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The Power of Transformation

HARVILLE

HENDRIX

Introduction Subject and definition of terms. This paper is addressed to the question: H o w is man empowered to change? T h e answer requires a preliminary and working model of "man" that exhibits the processes of internal change. M y purpose is to propose such a model and to show its power to illuminate a particular psychosocial problem, i.e., prejudice. T h e phrase "empowered to change" implies that man can and ought to be other than he is. " E m p o w e r e d " means that change is the result of the actualization of power. W h e r e does this power come from? Is it in man or outside of him? I shall contend that power is both "in" and "outside of" man.

Further elaboration of the nature of man and the sources of power will be given in the main body of the paper. T h e meaning of "change" needs further specification here. By "change" I mean an internal metamorphosis. This distinguishes change from any reference to external actions that are not congruent with internal states. There are at least four views of change. One view stresses the emptiness and passivity of man. This means that all change is the result of external THE REV. HARVILLEHENDRIX,M.A., is Instructor in Pastoral Theology at the Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas. He is a Fellow of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors and a member of the Academy.

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forces. A second view sees change as a result of the interaction of internal with external forces. The stress here is upon the internal drives that are limited by external resistances. A third view sees: change as internal reorganization that occurs as a consequence of the presence of necessary and appropriate conditions. T h e presence of these conditions as external factors calls forth the internal possibilities. A fourth view has an eclectic character that includes activity and passivity in man and sees the external forces as both repressive and eductive. Internal and external forces exist in a complicated but creative interchange and balance.

Definition of method. Methodology and method are different things, but they are integrally related. Methodology means the framework or approach to a subject. Method means the tool used to deal with the subject. Experiencing-symbolization, as used in this paper, is both a methodology and a method. It is an approach to the human process and a means of analyzing that process. These terms come from the work of Eugene Gendlin's, Experiencing and the Creation of Meaning. He defines experiencing as a global mass of feeling in a person to which he can refer at any time if he wishes. Symbolization means any form that experiencing takes as it is ordered and specified in the cognitive process. This may include words, acts, events, persons, or anything that points to or "means" the experiencing. T h e relation between experiencing-symbolization is clarified by what he calls the "loft" principle of the universals. This principle states that any symbolization is an instance of a certain kind of experiencing. 1 These definitions as they stand are important for the constructive section that follows. I use them as they are, because they are both exact and comprehensive. The treatment of the process of experiencing-symbolization in Gendlin's book is the most specific delineation of it that I have seen. Dorothy Emmet approaches this process by her distinction between the "adverbial" and the "accusative" modes of knowing3 She, however, deals

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principally with symbolization and neglects experiencing. Susanne Langer distinguishes between representational and discursive language, but she also neglects experiencing? Both are concerned with the appropriation of the richness of experience, but neither gives enough attention to the dynamics of experiencing. John Baillie explicates this subject in the context of theological epistemology, but his treatment of experiencing is similarly limited? Schleiermacher comes closer to a consideration of experiencing when he distinguishes feeling from doing and knowing, but he sees their unity as one process? The fact that the dynamic of experiencing is an elusive and difficult subject emerges. It may be charged that this paper also fails to give enough attention to experiencing. The points I wish to stress as underlying the forms of symbolization with which I am concerned are 1) that experiencing is prior to symbolization and 2) that symbolization is an instance of a certain kind of experiencing. Experiencing-symbolization as a method is empty of content. Used as a methodology, however, this polarity has an implied content, but it must be specified. In terms of approach to theology, I shall begin with Being as it is manifest in existence. Being in existence is observable, for a being is an instance of being. Everyone has being. One finds the polarity of experiencingsymbolization everywhere, in man and in his history. Being is manifested in man and in his history. By inference, and because Being is consistent with itself, one can assume that it includes the polarity of experiencingsymbolization in itself. This means that experiencing-symbolization can be considered as an ontological polarity. Defense of the method. Method should be congruent with methodology, and methodology should be congruent with the subject matter. My defense of the use of experiencing-symbolization as methodology and method rests upon its existence as an observable element in the human process. Every living thing is a center of experiencing. Experiencing in all living things seeks order and form, i.e., symbolization. 6

