Thesis (Ph. D.)--Syracuse University, 2009. / "Publication number: AAT 3381562."

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 2002. / Author presents a study on the implications of reflexive spirituality for a meaningful modernity. Includes bibliographical references (p. 244-253). Also available on the Internet.

<p> Ancestor reverence, in this study, is considered to consist of reflecting on and honoring the women and men who came before us in our bloodlines, including those friends and chosen family who were part of our intellectual or spiritual lineages. Many traditions include beliefs that our consciousness continues after death, and some traditions hold that ancestors may influence the events of the living or intercede with the gods on the living's behalf. In many traditions ancestors are honored through altar building, rituals, and trance journeys. Rituals performed for the ancestors create strong familial and community bonds. This thesis work is important because it expanded the opportunities for me to understand my family dynamics and to develop relationships with my deceased foremothers and forefathers. I learned about myself in understanding my families' past and felt stronger connections to my lineage and progeny. The literature revealed that genealogy research is a form of ancestor reverence; especially in Western cultures that no longer have formalized ancestor reverence rituals and practices. Through genealogy research, I learned the names and stories of my ancestors and ancestresses and, in combination with that research, on a pilgrimage to my ancestral homeland, I explored my matriline using an archaeomythological and feminist lens that combined archaeology, anthropology, mythology, folklore, genetics, ecology, and history to search for the evidence of what women did throughout herstory. I gathered the stories focused on how women worked, lived and contributed to society throughout history, because the stories of my ancestresses, like the accomplishments of most women from 1500-1900, were often omitted from written history. A sacred journey can catapult the participant into greater and faster spiritual growth; this was true for me in that I may not have gained this wisdom otherwise. In this paper I explored the idea that ancestors were revered through multiple methods, including pilgrimage and creative writing. While altar building, rituals, trance journeys, and genealogy were most often recorded in written form in regards to ancestor reverence, they are not the only methods that can provide experience and impact to the descendant who honors their ancestors. I have tried to prove this assertion through academic research: I used a heuristic approach to carefully examine my personal experiences with each of these forms of ancestor reverence and an arts-based approach through creative writing to pen short works about my ancestors.</p>

<p> In searching for restorative stories that elevate understanding and engender the capacity for seeing through the cultural chaos and confusion of modern times, this dissertation turns to Egypt at the beginning of its recorded history, approximately 3100 BCE. The ancient Egyptians faced many of the same challenges facing the world today, and they learned to weather them by creating a resilient cultural model that endured cycles of growth and decline. Their culture perpetuated while adapting and transforming. In their surviving records are some of their rituals, practices, and beliefs that provide much-needed perspectives, observations, and stories that contributed to their own renewal and capacity to regenerate their culture. </p><p> The mythological roots of renewal in ancient Egypt reveals one deity in particular who embodies the capacity to harmonize and balance the opposites&mdash;Ma&lsquo;at. She is central to the act of fostering daily reciprocal relationship and maintaining the flow of energy between the divine and the human realms. She is both the daughter of the solar god Re and his source of life. She is the embodiment of the cosmic patterns and natural laws. She is the incarnation of the offerings to the gods and their reciprocal response flowing back to the human realm. She governs the tides of justice, truth, balance, and harmony. </p><p> The collective psyche&rsquo;s inherent capacity for renewal and resilience is revealed through Ma&lsquo;at&rsquo;s story and prominence in Egyptian history. Their images and literature reveal that in the presence of Ma&lsquo;at, it is possible for human consciousness to discover the transcendent space where opposites reconcile to initiate new harmony, create unity, and guide all things to their rightful place. Balancing and harmonizing any duality creates a continuous circulation of energy in the psyche. This circulation has the potential to birth a conscious, ethical heart, an awakened heart which&mdash;as these ancient people would say&mdash;directs our saying and our doing. By recognizing Ma&lsquo;at&rsquo;s essential characteristics, understanding her relationship with her fellow deities, and identifying her foundational role within the ancient Egyptian civilization it is possible to participate in the awakening of Ma&lsquo;at&rsquo;s roots of renewal in our own times.</p><p>

