Them that believe: a postmodern exploration of the contemporary Christian serpent-handlers of Appalachia

The call for a new paradigm is loud and clear and consistent with postmodern methods. They are no gold standard to be applied to all investigations; no master narrative to be defended. Interdisciplinary, as the author tries to demonstrate, can mean not only cooperation among disciplines, but also the use of a variety of often discipline favoured methods by a single investigator or a team of investigators whose location within a particular ‘discipline’ is both historically contingent and likely dated in terms of its usefulness. Likewise, the use of multilevel considerations means that the diversity of methods and approaches at various levels of abstraction are necessary to begin any study of religious phenomena in their immense complexity. This study of serpent handlers focuses upon archival research; hermeneutical explorations of textual criticism of the Bible; ethnography linked to videotapes; phenomenological interviews analyzed in terms of a hermeneutical method that reveals the meaningfulness of handling serpents, being anointed, and the experience of near death from serpent bites. The author is committed to exploring the meaning of serpent handling from personal and cultural perspectives, and also takes into account psychological theories to link the symbolic and sign value of serpents that further does justice to the power of the serpent to elicit genuine religious experiences and to serve as an apologetic for a tradition that has been maligned and misunderstood by lay persons and scholars alike.

An Introduction to Atheism, Agnosticism, & Non-Religious Worldviews

Coleman TJ, Hood RW, Streib H. An introduction to atheism, agnosticism, and nonreligious worldviews. Psychology of Religion and Spirituality. 2018;10(3):203-206

Deconversion and "Spirituality:" - Migrations in the Religious Field

Streib H, Hood RW, Keller B. Deconversion and "Spirituality:" - Migrations in the Religious Field. In: Streib H, Hood RW, eds. Semantics and Psychology of "Spirituality". A Cross-cultural Analysis. Cham, Heidelberg, New York, Dordrecht: Springer International Publishing Switzerland; 2016: 19-26.The Bielefeld-based Cross-cultural Study on “Spirituality” has been inspired by the previous Bielefeld-based Cross-cultural Study on Deconversion. In this chapter we review this previous study and highlight the open questions and desiderata for the present study. Linking the two research perspectives implies the interesting question: Does “spirituality” and biographical development toward “spirituality” involve processes of deconversion? Because both are changes in the religious field that are associated with the “spiritual” self-attribution, our model of the religious field may help to understand this link. Where is privatized, experi-ence-oriented religion located in the religious field

Theoretische Konzepte aus der empirischen Mystikforschung: Eine Jamessche Perspektive

Theoretische Konzepte aus der empirischen Mystikforschung: Eine Jamessche PerspektiveDie Forschung im Bereich des Mystizismus wird erschwert durch zahlreiche Ansätze, die sich gegenseitig auf weiten Strecken ignorieren. Dieser Umstand wird noch bestärkt dadurch, dass diese unterschiedlichen Ansätze alle die Existenz introvertierter Mystik akzeptieren und ähnlich charakterisieren. Dabei greifen sie auf eine große Bandbreite empirischer Ansätze zurück. Im Folgenden wird nun unter Rückgriff auf William James' Anstrengungen, Psychologie innerhalb der Grenzen der Wissenschaft zu verorten, argumentiert, dass James unter Einfluss seines sich ständig erweiternden Konzept von Empirizismus, ein reduktionistisches Konzept der Mystik ablehnte. Dies ist ebenfalls Konsens in der aktuellen Mystikforschung. Außerdem wird gezeigt, dass zur Erforschung eines introvertierten Mystizismus Sprache und Kultur nicht als alleinige Konzepte zur Erklärung herangezogen werden können, sondern vielmehr ein empirischer Ansatz benötigt wird.The study of mysticism is hampered by the existence of discreet literatures that remain largely ignorant of one another. This is further exacerbated by the fact that these literatures converge toward a consensus on the existence and characteristic of introvertive mysticism using a variety of empirical methods. Tracing the efforts of William James to confine psychology within the limits of natural science assumptions it is argued that James' ever expanding definition of empiricism led him to abandon what amounts to a reductionistic view of mysticism, something the discreet literatures on mysticism have also reached as a consensus position. Furthermore, with respect to at least introvertive mysticism, language and culture cannot be considered as exhaustive explanations of its fundamental empirical reality