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A second defense of the method is that this polarity exists in an explicit or implicit way in all systems of thought and in all thinking. Every man is a center of radical consciousness of his being in the world, of his environment. He responds to his environment, and his response is his world. World here is equated with symbolization as radical consciousness is equated with experiencing. This is the basis of the contention that experiencing-symbolization is an ontological polarity. By ontological I mean structures that are found in all being. This contention is based also upon the interpretation that Tillich's ontological polarities - - individualization - participation, freedom - destiny, dynamics - form - - are instances of and further specifications of experiencingsymbolization.7 This means that experiencing and symbolization are ontological fundamentals that precede and include Tillich's polarities. On the basis of these contentions, the following theological construction is possible. Outline of a theological notion In this theological construction it will be apparent that I am thinking and working within Tillich's general frame of reference. This will be indicated by a selection of his concepts that are useful. I choose them because they express what I am trying to say. I wish to emphasize, however, that I do not conceive of this construction as a critique of Tillich. The terms and language borrowed from him retain much of the meaning he gives to them and include the meanings I have added to them. Being and creation. The nature of Being excludes any analysis, but by an observation of the manifestation of Being in existence, and as experienced, certain inferences can be made. Tillich says that any statements about God other than "God is Beingitself" are symbolic. They point to a reality that they do not contain or describe. The statements below are symbolic in the sense that they also point to what cannot be described. They are also statements of a personal

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character. They portray God as personal. My feeling is that statements portraying God as personal and related are the only ones that are meaningful. At the same time, one must admit that no statement about God is literal or adequate (unless Tillich is right that there is only one literal statement: God is Being-itself). All statements come from man's experiencing of the divine reality and are necessarily personal if they are meaningful. In addition, all statements about anything have a symbolic character. They point to objectivities that man has encountered, but his perception of those objectivities is subjective. The thing-in-itself eludes man. He can only point to it through the perception of his experience of it. The first inference is that Being is a center of experiencing. Being is totally conscious of itself and its infinity. It is totally conscious of the universe in which Being is manifest and through which Being manifests itself (God and Being will be used interchangeably). God knows the universe; he "feels" it. The universe is of him, by him, and is experienced by him as his own. The second inference is that the universe is a creation of Being. Since Being is a center of experiencing, the universe, including man and man's consciousness, is a symbolization of Being. Symbolization can take any form and is an instance of a certain kind of experiencing. The universe, including man, is an instance of a dimension of God's experiencing. These inferences are pointed to and supported by the biblical story of creation, by Tillich's ontology, and by Schleiermacher's theology. In Genesis (Chapters 1, 3) the mytho-poet tells us that God spoke and the world came into being. The world is a "word" of God. The world comes out of God, is created by God, bears the mark of God, and is a form of God's experiencing. Schleiermacher supports this position when he says "it is quite consist e n t . . , a n d . . , correct to say that the world itself, since it came into existence through the spoken word, is the word of God." He quotes Luther as his support: "What is the whole of creation else than a word of God, said and spoken by G o d . . . (Luther in Genesis 1: 51) .,,8

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Tillich uses the word "articulation" to express the same emphasis. "The self-world structure is an articulation of being. ''9 If one analyzes the word "articulation," one finds that it has affinities with "symbolization." The emphasis in "articulation" is upon "verbal" expression, whereas "symbolization" has a broader meaning that includes the verbal. A new form of the statement of Being and creation is: Being symbolizes itself as a self-world structure. Man as the bearer Of selfhood and the universe as the context of man's world are symbolizations of Being, and as such, they are instances of God's experiencing. Symbolizations participate in experiencing and experiencing conditions the character of symbolization. Therefore, man and the universe participate in Being and Being in them.

