Henderson, Gwen Deborah (2008) Evangelical women negotiating faith in contemporary Scotland. PhD thesis. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/323/ Copyright and moral rights for this work are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This work cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Enlighten: Theses https://theses.gla.ac.uk/
[email protected] Evangelical Women Negotiating Faith in Contemporary Scotland Gwen D. Henderson A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements of the University of Glasgow for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Theology and Religious Studies February 2008 i Abstract This thesis explores the experience of spiritual dissonance described in the spiritual life histories of twenty one Christian women associated with the evangelical Christian community in Scotland. It describes the symptoms of constriction, paralysis and impasse which some of these women report and explores the reasons for their interpretation of their symptoms as signs of spiritual sickness. It uses faith development theory to explain some aspects of these symptoms in the context of healthy transitional faithing change. It suggests however that women’s reluctance to speak publicly about their experience, their habitual repression of their deep emotions and questions, their tendency to use psychological ‘splitting’ to conform within their faith communities and resist the fragmentation of their spiritual identity, indicate that their development has been seriously damaged by spiritual restriction in some congregations.