A noble task: Testing an operational model of clergy occupational health

In many ways, clergy and religious leaders are an ignored yet high-risk population. In their efforts to ensure the spiritual well-being of their congregations, clergy frequently neglect their own well-being, resulting in stress and burnout, which then can lead to impaired health. This neglect often extends to clergy’s family and congregation. Church members typically seek help from clergy to cope with the loss of loved ones, life crises, and other general life stressors. A clergy member unable to cope with these same challenges in his or her own life may be ineffective at helping church members to cope with their stress. Recent theory applications and measure development efforts in this research space have led to several studies of specific occupational hazards or challenges faced by clergy. These challenges include high job demands, congregational criticism, and isolation; restoration following moral failures (e.g., alcohol abuse, adultery); and resolving conflict among congregation members . Furthermore, a holistic model of clergy health functioning has been proposed, which includes specific occupational challenges and their detrimental effects on clergy health. Unfortunately, the constructs in this model are more theoretical than operational. While such a model is useful for conceptualizing the factors that influence clergy health, an operational model of clergy holistic health is still needed to empirically test the effects of occupational demands, and personal and job-related resources on the health of clergy. The purpose of the present study, therefore, is to develop and test such a model. The ultimate goal of this research is to offer a model and methodological approach that can be useful to those interested in better identifying and addressing the health and well-being needs of clergy so that they may thrive in their roles to the betterment of their families and congregations

Categorizing People by Their Preference for Religious Styles: Four Types Derived from Evaluation of Faith Development Interviewsof Faith Development Interviews

Streib H, Chen ZJ, Hood RW. Categorizing People by Their Preference for Religious Styles: Four Types Derived from Evaluation of Faith Development Interviewsof Faith Development Interviews. The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion. 2020;30(2):112-127.This article presents a typology that categorizes people according to their profile of religious styles which concerns, among other things, the sources where they derive validity and stability, when confronted with religious and existential questions or inter-religious challenges. The modeling of this typology is an empirical complement to Streib’s model of religious styles which, in turn, is a critical advancement of Fowler’s faith development theory. Data are religious style assignments to the answers on the 25 questions in the Faith Development Interview (FDI), which has been administered to 677 participants in the United States and Germany. We present results based on a theory-driven approach to determine a person’s religious type by incorporating frequencies of religious style assignments from the evaluation of their FDI. We also explored convergent validity with latent class analysis and a machine-learning algorithm. Results based on three samples converged on four religious types: Substantially Ethnocentric, Predominantly Conventional, Predominantly Individuative-Reflective, and Emerging Dialogical-Xenosophic types. We reported the profiles of the four types with reference to group differences on religious schemata and openness to experience

The Differential Evaluation of Religious Risk Rituals Involving Serpents in Two Cultures

While serpent symbolism is common in many religious traditions, few traditions have including the actual handling of serpents that can maim and kill in their rituals. Two exceptions are various Manasa sects common in India and the serpent handlers of Appalachia in America. We presented brief descriptions of each of these traditions along with videos of the handling of serpents in each tradition under three degrees of risk, video with no serpents, video with serpents but no bites, video with serpents and bites. Under a fourth condition only for the Appalachian handlers, the video showed a handler dying from a bite. American, largely Christian participants rated assessed each condition for ritual quality and perceived legitimacy. As predicted, serpent handling in America was perceived as less legitimate than serpent handling in India. No differences were found between perceived legitimacy and level of risk except in the condition where a handler was seen dying from a bite

How does one become spiritual? The Spiritual Modeling Inventory 5 of Life Environments (SMILE)