Being and New Being. Being symbolizes itself anew in Jesus as the Christ. Christ is a specification of God's experiencing in relationship to his creation. Because he is a new form (symbolization) of God's experiencing, he is called the "New Being" by Tillich and the "New Adam" or the "New Man" by Paul. Jesus as the Christ is the "word" of God. The Gospel of John (1:14) says that the "word was made flesh and dwelt among us." Tillich further defines him as the "final self-manifestation of God to humanity. ''1~ He is another "word" spoken by God; he is a perfect "word;" the final "word." He comes out of God as did the universe. He participates in God and God in him. The Being of God is the source of his being and the power of his being. There is a unity of being as manifest in the Christ and in the universe with Being-itself. The unity is their common participation in the ground of Being. Schleiermacher documents this approach in his Christology when he says that man and Christ emerge from the continuing divine creativity. "Both events go back to the one undivided eternal decree and from t h e . . . same natural system. T M The first "word" spoken created the physical life of the human race. The second "word" created the spiritual life of the hu-

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man race. In the first creation, the impartation of the Spirit to human nature was insufficient, because it remained sunk in sensuousness. It was there and potentially active, but its activity was expressed only as a "presentiment of something better. ''12 The spiritual life is identified, by Schleiermacher, with God-consciousness. In the Christ there was a complete union of human consciousness with God-consciousness. Through Christ's God-consciousness the God-consciousness in man is evoked.13 The emphasis I am trying to make here is that there is a unity in the activity of Being in the creation of man and Christ. The second point is the presence of the divine life in man and in Christ and their unity in the ground of Being. Both originate in God and are grounded in God. They are instances of God's experiencing, and as such, they participate in him and he in them, although the participation is different in degree and purpose.

New Being and community. The church as community is a further symbolization of Being through the work of the Christ. It is a creation of the N e w Being and through the N e w Being the church is a consequence of the continuing divine creativity. Being is in every man. God-consciousness is in every man, although it is buried in sensuousness. The church exists in a "latent" form in the world; it is present with potential power in every community. The N e w Being i s recognized by the "being" in man; God consciousness is evoked by the God-consciousness of the Christ. When the recognition or evocation occurs in such a way that being in man and his buried God'consciousness: is identified with the New Being or the full God-consciousness of Christ, the "latent" church becomes the "manifest" church. The power of the Christ is actualized by his power to call into actuality the potentiality of a dynamic divine-human relationship. The power of Jesus Christ as N e w Being conjoined with the symbol of the resurrected Christ creates a new meaning. The new meaning takes the form of the manifest church. In this instance, as in prior ones, the church as the community of "new creatures" is a

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symbolization of God's experiencing. The power of the church comes from the power of being, or Being-itself. This power is present, according to Schleiermacher, when there is an "ever-active susceptibility to his influence, clearly every given state of this corporate life must remain no more than an approximation to that which exists in the Redeemer himself. ''14 With regard to the latent church, Schleiermacher sees the Christ with his "capacity of God-consciousness... giv[ing] the impulse to all life's experiences a n d . . , determin[ing] them..."~5 Indeed, "in truth He alone mediates all existence of God in the world and all revelation of God through the world . . . . ,,16 Power c4 being, N e w Being, and man's being. At this point I wish to emphasize the concept "power of being," which was used briefly in the preceding section. Tillich identifies Being-itself with "power of being." Being-itself is power of being. As power of being, Being-itself is the power of being in everything that exists. Tillich extends the meaning of this concept by positing a power of being in everything that exists. He gives this power of being relative degrees of power. Some things and some men have more power of being than othersY Whatever power one has and wherever power is expressed, it is power of being that is empowered by Being-itself. No one has degrees of being, for everyone has being. One may have degrees of power of being. The degree of one's power of being is measured by his power to take nonbeing into himself, i.e., to affirm his being in spite of nonbeing is an expression of one's power of being. "The neurotic can include only a little non-being; the average man a limited amount, the creative man a large amount, and God symbolically speaking--an infinite amount."ls In the preceding section I noted Schleiermacher's position that some amount of God-consciousness exists in every man by virtue of the divine creativity. Tillich posits power of being in everything. Some people have more power of being than others. The mytho-poet of Genesis portrays the

