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Spirituality without Inwardness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

Adrian Thatcher
Adrian Thatcher
Affiliation:
College of St Mark and St JohnDerriford Road Plymouth PL6 8BH
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Extract

Theologians are not generally aware of the influence of the concept of spirituality in education. Is it not remarkable, not to say amazing, for example, that the secular Parliament of Great Britain should pass a bill listing ‘spiritual development’ as the first aim of the school curriculum?1 But educationists are not generally aware of the rich heritage of thought about spirituality in Christian faith and practice. And one is also tempted to say that theologians and educationists do not read much material from philosophy about ‘spirit’ and ‘spirituality’. Yet spirituality is too important to be confined to narrow treatments in separate academic disciplines.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 46 , Issue 2 , January 1993 , pp. 213 - 228
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1993

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References

1 Section 1 of the Education Reform Act says the curriculum should be balanced and broadly based, and should ‘promote the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at the school and of society’. See, Department of Education and Science, The Education Reform Act 1988: The School Curriculum and Assessment, Circular 5/89 (London: 1989), p. 7.Google Scholar

2 A good example of the ‘interiorization’ of spirituality is found in Hammond, John, Hay, David and others, New Methods in R.E. Teaching — An Experiential Approach (Harlow: Oliver & Boyd, 1990).Google Scholar

3 I criticise this approach in my ‘A Critique of Inwardness in Religious Education’, British Journal of Religious Education, 14 No 1 (Autumn 1991), pp. 22–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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8 Wittgenstein, op. cit., §290.

9 op. cit., §257.

10 op. cit., §247.

11 op. cit., §337.

12 op. cit. §249.

13 op. cit. §305.

14 op. cit. §343.

15 op. cit. §363–397.

16 op. cit. §370.

17 op. cit. §361.

18 op. cit. §363.

19 op. cit. §341.

20 op. cit. §323.

21 Heidegger's, Being and Time (tr. Macquarrie, & Robinson, , Oxford, Blackwell, 1967)Google Scholar, Ryle's, The Concept of Mind (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1963: 1st pub. 1949)Google Scholar, Rorty, , Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (Oxford: Blackwell, 1980)Google Scholar, and Parfit, Derek, Reasons and Persons (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984)Google Scholar, are established classics. For a brief account of the influence of structuralism and post-modernism, see Robert Solomon Continental Philosophy since 1750 — The Rise and Fall of the Self (Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 194–202.Google Scholar

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25 McFadyen, op. cit., p. 23.

26 op. cit., p. 27.

27 op. cit., p. 33.

28 op. cit., p. 40.

29 op. cit., p. 40.

30 op. cit., p. 10.

31 op. cit., p. 46.

32 op. cit., p. 65.

33 Kerr, op. cit., p. vii.

34 op. cit., p. 5.

35 op. cit., p. 23.

36 op. cit., p. 45.

37 op. cit., p. 46.

38 op. cit., p. 73.

39 op. cit., p. 72.

40 op. cit., p. 69.

41 op. cit., p. 132.

42 op. cit., p. 118.

43 op. cit., pp. 132, 175, 177.

44 McFadyen, op. cit., p. 18.

45 op. cit., ch. 2.

46 op. cit. p. 318.

47 ibid.

48 ibid.

49 Mill, John Stuart, A System of Logic (1843) (London: Longman, 1961), p. 550.Google Scholar

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51 ibid, (author's emphasis).

52 See e.g. Ackrill, J. L., Aristotle the Philosopher (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1981) ch. 5.Google Scholar

53 See e.g. Mark 8.36, Matthew 16.26 in the New English Bible and Revised English Bible.

54 I attempt this in my Truly a Peison, Truly God (London: SPCK, 1990).Google Scholar

55 e.g., Boff, Leonardo, Trinity and Society (Tunbridge Wells: Bums & Oates, 1988)Google Scholar: Brown, David, The Divine Trinity, (London: Duckworth, 1985)Google Scholar; Gunton, Colin, The Promise of Trinitarian Theology (Edinburgh: T.& T.Clark, 1990)Google Scholar; Moltmann, Jürgen, The Trinity and the Kingdom of God (London, SCM Press, 1981)Google Scholar; Torrance, T. F., The Trinitarian Faith (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1990)Google Scholar. And see Thatcher, op. cit., ch. 10.

56 Yarnold, Edward, ‘The Theology of Christian Spirituality’, in Jones, Cheslyn, Wainwright, Geoffrey & Yarnold, Edward (eds.), The Study of Spirituality (London: SPCK, 1986), p. 10.Google Scholar

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58 Ochs, Carol, Women and Spirituality (New Jersey: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983), p. 2.Google Scholar

59 ibid.

60 op. cit., p. 12.

61 op. cit., p. 14–20.

62 Bradshaw, Michael, ‘The Christian and Geographical Explanation’, in Francis, Leslie & Thatcher, Adrian (eds.), Christian Perspectives for Education (Leominster: Fowler Wright Books, 1990), 14.3.Google Scholar

63 Michael Poole, ‘Science and Religion in the Classroom’, in Francis &, op. cit., 14.2.

64 Adrian Thatcher, ‘Learning to Become Persons: A Theological Approach to Educational Aims’, in Francis & Thatcher, op. cit., pp. 79–81.

65 Derek Webster, ‘A Spiritual Dimension for Education?’, in Francis & Thatcher, op. at., 14.1

66 e.g. Berry, Thomas, ‘The Spirituality of the Earth’, in Birch, Charles et al. (eds.), Liberating Life: Contemporary Approaches to Ecological Theology (New York: Orbis Books, 1990)Google Scholar: Regenstein, Lewis G., Replenish the Earth (London: SCM Press, 1991).Google Scholar

67 above, p. 8.