Changing Religions
The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life is the best friend of anyone studying religion (religious studies, sociology, psychology, theology, etc.) in America. You will see me citing their statistics more than once. One thing that they measure is the number of adherents the major religions have, and they measure growth in those religions as well. Something the stuck out to me the last time I read this page is how often people in the United States convert to new religions.
Large-scale religious movements fall more under the realm of sociology, and I’m really not very knowledgeable about that, but since I’ve never converted to a new religion, I’ve often pondered what it would take for me to leave my church. I think I’ve decided that it would take three major things to happen before I’d leave my church:
- I would have to decide firmly that the major truth-claims of Mormonism probably did not happen. Joseph Smith did not receive revelation from God, the Book of Mormon was a fraudulent document, the prophets leading the church don’t really receive any kind of revelation, etc.
- I would have to decide that Mormonism is not pragmatically useful. In other words, even if I didn’t believe the truth-claims, I could probably still find a lot of good in the church, and opportunities to actively serve others within it. Many of my family and friends are in the church, and I probably wouldn’t want to strain relationships with them, either.
- I would have to find another religion I believe in more strongly. In other words, even if I found Mormonism neither true (in the sense of truth-claims being accurate) nor pragmatically useful, I still think the benefits and community related to organized religion are such that I would have to find another church before I left this one.
These three numbers, I think, reveal something important about me. When I envision myself converting to another religion, it’s a gradual, methodical process. Some would probably say that they wouldn’t ever change religions unless they had some kind of Saul-on-the-road-to-Damascus experience where God or an angel appeared to them in vision, or at least some kind of intense, heavenly sighn. I simply can’t see myself converting due to an experience like that, because even if I had such an experience, I still feel I’d have to gradually move into a new religion and really internalize the contents of it in order to feel like I was really converted. Two researchers, Kirkpatrick and Shaver, did a study in 1990 that discovered an interesting pattern regarding religious conversion: the way people convert to another religion is influenced by their relationship with their parents as a child.
In order to really understand this, we need to know about the concept of attachment. Attachment Theory is a system of ideas that grew out of psychoanalysis but have been very strongly developed in modern developmental psychology. Developmental psychologists do tests on babies to see what kind of a relationship they have with their primary caregiver, and they have separated these babies into three groups: secure, anxious/ambivalent, and avoidant. You can read about the three patterns (plus another rare one that has more recently been developed) here.
You might wonder how these patterns could actually have an effect on people when they grow up, but that’s just what happens! Attachment patterns make a big difference as people get older, and have a significant effect on that person’s interpersonal relationships, romantic interests, and the way a person internalizes stress. What Kirkpatrick and Shaver found was that attachment styles can often predict the way that people convert to a new religion!
For instance, they found that people with avoidant childhood patterns were far more likely to experience sudden religious conversions than people in the other groups, who are more likely to experience conversion as a slow, gradual process. I feel like I had a pretty stable and secure relationship with my caregivers, so that partly explains why I can only envision a religious conversion happening in the slow way, for me. In The Varieties of Religious Experience, William James spoke quite a bit on religious conversion, but he focused mainly on the strong, sudden types of conversions. These sudden conversions are often quite dramatic and result in very strong behavioral or personality changes in people’s lives. However, we also find through modern research that those who have these strong, sudden religious conversions are far more likely to have them again in the future. This means that someone that has a sudden conversion experience, say, from Catholicism to Methodism one year, might suddenly convert again to Mormonism a few years later.
However, we must always remember that modern psychology deals with generalizations. We can’t say that a securely attached adult can’t have a sudden religious experience. There are always plenty of exceptions to rules. We can only say that, statistically, there is a trend in one group to have a certain type of experience over another. So don’t worry if you don’t fit the mold!
Conversion is a fascinating and important topic in the psychology of religion, so I will be writing about it quite a bit in the future. Stay tuned!
Growing up Mormon I was aware that often we’d have someone join the church as what you describe as a sudden conversion, then over a period of months or even years their spouse would also be converted. That always puzzled me, but your explanation of different attachment types makes perfect sense to me.
This also explains the phenomenon of what were called “church hoppers”, who converted and in a few years left to become converted to something else. It was assumed that they were “not really converted” or they’d never have left. I think in those days it did not occur to most people that someone’s spiritual or social needs might vary over time or that religion is not one-size-fits-all.
My own conversion out of Mormonism was certainlynot sudden.I grew up in a very stable and affectionate family so my attachment level is very secure.
I questioned things in doctrine and practice that didn’t make sense to me or didn’t work for me even as a child, but didn’t actually leave the church till I’d raised four children in it. That’s definitely gradual.
Your list of three major things that would be needed for you to leave your church interests me a lot. I had never thought of what would be required for me to leave, because I left without that level of analytical thought about why I was leaving.
Looking back I’d say your # 1, doctrinal disenchantment, was defintely a factor, beginning when I was a curious teenager.