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creation of man. According to him, man was given special attention by God in the moment of his creation. The Divine Creator brought man into being by his "breath" (Genesis 2:7). Man's power of life is the breath of God. Paul in Romans (1:20) asserts that the heathen know God in their hearts, but they will not acknowledge him. What these sources indicate can be stated as a doctrine of man. This doctrine, within the structure of this paper, takes shape as follows. Man is a symbolization of God's experiencing. He is "a" word of God. Christ is "the" word of God. Man receives his creation from God. He comes from out of God. As a symbolization of God's experiencing, man participates in God's being as a symbol participates in the experience of which it is an instance. As a symbol both participates in experiencing and has a reality of its own, so man participates in Being and is separate from Being. He is separate but he is dependent. His dependency upon Being-is the source of the power of meaning of his life. A symbolization must refer back to experiencing for its power and meaning. In every man, therefore, there is the presence of divine activity. In the third volume of his system, Tillich calls this divine activity "spirit." "If God were not also in man so that man could ask for God, God's speaking to man would not be perceived by man. ''19 This means that there is an essential unity between God and man. The outline of Christology above indicated that a similar situation exists between Christ and Being-itself. The difference is that in Christ the power of being is actualized fully. God-consciousness in him is undisturbed. This means that there is an essential unity of being in God, in Christ, and in man.

N o w one may ask, what is the nature of the relationship between Christ and man? The nature of the relationship is implied in the distinction between them. Man does not have full God-consciousness. His power of being is limited, not fully actualized. His creation is incomplete. The fulfillment of creation is salvation. Salvation is the restoration of unity between man and God through Christ. The function of the Christ is, therefore, the function of mediation. Ac-

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cording to Schleiermacher, the influence of the full God-consciousness of Christ evokes the God-consciousness in man and gives him a new "religious personality. ''2~ The power of Christ's influence to evoke such a reaction is possible because "a longing for it pre-exists in its object. T M " T h e . . . influence of Christ is the continuation of the creative divine activity out of which the person of Christ arose. ''22 Tillich agrees with Schleiermacher that Christ's function is mediation, but he expresses it differently. Tillich sees mediation as bridging the gap between the finite and the infinite. Mediation is reunion. 23 Mediation is also a revelatory event in which the ground of Being is manifested as the New Being, bringing healing and salvation. 24 In Systematic Theology Ill, Tillich introduces the concept of "Spiritual Presence," which creates the N e w Being. 25 This "Spiritual Presence" makes an "impact" upon man's being to which man can respond because of the witness of the Divine Spirit to the human spirit. He speaks of this impact also as being "grasped." He contends that "man is never alone. The Spiritual Presence acts in every moment and breaks into it in some great moments...-26 These references to the function of the Christ mean that Christ's function is to reconcile man to God. He does this by evoking his being, grasping him, influencing him. Man can respond because his power of being is grounded in Being-itself. This establishes his essential unity with God. The final point that must be made concerns the mode of mediation and appropriation. Schleiermacher and Tillich both emphasize the point that the power of being is mediated in and through the structures of community. They deny direct mediation. Both see man as a part of a community through which he is called into being and to salvation. The media may include the word and the sacraments or some other action or event, but the power of life always comes through a social situation. The social situation may or may not be the church. It may be any community in which the power of divine life is actualized. The N e w Being is in all history, but it is recognized as N e w Being only in the church, e; This point is important in the following analysis. In this section I have attempted to delineate a theological notion that

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would show the essential unity of being between God and man. My aim has been to discover how man is empowered to be and to change. As I have noted, man has power of being in himself that, when evoked and affirmed by the power of being in Christ mediated through a community, enables him to experience a new reality in himself. In the next section I shall deal with man's existential predicament with specific attention given to the psychopathology of prejudice.

