The paper seeks to answer the following questions: 1) what are the forms under which the phenomena of the religious experience of beauty occur? 2) what are the differences here as regards age and sex? The paper is a continuation of research on religiosity (Wales 1997; 1998). In view of its theoretical foundations a definition of the religious phenomenon of the experience of beauty, its conditions, context factors, existential and purely aesthetic aspects, beauty in human life and others. Forty people from each group have been examined: aged 12, 15, 18 and 24 (with equal sex groups). In order to gather data a standardized explorational interview has been used with a question about religious biography and 18 particular questions. The identified phenomena of the religious experience of beauty has been categorized according to the contents and parameters of religiosity. Thus established distributions of numbers have been presented in table one. Now, the differences in view of age and sex of the people under study have been shown in table two. The biggest scores have gained people aged 18, and as regards sex - women. The paper has also discussed some issues of the religious experience of beauty in distress, the effects this experience of beauty has (mainly for religiosity and for the further course of life), the problem of spiritual ugliness as a passive and active negation of religious beauty (its consequences in life) and other.
The aim of the study was to examine the differences in religious experience in early, middle and late adulthood. The study examined 608 people who were a part of catholic religious communities. Religious Experience Scale, which includes five dimensions: Importance rating, Negative experiences, God’s support, Entrusting in God and Openness to God, was used. Statistical analyzes showed that the level of religious experience was significantly differentiated by the age of the respondents for four out of five dimensions of Religious Experience: Importance rating, God’s support, Entrusting in God and Negative experiences. People in late adulthood were characterized by the highest level of Importance rating, God’s support, Entrusting in God and the lowest level of Negative experiences compared to people in early and middle adulthood. The nature of late adulthood – i.e., the ability to discover the specificity of religious experience to understand and interpret the signs of God’s presence and action in everyday events – may account for the observed effects. The results of the study add to the knowledge on religious experience depending on the developmental stage of the person. They could be used to adjust the character of pastoral counseling to the needs of specific age groups of adult clients.
The aim of the article is to present a new measure of structure and level of religiosity. The cognitive-developmental concept of integral development of religiosity by Czesław Walesa, which distinguishes eight parameters of religiosity: religious awareness, religious feelings, religious decisions, bond with the fellowship of believers, religious practices, religious morality, religious experience and forms of profession of faith served as the theoretical bases for the test. The measure was constructed to fit the specificity of the people of the Christian profession. The preliminary reliability and validity indicators were calculated on 126 participants. Construct validity was established with Centrality of Religiosity Scale (C-15), Scale of Religious Identity, Deconversion Scale for Adolescents. The psychometric indicators were satisfactory, which shows that the test can be used to measure structure and level of style of religiosity.
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