Religious Healing Experiences and Earned Security

Abstract

This article focuses on religious healing experiences related to resources from Christian faith and practices and attachment theory. Qualitative interviews were conducted with nine informants. The results indicate that they perceived healing experiences as intense encounters with a loving, sensitive, external power with detailed insights into their burdens. The respondents interpreted the external power as the Christian God. They characterized these experiences as life-changing spurs to further healing processes. We suggest that these encounters can be understood as perceived experiences of God as an attachment-like figure. Earlier research on religious attachment showed that God is often approached as a safe haven in stressful times. Although there is less evidence implying that God is seen as a secure base or a starting point for new exploration, our respondents indicated that these experiences prompted new explorations of their lives, selves, others, and God. We discuss how healing experiences may provide a sense of earned security that changes insecure internal working models into more secure models and argue that this insight can be relevant in the field of pastoral care.