Dynamics o[ prejudice Man in the .world. The second aspect of the doctrine of man is his existential predicament in general and the special forms through which he experiences the threat of nonbeing. The experience of man and the witness of history, tradition, and theology concur that the unity of man and God is essential but not existential. Man is estranged from the ground of Being. His power of being is limited by his estrangement. His God-consciousness is buried in sensuousness, says Schleiermacher. Man is separated from God and his being is threatened by nonbeing. Secondly, man is a symbolization of God's experiencing, therefore, he participates in God's nature. Man is a center of experiencing. God has total consciousness; man has limited consciousness. His experiencing finds form in symbolization. The power in his experiencing comes from its roots in the ground of Being. The content of his experiencing includes both his essential unity with being and his existential separation from being. This content is symbolized as his "world." His world is a distorted symbolization because of the disturbance in man's experiencing that is caused by his separation from Being-itself. Man's separation from Being causes him to experience the universe and others or neighbor as a threat. His experience of the other as threat is also one of the forms through which he experiences the threat of nonbeing. The fact of his anxiety disturbs his experiencing of the other and dis-

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torts his perception of the reality of the other. The other becomes an object of reaction instead of a subject of response. The result is alienation from the other, the breakdown of community, and the loss of power of being.

The prejudiced personality. The cognitive process of a prejudiced person is a good illustration of the concrete form that ontological anxiety and the threat of nonbeing can take in a personal experience. It is also a good example of the failure to meet the demand of the moral imperative, which, as Tillich states it, is to be a person in a community. The Cognitive Process: In the two studies of the dynamics of prejudice by Gordon Allport 28 and Bruno Bettelheim29 both authors report that the dynamics of cognition in the preiudiced person is a reflection, for the most part, of the "prejudiced person's way of thinking about anything." There is, it is asserted, a definite pattern and attitude in the intolerant person that is clearly distinguishable from the cognitive structure and pattern of action in the tolerant person. This pattern is reflected in the way the prejudiced person organizes and responds to his world. The symbolizations of the prejudiced person, i.e., his world, have a rigidity and a lack of consistency. His experiencing takes the form of a need for definiteness. This is expressed through the need of a rigid moral structure, identification with institutions, a deep need for authority, and dichotomization. The world is black and white for the prejudiced personality. The lack of consistency is reflected in his ambivalence toward parents, minority groups, 3~ and toward a government he may hate and at the same time accuse of not having done enough for him? 1 Allport and Bettelheim stress the factor of externalization or projection. The prejudiced person is experiencing internal conflict. Things happen "out there." There is a strong tendency to avoid self-reference. It is not "I who hate, but I who am hated." This points to the presence of suspiciousness of others. This is the basis of projection. The cognitive process of the prejudiced personality is subsumed under

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Allport's description of undifferentiated categorical thinking. This is a kind of thinking process that allows for little if any ambiguity. The forms that the experiencing of the prejudiced person takes indicate the absence of trust. There is no trust of self or others. Distrust of self is reflected in the need for definiteness and rigid organization. Distrust of others is reflected in the need for authority and externalization and the fear of ambiguity. Both sources of distrust are reflected in the social relationships of the intolerant person. He is usually an emotional, and often a physical, isolate. His group identifications, if they exist at all, are generally negative in character. Inability to trust creates a loneliness that can lead to despair. The despair may be experienced as rejection by others. Such a rejection may be actual, since the intolerant person has rejected others because of his perception of their rejection of him. Allport and Bettelheim conclude that the prejudiced-personality is a distinctive type. Prejudice is the result of character-conditioning. In early childhood there has been emotional deprivation. The experience of deprivation in the past, even if it is not consciously remembered, creates an anticipation of being deprived in the future. This past experience and future anticipation combine to create a style of thinking about everything. The cognitive process is a reflection of his manner of being in the world. The world is experienced as a threat; the response to the world has the character of a defense. This mode of being in the world is categorically different from that of the tolerant person. The difference between the tolerant and the intolerant person is reflected in the difference between differentiated and undifferentiated thinking. The tolerant person can tolerate ambiguity. He has little need for authority; he trusts the other person unless he has a reason to do otherwise; and he has flexible habits of action and thinking22 These factors are just the opposite in the intolerant personality. The Presence of Anxiety: With regard to the cognitive process of the prejudiced person, we have to ask: what kind of experiencing is this an instance of?

