Merton's "True Self": Moral Autonomy and Religious Conversion

Abstract

My developmental frame of reference will be Lawrence Kohlberg's cognitive-developmental theory of moral reasoning. In its broadest terms, Kohlberg's theory outlines normative progression from the child's egocentric, preconventional moral orientation of punishment and reward, through the conventional orientation of interpersonal approval and social order maintenance typical of most American adults, to the rarely achieved autonomous, postconventional orientation of universal ethical principles. In addition to the critical perspective of advanced cognitive development necessary for questioning conventional morality, Kohlberg claims that movement to autonomous, postconventional morality also requires specifically adult experiences of responsibility, of making irreversible decisions for one's own and others' lives. Even the most adequate postconventional moral orientation, however, cannot answer the question, Why be moral? This is finally not a moral question at all but an ontological or religious question about the meaning of life. This question has led Kohlberg to suggest a postconventional religious orientation, a cosmic (as opposed to a universal human-