Development of Morality

*Fair warning, this post is different than our normal short articles. It is a paper that I wrote for my undergraduate degree. I hope you enjoy and perhaps think about some things that you would not have thought about otherwise*

Development of Morality: Childhood and Faith Development

It is not often that one hears or sees something that truly changes their outlook on life or their feelings about their purpose.  I once heard someone explain that there are resume virtues and eulogy virtues.  That is to say, that there are characteristics that people think are important in the moment, or in life, and then there are things that people will actually remember about you.  Your resume virtues are things like being organized or always being on time, but eulogy virtues are things like making people smile and helping out friends.  So how does one learn what these things are? How does one become virtuous, moral or build their conscience?  It is in childhood that one develops their ideas of right and wrong and alongside this, one also develops their faith and their concept of God.

One’s sense of faith and morality does not arise overnight, but is developed over many years of living, and for some, due to the circumstances of their lives, there is more development than others.  In this paper, I will demonstrate the relationship between faith and morality by examining the development of a child’s concept of faith and morality, the development of faith, and the development of morality, and finally how faith and morality are intertwined.  Of course, these are things that not only occur in childhood, rather throughout one’s whole life, but the most important development occurs in childhood as this lays the foundation for the rest of one’s life.

Children have an immense capacity for learning moral behaviour because they are untainted by the external world. Their experiences are limited since they have only lived for a short amount of time, which means that they encounter a plethora of new experiences daily which shape who they are.  James W. Fowler is one of the most prominent figures in the world of faith and moral development and has written many books on the topic of stages of faith.  In his book, Becoming Human, Becoming Christian, he says about children, “We see lively imagination grasping the world, endeavoring to give it unity and sense.  The preschool child who has access to symbols, stories and shared liturgical life of a religious tradition awakens to an expanded horizon of meanings”, in the same paragraph he goes on to say that symbols, “can provide powerful identifications and aspirations, as well as sources of guidance and reassurance” (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 55).  Children can uniquely understand the world because of their uninhibited imagination. 

There are four stages of “childhood” that Erikson recognizes. They include infancy, early childhood, play age, and school age (Erikson 32). In early childhood, Erikson claims that the psychological crisis one experiences is “Autonomy vs. Shame, Doubt” during which the child is eager to explore their surroundings and establish what is theirs.  Fowler explains that also at this time is when parents wish to “establish limits and curb their children’s angry outbursts” (Fowler, Faithful Change, 109).  Children at this age are very compulsive, and have a strong will-power. Erikson claims that their Principle of Social order is “Law and Order” (Erikson 33).  That is to say, at this age, one becomes aware of how things are supposed to be. For example, it is at this age that a child becomes particular about routine and what should happen at a certain time of day, such as bed time. This is the beginning of understanding their view of their surroundings in terms of how things are supposed to be.

In addition, Fowler says that at around the age of four, children have a concept of God and can imagine who God is and what God might be like.  However, at this point in their lives, they understand God in the way that they understand Santa Clause or the Tooth Fairy. According to Fowler, there are three ways that a young child understands things: “perception, feelings, and imaginative fantasy” (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 54).  Therefore, one can see that their concept of things around them is not based on logic or reason, but instead what they see, feel, and imagine.

For a child then, their behaviour, which is based on their concept of the world around them, is mostly coming from feelings.  One sees this in the way that children can seem to have overwhelming expressions of emotions which are out of proportion for the situation. Lawrence Kohlberg is the creator of stages of moral thinking which are exemplified by the aging of a person from infancy to adulthood. He claims that we begin at a punishment and obedience level where what is right or wrong is determined by the consequences of those actions (Dykstra 58). For example, if I drive over the speed limit, I will get a speeding ticket. One is obedient to the rules set out because it is one’s duty to follow these rules. However, Kohlberg claims that there are events in one’s life that forces them to consider another way of thinking about right and wrong. If I am driving the speed limit and a police officer passes me, I am no longer afraid that I will be ticketed for speeding, so how do I decide what is right?  These moments happen which force one into a different stage of moral development. Therefore, as a child grows, their method of moral deliberation changes. They go from rule-following to asking, what would a good person do in this situation? However, it is possible that their concept of good behaviour may be skewed by the people they are surrounded by. This can greatly affect the moral development of a child. Fowler uses the example of Charles Manson who was repeatedly abused as a child and instructed by his father to punch his mother in the face. Clearly, in this situation, it is nearly impossible for a child to understand what is right and wrong because the authority in the child’s life are setting a poor example.

Kohlberg claims that one can overcome poor examples which are around them (perhaps in reality or via television/internet personalities) by moving into stage five which is asking oneself, what would a just society expect of me?  “The we begin to think in terms of what a good society would expect if it were really good (no what it does expect since some of its rules may be very wrong-headed)” (Dykstra 59).  It is here where one sees that a person has truly let go of their sense of duty to rule following, and is making moral judgements based on something deeper. This is not to say that people should break the laws and do whatever they want, but is to say that authority is not always acting in the best interest of the public and there are times when people need to break rules in order to do what is right. 

