There is a tendency for Christian basics courses to be arenas where people learn the basic narrative structures of conversion and how to identify things in their life that can be pulled out and conform to that structure. I’ve observed this in confirmation and baptism preparation where people are encouraged to write a ‘testimony’. When they have pretty much grown up “in the fear and nurture of the Lord”, they are often/sometimes coached into traditional before-and-after conversion narratives which are partial and gave significance to aspects of their lives and fail to value other ‘less fitting’ things which probably would have been seen differently in a larger narrative arc.
If you would like to read more you will need to click on the title of this post. It's a partial cross-posting because I recently started up a blog experimentally on Wordpress, Pneumaculturist, in which I want to focus on personal and spiritual growth issues. I have managed to intrigue myself with the above and I'm soliciting any suggestions to follow up the theme of narratives, 'given' storylines, personal appropriation, conversion and personal growth ...
Pneumaculture � Narratives of conversion and identification:
Filed in: Christian, spidir, narrative, mission, culture, spirituality
No comments:
Post a Comment