02.21.08
More about Fowler…..
Fowler based his stage theory on empirical research done early in his career where he and his students interviewed hundreds of people about their beliefs. The thought processes that came into play in developing Faith Development Theory (FDT) were heavily influenced by Fowler’s study of the work of Niebuhr and George Herbert Mead and also Erikson. Later he was introduced to the work of Kohlberg and Piaget and their theories also played a part in FDT. Over the years since the original work was published, Fowler has maintained his premise that the FDT stages are sequential, invariant and hierarchical, despite the challenges of various critics over time.
And Fowler’s early work implied that what was necesary to move from one religious stage to the next was…..reasoning power - cognition. As a person matures supposedly their power of reasoning develops more fully. This concept was later challenged as being the cause for a person moving up in the religious stages. That is part of the dilemma I am trying to set up. But it is important to note that reasoning ability surely must play an important role in religious/spiritual development.