Parents often tell their children to do what they say, and not what they do.  Children are rule-followers, but they are also gifted mimickers who will take their mother or father’s actions as a sort of rule setting. Children desire to be like those around them because that is what they see as the social norm, therefore, those around them have an incredible influence on the development of their moral capacities.  Kohlberg claims that the most interesting part of a person’s actions is not the act itself but their way of determining that this act was either right or wrong. “For Kohlberg, it does not matter what the content of a person’s thinking is – for example, whether a child thinks it is wrong or right to steal a cookie from a cookie jar. What matters is the reasons a person uses in determining what is right or wrong – in this case, reasons centering on punishment and obedience” (Dykstra 58).  One can begin to see the similarities between Kohlberg and the Church’s teaching on conscience, in that the situation and the person’s development of their concept of right and wrong (or their work to create a developed conscience), makes a difference in the person’s freedom to make good moral decisions.

The development of faith is best explained by Fowler who has concluded that this occurs in stages which one cannot skip.  However, Fowler does not define faith by religious belief or tradition, “For Fowler, faith is the human activity of composing meaningful worlds in which to live out of the fabric of day-to-day experience with other human beings, institutions, values, and visions” (Dykstra 59). So by this definition of faith, it means a seamless connection to morality if faith is about creating the world in which one lives in. 

In continuation, the first stage of faith is Intuitive-Projective where “children intuit meaning and order in the universe by projecting their fantasies on the cosmos” (Dykstra 59).  Young children will take the narratives that are familiar to them to create an imagined idea of God and God’s interactions with the world and humanity.  It is important to note that they will also use the actions of those around them as a baseline for the actions of God. Therefore, when one has a parental figure that is abusive, and God is said to be Father, they will apply those characteristics to God as well.  Stage one is the beginning of developing one’s conscience and sense of morality. This is done through tradition which is accepted as truth at this stage.

In the second stage, Mythic-Literal, children start to form more literal understandings. It is here that children often take biblical myths to be literal truths, for example the figures of Adam and Eve are easily imagine as real people who truly lived with God in the garden of Eden. Fowler says that by the time a child enters school,

“Stable categories of space, time, and causality make the child’s constructions of experience much less dependent on feeling and fantasy. Now able to reverse processes of thought and to coordinate more than one feature of a situation at a time, the world becomes more linear, orderly, and predictable” (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 55).

In this stage, a child’s faith becomes deeply connected to stories, narratives, and shared community and family values. Fowler also explains that at this stage, it is important for children to feel that they know the stories of their community as a means of feeling a sense of unity (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 56).  Also in this stage, who a person is viewed as the sum of their actions. Therefore, children are more likely to favour and emulate those who are kind to them or act in a way that is pleasing to the child.

            The third stage of faith development is Synthetic-Conventional faith.  “It is this stage which synthesizes a basic outlook out of diverse influences in order to provide a basis for one’s own identity and place in society. Its construction depends heavily on the influence of others” (Dykstra 60).  Though this stage begins often in early adolescence, one could argue that this is still the “childhood” of moral development. Here, as many of us experience in adolescence, there is a desire to conform, to be like everyone else.  One is still unsure of themselves and does not feel that they are able to make decisions that will not ostracize them from the group.  It is at this stage that one becomes aware of how others see them, and recognize that an outsider’s perspective of oneself exists in the minds of others.  That is to say, “Due to the rich new possibilities of interpersonal perspective taking, the young person now has available a variety of reflections or mirrorings of the self” (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 59). 

            The fourth stage is Individuative-Reflective where the person now reverses the desire of early adolescence and wishes to be different than everyone else. Fowler says,

“Two fundamental movements are at the heart of a transition to this stage: (1) There must be a shift in the sense of the grounding and orientation of the self…The self must now begin to be and act from a new quality of self-authorization…(2) There must be an objectification and critical choosing of one’s beliefs, values, and commitments, which come to be taken as a systemic unity” (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 62).

In this stage, it is important for the person to feel that they can assert their beliefs with confidence.  One is no longer willing to accept the opinions of others as truth and needs to examine the belief for oneself.  One’s conscience can be trusted, and one wants to utilize this in their life.  This is perhaps Fowler’s version of a mid-life crisis, where one may face the stunning realization that doctrines and laws do not fit their vision of a just world. 

Furthermore, this stage often occurs when one is in their thirties or forties and makes clear again the connection between Fowler’s idea of faith, and morality. Identity and morality do go hand in hand, though one is not merely the sum of one’s actions.  Fowler claims that as adults, we develop habits of behaviour, and we sometimes must accept that we cannot totally break out of those habits, even if we want to (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 64).  This is disheartening, but also encouraging because it means that if we wish to be better adults, we must develop good habits as youth which we can carry into adulthood, though the expectations that the world has for one are different, the skills are transferable.  