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Both studies answer this question by their report of anxiety as an underlying factor in the personality of the intolerant person. In all the cases of intolerant people studied by Bettelheim and Janowitz and in all the reports on prejudiced people summarized in Allport's study, there was what Allport, quoting Newcomb, designates as a "threat orientation. ''aa The content of the "threat orientation" is an inability of the individual to face the world without fear. The prejudiced personality seems to be "afraid of himself, of his own instincts, of his own consciousness, of change and of his social environment.T M An underlying insecurity seems to be at the roots of the personality. In the study by Bettelheim and Janowitz, it was found that there was no relation between the felt anxiety and external causes. There was no relation between external causes and prejudice except that a particular event might be a cause for the expression of prejudice. There was, however, a definite correlation between anxiety, internal insecurity, and intolerance. The intolerant person was anxious about the future. He was suspicious of the government, expected another war, and anticipated economic difficulty. In almost every instance a specific relation could be demonstrated between an inclination to feel insecure and intolerance. Through the threatening structure of the world, the intolerant person experiences the threat of nonbeing with great intensity. Theological meaning. The theological meaning of this particular psychosocial pathology has been indicated in the introduction to this section. Consistent with the thesis of this paper, the theological analysis of the prejudiced personality indicates that he is experiencing the threat of nonbeing in the form of threat by other beings. His past has been deprived of union with other beings. This has intensified his sense of separation from the ground of Being. The intensity of his experiencing of separation and of threat is so great that it is manifest in the form of a neurosis. He has lost his eenteredness as a self, and consequently, his power of being is weak. 35 Tillich says that the more centered a person is, the more power of being is embodied in him.:"~ The prejudiced person is not a centered self. The

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social scientists interpret the same phenomenon as ego-alienation and egodeprivation. This kind of personality is so estranged from the ground of his being that his power of being is severely limited. His limited power of being makes it impossible for him to integrate and to order his internal life. Since what power of being he has is used to bolster some semblance of order, he has no power of being left to participate creatively in community with other centers of power. The community threatens what power of being he has. Since he cannot be with them, he defends himself against them. His estrangement from the ground of being is reflected in his estrangement from himself. He has no power, therefore, to meet the demand of the moral imperative. To meet that demand he has to receive power of being from outside himself. How he receives this additional power is the question of this paper and is pointed to in the next section.

The power of transformation Kurt Lewin asks: What has to happen in the individual so that he will give up his divergence and be reoriented toward a closer contact with reality? 37 The theological question in correlation with this one is: What has to happen to a person so that he will give up his idols and be reoriented to and reunited with God? Both questions ask for the source of man's power of transformation.

The meam of change. The Bettelheim and Allport studies offer a variety of means for change. These include, social legislation, re-education, early education of children, involvement groups, individual and group therapy. The impact of all these suggestions is that they indicate that change comes in social, interpersonal situations. The role of the group. Lewin has described how the social or group setting works to effect "change in the perceived social world. ''38 He emphasized that change must be total to be actual. A person is not converted to a new

