Convergence: maturation and integration in the course of a religious conversion.

Abstract

The process of religious conversion has not been the focus of psychoanalytic understanding. This article examines one conversion narrative, a spiritual autobiography, in which, the author asserts, evidence can be found that the conversion described involved a process of maturation of the subject's internal god-representation, with an integration of maternal and paternal aspects of that internal object representation. Such a process as one aspect of a religious conversion, has implications for psychoanalytic work with religious patients, including the necessity of acknowledging the psychological and deeply believed reality of God for religious patients.