Most of the existing research on relationships between counselling and religion has addressed how practitioners provide services to religious clients or on strategies for working with people from specific religious traditions. The focus of this study is on how counselling professionals’ religious identity may impact on their clinical work. All the participants had at least one year of post-qualification experience working with religious and non-religious clients. Nine participants (6 female and 3 males) were interviewed and the data were analysed using a social constructionist version of Grounded Theory. This gave rise to four different yet highly related sub-categories. These were as follows: 1) Meaning making: Identity within the context of religion, 2) Keeping my faith life and my psychotherapy life separate, 3) Disclosure: The Unavoidable Blend between Religion and Counselling, 4) The Impact on Therapy. The findings of this study suggest that there is a tension in the way counselling professionals are managing their religious identity within their professional environment (i.e. training, supervision and counselling room). This tension seems to be centred on a need to protect their religious self from challenges imposed by professional colleagues, and a need, at least for some participants, to use the counselling room to reinforce their religious beliefs. While some participants have consciously chosen to keep their religious self out of the therapy room, others emphasise this split between religious and professional self is not possible when it comes to their counselling practice. The participants’ need to protect themselves from potential negative judgment was identified as a complex phenomenon that formed the basis of the core category ‘Protection’. The findings have added a novel perspective in recognising the impact a counselling practitioner’s religious beliefs has on their clinical, supervisory and training experiences.

<p> This qualitative study involved the creation and assessment of a seven-week heart-focused psycho-spiritual inquiry program, Map of the Heart. The program&rsquo;s curriculum was comprised of heart-based practices and theories designed to develop heart-centered awareness. The purpose of this investigation was to reveal and understand the personal experience and expression of heart intelligence and to define it and its personal meaning while illuminating the clinical relevance of Map of the Heart curriculum in the field of counseling psychology. </p><p> The curriculum was organized into six weekly themes based upon core heart feelings associated with the Four Immeasurable Truths, Buddhist virtues, and practices for cultivating the heart. Informed by East-West psychology, the curriculum highlighted perennial philosophy from both Eastern and Western religions and indigenous and psychological traditions, integrating spiritual discipline with Western neuroscience research and psychotherapy practices. </p><p> The research design used heuristic phenomenology and co-operative inquiry to explicate the individual and group experience of heart intelligence. Data analysis was primarily derived from a series of one-on-one semi-structured interviews and group dialogue sessions with nine state-registered psychotherapists. </p><p> Research findings indicated that Map of the Heart may support psycho-spiritual and clinical skills development and may encourage personal and interpersonal conflict resolution. Co-researchers reported increased experiential awareness of their own heart center and a defined ability to connect internally, reinforcing therapeutic intuition, perception, and sensitivity, subsequently strengthening the therapeutic alliance. Increases in therapeutic presence, empathic listening, attunement, and accurate mirroring were also reported. Co-researchers reported a greater ability to work more effectively with difficult clients and complex mental health issues. As a result, transformative changes in the client were observed. Co-researchers indicated that they were able to effectively use aspects of the curriculum for therapeutic intervention and clinical directives, where the heart became a focal point of the session. For example, the client focused on their own heart center by implementing heart breathing and other heart-related exercises to facilitate self-inquiry and emotional self-regulation. </p><p> Map of the Heart offers the beginnings of a theoretical template and experiential basis upon which psychotherapists, psychologists, and mental health care and other professionals can access and integrate the spiritual, psychological, and physiological terrain of the heart for therapeutic process and intervention. Further investigation is necessary to determine a more comprehensive psychology and theoretical orientation of the heart.</p><p>

Thesis (Th. M.)--Dallas Theological Seminary, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves [56]-63).