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action-ideology, to new facts and new values in piece-meal fashion. His total orientation is changed as one process. All the dimensions of his life may not be changed in one moment, but they are worked out "after" and "in" the direction of the new orientation.39 The setting for transformation is the "inner group. ''4~ When one feels that he belongs to a group, he will accept the new system of values and beliefs of the group. The acceptance of the new values is preceded by his acceptance of the group. This means that the power of transformation is released when one experiences being part of the whole. The result of positive group identification is emotional and cognitive transformation. Lewin does not stress, however, what seems to be a prior condition that has to be met before one accepts a group: the feeling of acceptance by the group. This feeling precedes any acceptance of the group. This means that the power of transformation is released when a person experiences being received by another person. Pov:er in the comnmnity. Several important points emerge here. First, the power of transformation is mediated through a social setting. Second, the experience of being accepted by others empowers one to accept others. Third, one must be accepted and trusted before he can accept and trust himself. The corollary to this, which applies to the prejudiced personality, is that his rejection of others is based upon his perception of being rejected by others, although he may not symbolize it in this way. The fourth point that Lewin's study suggests is that one's power of being is increased when it is affirmed by another individual or group. Power is mediated through power. Personal power is the source of personal power. Centeredness is a response to centeredness. We are what we are and we become what we become because of the gift of ourselves to ourselves from others. As the mother calls the selfhood of the child into being, so the group (family, church, community, or one person) engenders the power of being of an individual and increases it by affirming it. W e live by the grace of our neighbor. If our neighbor (as church, friend, therapist, ram-

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ily, etc.) withdraws from us or we from him, we are cut off from the channels of grace and power by which it is possible for us to live. W e are cut off from the sources of power, indeed, from Being-itself. The presence of the community in some form as an affirming community overcomes emotional and physical isolation. It becomes a channel to grace. The affirmation of the power of being of an individual reduces the threat of nonbeing in whatever form he may be experiencing it. This reduction of threat further reduces anxiety. The reduction of anxiety lessens the disturbance in experiencing. The anxiety in experiencing is overcome, and its place is taken by a courage to be that is the ground of faith. Emphasis upon the community as the mediator of power of being is made by Tillich and Schleiermacher. Tillich states categorically that the power of the Divine Spirit upon the human spirit "does not occur in isolated individuals but in social groups, since all functions of the human spirit--moral self-integration, cultural self-creation, and religious selftranscendence--are conditioned by the social context of the ego-thou encounter. ''41 What may appear to be an "inner word" is really the Spiritual Presence grasping us from the "outside. ''42 He grasps us through the medium of the word as tradition and history. This word is in our memory because of our former experiences in community. Schleiermacher is equally emphatic in his contention that the influence of the God-consciousness is mediated through the community.~8

Power of being in tbe world. The important point made by Tillich and Schleiermacher is their contention that power of being and God-consciousness are in every man as a consequence of his divine creation. This element of divine life or aspirit" is man's power of life. It is present in and expresses itself through religion and culture. The fact that this is true is the basis for personal transformation. What man becomes he is already, potentially; how he becomes what he is is a gift of the community that gives him to himself by calling him into being and affirming his power of being. In addition, the presence of potentiality in man that can be called forth by an affirming community is the basis for finding and establishing an in-

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tegration between theology and the social sciences. The power of being of a group, the pbwer of being experienced in psychotherapy, the power of being experienced under any conditions, if it overcomes the threat of nonbeing in whatever concrete form it may be experienced, is rooted in Beingitself. The experiencing of power of being may assume an infinite number of symbolizations. However, it is imperative that symbols specify the experiencing with accuracy and exactness. This means that while many symbolizations are appropriate, the symbolizations that recognize the source of power of being in Being-itself are the more exact symbolizations of the reality that is experienced. Conc~swn

The answer to the question, how is man empowered to change? can be given in this form: We are empowered to change when we experience trust and acceptance coming to us from another person or group. Change occurs when our power of being is affirmed by other centers of power. This affirmation of our power of being overcomes the anxiety of nonbeing implied in every change. It supplies us with the courage to accept our acceptance and to exist in spite of threats to our existence. The content of trust in our experiencing that has taken the place of the prior anxiety in our experiencing reduces the disturbances that distorted our perception of reality. This enables us to receive reality more accurately and to symbolize it more exactly. Change then is an internal metamorphosis that is the result of a courage educed in us by external forces. The transformation of our internal experiencing is the prior condition and ground for the transformation of our symbolizations. Re~erences

