Should I Pull that Thread? Methods at the Intersection of Theology and Psychology

BY: Revd Dr Sarah Bixler | September 19, 2024

In August 2023, the first cohort of cross-training fellows gathered at the University of Birmingham for two weeks. During this intensive workshop, the possibilities seemed endless for imagining interdisciplinary projects at the intersection of theology and psychology. Little mental capacity was left for exploring methodological questions. But as their research projects emerged, methodological questions rose to the fore.

In my onsite meetings with the fellows, I shared two methodological models from my own mentors in theology and the social sciences. In August 2023, I dropped a handful of pick-up sticks on each table in our meeting room. Pick-up sticks are a traditional children’s game where thin wooden sticks are dropped so that they randomly cross over each other. The object of the game is to pick them up, one by one, without moving any stick other than the one selected. Practical theologian Richard Osmer used this metaphor to illustrate the transversal method, derived from J. Wentzel van Huyssteen, to describe interdisciplinarity as the rational crossing over into various perspectives through dialogue with persons or their ideas. The crossover of disciplines is overlap, not integration, and is always focused around a concrete problem or phenomenon. The disciplines are chosen by virtue of their relevance for the identified phenomenon.

The game of pick-up sticks. Source: Wikimedia Commons, Mokkie, CC BY-SA 4.0

At the next gathering at the University of Birmingham in April 2024, pressing questions arose about the intersection of these fields. What are the normative commitments that provide the measuring line for judging a behavior or idea as positive or negative? When psychological considerations are added, something that was considered theologically sound might come under critique. Similarly, is it responsible to “look the other way” from theologically problematic beliefs, if they serve a positive psychological function?

In response, I shared a model developed by pastoral theologian Deborah van Deusen Hunsinger in Theology and Pastoral Counseling: A New Interdisciplinary Approach (1995). She argues that pastoral theologians internally hold both psychology and theology as two disciplines in which they are fluent and can utilize the distinctive tools of interpretation, but the two can never fully be integrated. Accordingly, she proposes a matrix where a phenomenon can be interrogated on both a theological and a psychology basis. Based on psychological criteria where functionality is defined by integration, a behavior or idea can be psychologically functional or dysfunctional. Based on a separate criterion of theological commitments held by the individual or community, that same behavior or idea could be theologically adequate or inadequate. A behavior or idea can, therefore, fit one of four possibilities:

  1. psychologically functional and theologically adequate (the preferred option),
  2. psychologically dysfunctional but theologically adequate (in which case the concern is addressed using the resources of psychology),
  3. psychologically functional but theologically inadequate adequate (in which case the concern is addressed using the resources of theology), or
  4. psychologically dysfunctional and theologically inadequate (in which case the concern is addressed using the resources from both disciplines). 
Left: Richard Osmer's Practical Theology: An Introduction (2008, Eerdmans)
Right: Deborah van Deusen Hunsinger's Theology and Pastoral Counseling: A New Interdisciplinary Approach (1995, Eerdmans)

Psychologist Joanna Collicutt complexified our thinking further during her workshop presentation to the fellows in April. She asserted that self-blame can sometimes be considered a positive sign and serve a helpful psychological function. It is not a desirable long-term behavior, but it may be a temporary stop along the way toward psychological integration and healing. The emergence of self-blame, for instance, can be a sign of the self assuming personal responsibility and attempting to exercise agency. These are important and helpful psychological functions.

Because every human being has a unique lifelong journey, what is (temporarily) functional for one person may be a sign of dysfunction in another. Every experience is in the chronos sense time-bound, yet in another sense transcends time because of its impact beyond a particular moment. My own normative commitments to human dignity, freedom, and non-coercion might rule out some theological concepts a priori. And yet, the common assertion of God controlling events in God’s own timing (which makes me shift in my chair just typing it!) may be, for some individuals, a necessary point along the way of their unfolding understanding of God. If I’m honest, it probably served this function for me at an earlier point in my own personal faith journey.

When I teach pastoral care classes in the Seminary where I am on the faculty at Eastern Mennonite University, I articulate it this way: “Don’t pull out a thread that’s holding someone’s entire psychology or theology together. That’s an abuse of power.” Even if we judge something as inadequate or dysfunctional according to our normative criteria, no matter how much it bothers us, we have to respect the role it is playing in a person’s entire framework. We can tug at the thread a little bit to see how firmly it’s anchored, proceeding with great caution. Pastoral ethics necessitate extreme care when exploring another person’s psychology and theology, following their cues as we companion them on their integrative journey.

As researchers at the intersection of theology and psychology, we come with our own methodological frameworks for interdisciplinary work. We also engage in research with human subjects who have their own psychology and theology. It is important to exercise careful stewardship of our own commitments and allow space for others’ to intersect with ours. In this crossing over point, we may discover new insights that our own frameworks were too narrow to ever conceive. This is the beauty that can emerge only through interdisciplinary work: acknowledging the awarenesses and positionalities we bring, while remaining curious about the possibilities when intersecting with others.

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