We report psychometric properties, correlates, and underlying theory of the 15 Spiritual Modeling Index of Life Environments (SMILE), a measure of perceptions of spiritual models, defined as everyday and prominent people who have functioned for respondents as exemplars of spiritual qualities, such as compassion, self-control, or faith. Demographic, spiritual, and personality correlates were examined in an ethnically diverse sample of college students 20 from California, Connecticut, and Tennessee (N ¼ 1010). A summary measure of model influence was constructed from perceived models within family, school, religious organization, and among prominent individuals from both tradition and media. The SMILE, based on concepts from Bandura's (1986) Social Cognitive Theory, was well-received by respondents. The summary measure demonstrated 25 good 7-week test-retest reliability (r ¼ 0.83); patterns of correlation supporting convergent, divergent, and criterion-related validity; demographic differences in expected directions; and substantial individual heterogeneity. Implications are discussed for further research and for pastoral, educational, and health-focused interventions. 30 Keywords: spirituality; religion; social cognitive theory; measurement; validity; health promotion; education Introduction Throughout history, religious traditions have emphasized the importance of keeping company and attending to the example of good or holy persons, arguing that people tend 35 to become more like those with whom they associate. The power of example is also recognized and documented in modern scientific psychology, in which Bandura's Social Cognitive Theory (SCT, Bandura, 1986) Improved understanding of spiritual modeling processes would be of obvious interest in pastoral psychology. Such understanding would also be of interest to education, health psychology, medicine, nursing, social work, public health, and other fields in which spiritual factors have been found to predict or cause outcomes of significant interest This article reports on an initial psychometric evaluation of the Spiritual Modeling Inventory of Life Environments (SMILE), a multidimensional inventory of perceptions 65 about spiritual models and their availability and influence. Validated measurement instruments are vital for scientific progress in any field, and spiritual modeling measures have not previously been available. As described later, the SMILE follows in operationally defining spirituality with reference to a respondent's perceived ''ultimate concerns.'' 1 In the study reported here, the SMILE was administered to a geographically 70 and ethnically diverse sample of US college students drawn from both religious and statesupported public universities (N ¼ 1010). Besides providing psychometric information, these findings offer a solid initial view of the contours of spiritual modeling perceptions in contemporary US college students. We present theoretical background and a conceptual framework that specifies 75 key features of spiritual modeling perceptions and processes as experienced in daily life. We then report and discuss empirical findings, including implications for interventions. Conceptual background and model According to Social Cognitive Theory, social learning processes are influenced both by environmental factors, such as the availability of suitable behavioral models, and by intra-80 individual factors, such as motivations and self-efficacy perceptions Interpersonal factors, such as the nature, closeness, and psychic ''investment'' in one's personal relationship with a model, may also affect social learning processes . Intra-individual factors (represented in the center oval) are viewed as potentially 90 changeable and evolving, either conscious or unconscious, and closely related to social learning processes that include attention, retention, and motivation. . Social environments (the outer semicircle), including family, school, and religious or spiritual organizations, are a potential source of spiritual models. They help guide investments of attention and behavior by both individuals and groups, and may either facilitate or impede spiritual modeling learning processes. The framework represented in 105 Multiple levels for intervention The spiritual modeling framework presented in 150 Assessment strategy Constructing the SMILE demanded resolving two main challenges: conveying what we meant by spiritual, and conveying what we meant by model. Failing to offer any explanation of these constructs could create confusing findings due to idiosyncratic understandings of these terms. But asking participants to use a rigid definition of spiri-155 tuality could risk undermining our intended inclusiveness. Thus, in the final SMILE questionnaire, we addressed these challenges through a combination of three main techniques: First, we defined spirituality and spiritual models with reference to Tillich's (1951) notion of ultimate concerns, sometimes expressed in the SMILE simply as ''what's most important in life,'' a notion that does not require specific theological or ontological beliefs 160 (Emmons, 1999). The term spirituality was then introduced as a convenient word to describe skills or qualities viewed as ''helpful for what's most important/consequential in life.'' Second, we included substantial introductory text that used diverse examples to explain how people experience and respond to ultimate concerns, and how they learn from other people (models) how to respond to those concerns (spirituality). To illustrate 165 the concept, some specific everyday and prominent models were mentioned as examples from whom ''some people feel they have learned wise daily living.'' 2 Third, the SMILE was structured to allow earlier questions to set a context for later questions. This feature is analogous to a semistructured interview, in which earlier questions provide a context for understanding the intent and vocabulary of later questions. 170 The SMILE also included several opportunities for respondents to express their own conceptions and definitions of important constructs, which not only helped convey the inclusive intent, but also provided useful feedback. Later, we present evidence suggesting that these communication strategies were reasonably successful for engaging and representing the views of most survey participants. social environments, perceived efficacy for learning from models, and the perceived impact on other life tasks of learning from spiritual models. Scoring As an inventory, the SMILE is not intended to produce a single overall score reflecting all items. However, one can distinguish a meaningful continuum between respondents who 195 report no models in Part II, at one extreme, vs. respondents who report influential models in every major environment. As described later, SMILE scoring quantifies this particular dimension of variability as an interval-level summary measure of perceived influence from spiritual models. sections of the SMILE may be obtained on request from the corresponding author. Research questions The present empirical studies of the SMILE focus on psychometric evaluation of its foundational questions in a college student sample. Our diverse sample also supplies useful reference values for US college students, a population of major educational and 210 health related concern . We examined the following primary research questions: (1) What qualities do students view as important for spirituality (operationalized here as ultimate concerns)? What dimensions of variability (i.e., underlying factors) can be detected in their views? 215 (2) What spiritual models are most commonly recognized (1) within everyday life environments (family, school, religious organization) and (2) among prominent people known from tradition or from contemporary sources? (3) How are the perceived existence and influence of spiritual models associated with demographic and spiritual factors within various environments? 220 (4) Does a summary index of spiritual models across major life environments possess adequate psychometric reliability and validity? Methods We first describe methods used for a multisite cross-sectional study (N ¼ 1010), and then for a smaller single-site test-retest study (N ¼ 66). All surveys in both studies were admin-22