Thesis (Th.M.)--Dallas Theological Seminary, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves [56]-63).

A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor Of Philosophy (D.Phil) in the Department of Psychology at the University Of Zululand, 2017 / In South Africa, one of the most distressing concerns of many people living with HIV/AIDS is the stigma attached to this diagnosis. This intense stigma is psychologically traumatic, even leading to levels of depression. Religion or spirituality has come to be one of the most essential and effective coping strategies to live with the pandemic and depression as its consequence. This study sought to establish the impact of religion/spirituality on people living with HIV/AIDS using a convenient sample in South Africa. Using quantitative research methods, the study used the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II) to assess the severity of depression on HIV/AIDS victims. The BDI-II is presently one of the most commonly used scales for rating depression to indicate the level of distress the respondent is experiencing. To assess spirituality among people living with HIV, the Religious Coping (RCOPE) was used to measure the coping measures used by people living with HIV and AIDS. The results of the study established that, in both samples, respondents having a HIV positive status with depression levels within the spiritual/religious cohort, are different from those of the nonspiritual/religious cohort. Expressed differently, spirituality or religion seems to have a calming effect on the respondents to the extent that it lessens their level of depression. Furthermore, it was established that there is a considerably strong inverse relationship between religion/spirituality and depression. In fact, the correlation coefficient is -0.89 suggesting a near perfect negative relationship between the variables. In other words, as one’s spirituality/religious quotient increases, one’s depression levels decreases. The study concludes that, spirituality and religiousness plays an important role in the lives of patients with depression and HIV, and is the corner stone of coping strategies and longevity. Moreover, the study recommends that physicians should consider fusing in spirituality coping strategies in treating depressed HIV positive patients.

Approximately 40% of U.S. women in married or cohabitating heterosexual relationships have a partner who uses pornography more than once a month. Some studies demonstrate a negative association between the frequency of male partners’ pornography use (PU) and women’s sexual satisfaction and relationship satisfaction, while others find no association. These mixed findings may be due to moderating influences of women’s religiosity, attitudes, and diverse meanings given to PU (e.g. addiction, gendered norm, inspiration), which have not been adequately studied. The current study included a sample of 625 women (mean age=44, diverse SES, 86% White), recruited through a Qualtrics research panel, who were married or cohabitating with a man who had used pornography in the prior 3 months. Study aims were to investigate (1) pornography-related distress, attitudes and meanings given to a partner’s PU, (2) the relationship between perceived frequency of partners’ solitary PU (PFREQ) and women’s pornography-related distress, relationship satisfaction and sexual satisfaction, (3) contributions of attitude and religiosity (commitment and conservatism) to distress and satisfaction, and (4) associations among attitudes, religiosity and meanings, and among meanings, distress and satisfaction. Self-report measures included the Partner’s Pornography Use Scale, Pornography Distress Scale, Couples Satisfaction Index, Global Measure of Sexual Satisfaction, Multidimensional Religious Ideology Scale, Religious Commitment Inventory, Biblical Literalism Measure, Pornography Meaning Scales, and an item measuring attitudes towards pornography. Participants endorsed a range of PFREQ (median frequency=1-2 times/week) and attitudes (28% negative, 34% neutral, 38% positive). Partial correlations and multiple regressions, controlling for demographic variables and COVID-19-related stress, indicated that higher PFREQ was significantly associated with women’s higher pornography-related distress, lower relationship satisfaction, and lower sexual satisfaction. Attitude and PFREQ made independent contributions to distress and satisfaction. Negative attitude amplified the negative association between PFREQ and relationship satisfaction, and religious conservatism amplified the positive association between PFREQ and pornography-related distress. Findings support and extend previous research regarding the associations of higher PFREQ and negative attitude with greater distress and lower relationship and sexual satisfaction, the contribution of religiosity to greater distress, and the role of meanings of infidelity, sin, addiction and inadequacy in predicting greater distress and lower satisfaction.