s research on infancy, conceives of human development as “cosmic wandering through time and space...” development through Eriksonian psychosocial stages in search of the “ self-confirming, ordering presence of a loving other .” Human beings seek a “ Face that will not go away ,” starting with the mother’s face. All future relations are implicitly based on this “face” phenomenon. According to Loder, the ego is “ negation incorporated ” – it is a carefully crafted “no” response that protects the emerging self from the “no” of its world, beginning with primary social (family) and extending into secondary social (school, friendships).
- 19. The “Face” and Ego Development: Moving Unto Transformation As human beings develop, the ego resolves conflict transformatively in stage transitions, as well as in numerous proximate (calculative and functional) conflicts/crises within stages, with ever-increasing complexity and competency of personality , intelligence , and moral development . Yet the ego, cannot resolve ultimate (existential) conflicts/crises that present themselves from adolescence onward, because of its roots in primal negation – its limit is a decisive encounter with void . The developmental answer to this dilemma is a “negation of negation,” or the transformation of the original “no” into an ultimate “Yes” by a mediating “Face” that completely affirms oneself as spirit.
- 21. For Loder, the ultimate “Face” that will not go away is Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit empowers the human spirit to recognize this Face as the One that identifies us as human beings made in the image and likeness of God. As human beings conform to the “Face of God,” behaviors roles, and symbols that were incorporated as functional adaptations to resolve crises become reversible by the five-step process of the logic of the spirit , transforming human being from two to four-dimensional living . In other words, says Loder, transformations are themselves transformed by the Creator Spirit of God. To be more concrete: typical defensive forms of the ego (egocentric living) are transformed into styles of spirit-ual (exocentric) living. Following are a few examples... DEFENSE MECHANISMS TRANS-FORMED
- 22. DEFENSE MECHANISMS TRANS-FORMED Secondary Repression => Patience & Self-Control Projection => Empathy Denial => Forgiveness Regression => Service to Transcendence Introjection => Vicarious Suffering Fantasy Formation => Visions of the Holy Isolation => Concentration Reaction Formation => Return Good for Evil
- 23. The case of “Psalm 131” The case of “Ancient of Days” Case studies of counseling for resilience in the “logic of the spirit”
- 24. Therapists, as they deepen rapport with clients, become companions in transformation: “walking to Emmaus” through the 5-step process. Therapists can conceive of themselves as faces that mediate their clients’ passage from two to four-dimensional living, helping clients to wrestle with the crises of “void” in their lives. Therapeutic techniques are best conceived of as tools to assist clients in their transformation. Don’t fear chaos in therapy; create conditions for the logic of the spirit to reveal the hidden, more complex, yet ultimately coherent, order of convictional knowledge that seeks expression. Suggestions for discerning the “logic of the spirit” in therapeutic practice
Editor's Notes
- #2: Goals: introduce you to James Loder, to his generic model of transformative knowing, and to applications of this model in human development and counseling
- #3: We believe that Loder is most underappreciated interdisciplinary academic of the Twentieth Century; the “Einstein” of practical theology, whose theoretical project awaits (and merits) discovery and examination by a larger audience. Why he remains undiscovered is a whole other discussion that we don’t have time for today, since we only have 30 minutes and therefore must leave out an examination of Loder’s theoretical upbringing. Suffice to say that primary influences are Soren Kierkegaard, T.F. Torrance, & Michael Polanyi.
- #6: Hope to whet your appetite enough today that you’ll want to know more about Loder tomorrow…and we’d be happy to help you explore his thought and its implications further.
- #7: An intentionally scientific definition of spirit – yes! The great themes of the 21 st century according to Loder would be “science” and “spirit,” and events thus far have borne out this prediction/prophecy.
- #8: “ Strange loop” model of relational epistemology – not enough time to explain it here, but if interested, can recommend sources for more detailed information.
- #13: We believe that Loder’s work is a crucial attempt to rescue the word “spirit” from abstract or hyper-spiritualized understandings...”spirit” is an embedded dynamic of human being that involves all aspects of life, including, but not restricted to, religious experiences.
- #16: It is at this point that Loder’s model becomes theologically significant. The five-step process can be functional or calculative in nature, in terms of the knowledge it creates; however, when the knowledge in question involves matters of life and death, the nature of knowing becomes existential, and the void and the Holy are dealt with in more ultimate than proximate terms.
- #18: Different from linear, bell-curve, progressive models…a conception that is more in line with physical science models of reality.
- #23: Dynamics of physics, analagous in psychosocial phenomena.
- #25: Not a strictly religious issue, but a transformational issue that may very well involve religion, should be encouraged as patient, client permits