1. Gendlin, E., Experiencing and the Creation of Meaning. New York, Free Press of Glencoe, 1962,p. 3 ft.

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2. Emmet, D., The Nature o f Metaphysical Thinking. London, Macmillan & Co., 1949, p. 42. 3. Langer, S., Philosophy in a New Key. N e w York, Mentor Paperback, 1942. 4. Baillie, J., Our Knowledge of God. N e w York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1939. 5. Schleiermacher, F., The Christian Faith, Vol. I. N e w York, Harper & Row, Torchbook edition, 1963. p. 7. 6. Tillich, P., Systematic Theology, Vol. I. Chicago, Univ. of Chicago Press, 1951, p. 169. Tillich finds his polar ontological elements and a structure of centeredness that he calls selfhood in the inorganic as well as the organic realm. It is difficult to see how these things can be found in, say, a stone. H e solves this problem by saying that the elements find their fullest expression in man. Experiencing-symbolization is certainly found in all living things, including animals. For instance, in the animal world a dog may experience a rabbit and symbolize his experience by chasing him. This is reaction and not response, but it is the form in which this polarity is found in the nonhuman world. Finding this polarity in the inorganic realm is as difficult to clarify as it is to clarify how Tillich's polarities are found there. (Hereafter this volume of Tillich's theology will be referred to as S T I.) 7. Ibid., p. 174. 8. Schleiermacher, op. cir., p. 150, n. 1. 9. Tillich, ST I, p. 164. 10. - - , Systematic Theology, Vol. II. Chicago, Univ. of Chicago Press, 1957, p. 121. (Hereafter this volume will be referred to as S T II.) 11. Schleiermacher, op. cir., p. 389. 12. Ibid. 13. Ibid., p. 388. 14. Ibid.,p. 378.

15. Ibid. 16. Ibid., p. 388. 17. Tillich, Love, Power, and Justice. N e w York, Oxford Univ. Press, A Galaxy Book, 1960, p. 40. (Hereafter this book will be referred to as Tillieh, LPJ.) 18. Ibid. 19. - - , Systematic Theology, Vol. III. Chicago, Univ. of Chicago Press, 1963, p. 127. (Hereafter this volume of Tillich's theology will be referred to as S T IlL) 20. Schleiermacher, op. cir., p. 476. 21. Ibid., p. 431. 22. Ibid., p. 427. 23. Tillich, ST I, p. 95. 24. Ibid., p. 167. 25. Tillich, ST III, p. 140.

26. Ibid. 27. Ibid., p. 139 ft. See also p. 127 and ST I I p . 430 ft. 28. Allport, G. W., The Nature of Prejudice. N e w York, Doubleday Anchor Books, 1958 (original edition, 1954), p. 377. 29. Bettelheim, B., and Janowitz, M., Dynamics of Prejudice. N e w York, Harper & Bros., 1950, p. 3, 74 ft.

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30. Allport, op. cit,, p. 374. 31. Bettelheim and Janowitz, op. cir., p. 90. 32. Allport, op. cir., p. 171. 33. Ibid., p. 372. 34. Ibid.,p. 373. 35. W i t h regard to the terms that indicate something in man that can respond, I happened to find a surprising reference to Freud in a book by Binswanger (Needleman, J., ed. and trans., Being in the World. N e w York, Basic Books, Inc., 1963). Binswanger relates a conversation between himself and Freud. " W i t h respect to a concrete clinical example, I threw out the question as to how we were to understand the failure of this patient to take the last decisive step of psychoanalytic insight. I suggested that such a failure might only be understood as the result of something which could be called a deficiency of spirit. I could scarcely believe m y ears when the answer came. Freud: Yes, Spirit is everything." 36. Tillieh, LPJ, p. 44. 37. Lewin, K., Resolving Social Conflicts. N e w York, Harper & Bros., 1948, p. 56. 38. Ibid., p. 64. 39. Ibid., p. 66. 40. Ibid., p. 67. 41. Tillich, S T III, p. 139. 42. Ibid., p. 127. 43. Schleiermacher, op. cir., p. 435.

The power of transformation.

The answer to the question, how is man empowered to change? can be given in this form: We are empowered to change when we experience trust and accepta...
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