            Finally, the fifth and final stage is Universalizing Faith which is quite uncommon and involves decentration from the self which means “the gradual qualitative extension of the ability and readiness to balance one’s own perspective with those others included in an expanding radius. It means knowing the world through the eyes and experiences of persons, classes, nationalities, and faiths quite different from one’s own” (Fowler, Becoming Adult, Becoming Christian 69).   This stage allows one to fully accept the paradoxically nature of the world that we live in, as well as the divine. Dykstra explains that for Fowler, each person is on a quest to finding meaning, no matter their religious tradition, therefore this type of knowing is not particular to one religion, but is applicable to all persons, religious and non-religious. Everyone wants to find a sense of themselves, who they are and what the world is about.

            Faith and morality have been implicitly linked throughout this paper, but at this time I would like to bring to light the explicit connection between the two.  “Ordinary human transformation is an activity of the self. But convictional transformation is a result of the transforming activity of the holy spirit” (Dykstra 63). Therefore, when one transforms, or becomes more virtuous, one becomes closer to God for it is through the grace of God that one is able to overcome sin.  Human beings are dependant, then, on God to transform, but that one must also enter a state of conversion where one consciously takes on the commitment to change one’s life (Dykstra 63).  How does one do this? Spielgel says through wisdom, of which there are two types: sophia and phronesis.  “Sophia refers to speculative wisdom…In contrast, phronesis pertains to conduct and how to live a good life” (Spielgel 313).  Thus, one can see the difference between understanding right from wrong, and acting well. It answers the question of, why does one do things that they know are bad?  Acting well can be very challenging, especially when one might face personal consequences for doing so.  For example, if I know that a friend cheated on a test, the objective right thing to do is to tell the professor. However, if I do that, my friend will suffer and therefore I will suffer as well, further, that friend may know it was I who told on them, and be upset with me. These sorts of things hinder us from acting well.

            Subsequently, what one believes to be the right thing to do influences their actions.  There is a relationship between beliefs and one’s actions,

“Might it be the case that a person’s behaviour could in turn impact her beliefs? Psychological research suggests an affirmative answer. Leon Festinger and others have shown that people have a natural drive to achieve concordance among their various beliefs, ideas, values, and emotions” (Speigel 315)

If there is a conflict between any of these facets, a person may be forced to make a change in order to maintain unity. For example, I may value academic honesty, but I also believe that my friend is a generally good person who made a mistake. Therefore, I have inner conflict. How one deals with this conflict is directly linked to their moral and faith development.  Such conflicts can cause one to transition to another stage of faith. The transitions can be just as significant as the stage itself for it is where much of the personal growth takes place. As one journeys through their life, the find their values and their view of themselves, God, and the world around them changes which causes them to act differently. 

Fowler claims that shame can be a big factor in brining about change in a person’s behaviour.  One can experience shame when “the self becomes the object of one’s own attention…there is also some degree of painful awareness that one’s self is also the object of others’ attention – particularly others’ evaluative attention” (Fowler, Faithful Change, 104).  Shame, in some ways, can be used as a tool for self-improvement, though Fowler does say that too much shame is certainly a bad thing.  Sin, often the cause of shame, takes us away from our community and out of union with God.  Dykstra uses Alvin Plantinga to explain that sin can actually affect our thoughts about God (Dykstra 316).  Therefore, acting well can bring us closer to our community and to God.

Wisdom is a gift of the holy spirit which shapes our faith and our morality.  Dykstra claims that there is both a content and carriage of wisdom. The content is “the substance of the moral insights that are possessed by the wise person” and the carriage is “the outlook or attitude of mind that characterizes the wise person” (Dykstra 317). Different types of growth are required to develop both the content and the carriage of one’s wisdom. The serenity prayer gives us some insight into what wisdom really means, “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”.

In conclusion, there is a distinctive link between faith and morality which is exemplified in the child’s development of the two, the stages of faith and moral development, and wisdom.  One’s moral positions change and grown over time as one experiences different things and moves through the stages of faith development. These stages change the way we see ourselves and our surroundings.  One might experience something in their life which shakes their ideas of right and wrong, for example, when a child experiences the death of a parent.  One struggles to cope with the seemingly disjointed nature of the death of a loved one and the love of God.  When this occurs, growth occurs if one is able to seize the opportunity.  Through one’s own experiences, one gains empathy for others and develops their conscience.  However, this takes time, and for many, several decades.  It is naïve to believe that one’s morals can suddenly become impeccable. It takes time, work, and the grace of God for a child to grow up learning to act well.

Works Cited

Fowler, James W. Becoming an Adult, Becoming Christian. Harper & Row, 1984.

Fowler, James W. Faithful Change: The Personal and Public Challenges of Postmodern Life. Abingdon Press, 1996.

Erikson, Erik H. The Life Cycle Completed. W. W. Norton & Company, 1982.

Spiegel, James S. "Growing Wise: Resources For Nourishing The Supreme Virtue." Journal Of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 6.2 (2013): 313-321. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials. Web. 3 Dec. 2016.

Dykstra, Craig R. "Transformation In Faith And Morals." Theology Today 39.1 (1982): 56-64. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials. Web. 3 Dec. 2016.