#2, pragmatic concerns, was circumstantial in my case-we moved to a place far from the nearest Mormon church and couldn’t always afford the gas to get to meetings. Over time we realized the Sundays at home were happier for us than the ones that involved hours in the car and hours of meetings. We were geographically far enough that Home Teachers and Visiting Teachers seldom made it out our way, so the pragmatic advantages of membership faded away.
#3,finding a religion I believe in more strongly, is almost opposite to what my path has been.
I began my post-Mormon exploration by practicing Catholicism, partly because I lived in a Catholic neighborhood and partly because my logic-minded father had said many times that ‘the truth’ HAD to either be Mormonisn (restoration) or Catholicism (original Christianity). He apparently was not a fan of the Protestant movement. Hideous history aside, I loved Catholicism. Very romantic, very family oriented, very inclusive. I admire current Catholicism’s ability to keep the faith focused on NOW and not waste a lot of time arguing over history.
After a year of so of attending Mass and exploring Catholic thought we moved to a village where the nearest church was Methodist. I attended the Methodist church, became an employee there as custodian and pre-school teacher, sang in the choirs, became a “prayer warrior”. It was a satisfying experience.
Next we moved to Bloomington so I could attend IU and study religion. I joined a Zen Buddhist Temple, studied there and practiced meditation. It IU I also studied Islam, Hinduism, Taoism and various permutaions of Christianity. I studied witchcraft, neo-paganism, Unitarian Universalism, Transcendentalism,and my last year there I studied Judaism, kept a kosher kitchen and joined a synagogue.
Oddly I still haven’t converted to a religion. I’ve practiced each religion I’ve studied with all the sincerity of my heart. I really feel all religions are man made constructs. But they work, at least for me they work, and all work about equally well. I suppose if one worked and the others didn’t I’d join the one that worked, but that has not been my experience. Whatever “God” is, and I’m inclined to think God is not a man in the sky, whatever made this universe and keeps it running, it seems evident to me that humans can communicate with him-her-it. When I pray for help or inspiration or guidance to God the Father, or Mary, or Heavenly Mother, or Allah, or Krishna, or Baby Jesus, or the God of Abraham, or Athena or Apollo or any other name for a diety I’ve tried, the feeling of divine connection is the same. The inspiration and guidance are the same.
It seems to me for spiritual purposes I don’t need a religion, don’t need a middle-man to stand between me and all that is holy.
For social purposes a church-synagogue-mosque-sangha-coven is a great advantage in giving people both a support group and an opportunity to serve one another in a daily ongoing way. I love that about religions. I suspect if I lived near a cheerful good natured religious group instead of in the middle of a forest I’d probably join just for the way group interactions enrich life.
I’m glad to have wandered onto your blog, I apologise for my lengthy comment, and I’m going to happily search for more of your Thank You!
I’m guessing that my list of three things is really breaking down what happens in people’s minds without them knowing it’s happening (unless they’re more analytical like me). I think my number three stems from the fact that I simply like organized religion (which is very much not hip these days, I know). I think it’s because it causes me to stretch in ways that I wouldn’t expect from myself otherwise. For instance, serving for two years as a missionary required me to give up things I always suspected I’d be able to give up, but never had the opportunity to prove to myself that I could. I am attracted to organized religions that expect lots from their practitioners, which is why I like religions like Eastern Orthodoxy and Islam more than mainstream vanilla Protestant denominations (and if I became disillusioned with Mormonism I could easily see myself converting to Catholicism or Orthodoxy rather than Methodism).
Feel free to comment anytime at this blog. I could use someone who isn’t afraid to share and write.
I understand about you being attracted to religions that expect a lot from their practitioners. I feel that way myself. Once you’ve been a serious Mormon I don’t think it’s possible to be satisfied with a church that’s just Sunday morning entertainment.
Mainstream protestant religions feel lacking to me…like they’ve just been watered down too much. (I did not excell at Methodism, I kept thinking they should get more serious, and teach their youth group some Standards! ) The Methodist church for me was a good place to work (I still had 2 kids at home then) and to learn about contemporary worship practices, and the best musicians in town were there which was a big plus for our family.
Here’s what I love about Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Judaism and Islam-the rituals are ancient and steeped in beauty. They engage all the physical senses. Good rituals use the body as a vehicle to carry the soul into the spirit realm. This to me is much more satisfying than debating doctrine and intellectualizing religious concepts. Much more satisfying than being preached to. Don’t Tell me about it, TAKE me there.
I love the feeling of doing things that have been done in the same way for hundreds or thousands of years. There’s a strong energy that builds up in longstanding practices and when you participate you can feel the spirit of generations of people who did these same things before you, who poured their love into these same words and melodies and actions.
There may be a psycological explanation for this feeling (such as Leslie you’re delusional). Or maybe it’s that since time itself is an illusion when we practice an ancient ritual we connect across time to everyone else practicing that ritual.