Spiritual Emotions: A Psychology of Christian Virtues

by Robert Campbell Roberts

An expert in moral and philosophical psychology, Robert C. Roberts here develops an original, up-to-date understanding of human emotions in relation to spirituality and as a basic part of Christian moral character. With an eye on pertinent Biblical texts, Roberts explores emotions as nonsensory perceptions that arise from personal caring and concern. His study culminates with an in-depth examination of six "fruit of the Holy Spirit" contrition, joy, gratitude, hope, peace, and compassion.

Though  Spiritual Emotions  is rigorous in its focus on the inner structure of Christian character, it is nonetheless readable and is laced with many narrative examples. The book will be immensely useful for Christian ethicists, psychologists, pastors, and counselors.

Genres: Psychology, Philosophy, Spirituality, Theology, Christian Living

Paperback

First published July 1, 2007

Reviews

[Micah · Rating 2 out of 5]

So this book is remarkably mediocre - there's really nothing to get either inspired or angered by. It's definitely easy to imagine someone getting really infuriated by his frequent condescension towards non-Christians and those who do not believe in his conception of eternal life, but for me personally, it was hard to get too up in arms since I didn't take the rest of what he said seriously at all. This book's biggest failures (apart from its limited viewpoint as mentioned in the last sentence) are twofold.

1. Calling this a Psychology of Christian Virtues is a tad odd. Even though he defines what he means by Christian psychology numerous times in the first few chapters, I just don't see it. He relies entirely on philosophy, literature, and scripture for his insights and conclusions rather than any type of actual scientific research or studies. It's difficult to call this a work of failed psychology as despite the book's title, it's as if he never even attempts to truly 'do' psychology.

2. Despite Roberts having a Ph.D and being a professor at Baylor, his theology is very youth-groupish at times. It relies too heavily on cliches and dogma without any explication of their significance or real world meaning/implications. It's a book that lets the reader pat themselves on the back and feel good for agreeing with it.

I've probably made this book sound far more insidious and awful than it really is, but even though it's not awful, that doesn't make it worthwhile.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

"This is really no solution, not primarily because we have no reason to believe it, but because it trades on a shallow analysis of the problem. Our life is compromised not by death, but by something lying in us, within the power of our will. To a superficial view it may look as though all our troubles would be over if only could live a healthy life without end. But down deeper, we want not just more life, but a worthwhile life. The immature suppose that the yearning for immortality is a yearning for endless existence, but really it is the yearning for a morally worthy existence. Our current life is unworthy, and its extension beyond the grave will not solve the problem that fact The sting of life is not basically that it comes to a temporal end, but that we are guilty; we have failed to become what we ought, to achieve worthiness. The riddle of life is constituted nor by our mortality, but by our unrighteousness" (63).

"We must become friends of despair if we are to be drawn above it to genuine and heartfelt hope. Far from being an exercise in morbidity or arrogance, a deepening acquaintance with our
death and with the vanity of human wishes is our worldly hearts a needed path to perfect health" (61).

"It is hard to be close friends with an unrepentant cannibal" (87).

"Humility is cannibal-anorexia, as we say. It is thus a self-confidence, one that runs far deeper than the tenuous self-confidence of the person who believes in himself because others up to him" (88).

"If you refuse to take any responsibility for anything but your own amusement, or if you work only for yourself and your family, but not for God, you are headed for a crippled life, a life of incompleteness or disaster. If you seek irresponsible amusement, you are headed for a kind of basic disorientation in life, a sense of being lost in the cosmos without an identify;; if you take responsibility, but only for yourself and your family, you are headed for despair in face of the end of life" (125).

"To dull or downgrade the concern for the eternal kingdom, for a perfect relationship with God and neighbor, is to compromise one's status as a person, to live a damaged life; it is a sort of spiritual crippling" (149).

"What devastates the eternal self is not that it has earthly hopes, but that it ascribes to them a significance they can't bear" (151).

"There is nothing peculiarly Christian about moods of exaltation and triumph, or passing feelings of one sort or another; these kinds of changes happen just about every time one goes to a movie" (156).

"Christianity is not a therapy for those who wish never to be upset" (177).

"But in hope the Christian dares to believe that the things he does in imitation of Jesus are not destined to be foiled. Much of human endeavor will be brought to nothing, but these imitative acts will count; they will somehow be taken up and preserved in the kingdom" (I Corinthians 15:58) (192) .

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robert C. Roberts, who has taught at Western Kentucky University, Wheaton College (where I met him), and Baylor University, is now affiliated with several institutions in the USA and abroad. That diversity of background fits with his diversity as a thinker, ranging as he does over philosophy, psychology, and spirituality. In this book, as in several others (such as the pithy "Strengths of a Christian" of several decades ago), he offers hard-won wisdom for the Christian life rendered from careful reflection on everyday life and rendered to us in everyday language.

I'm not sure I yet quite buy Roberts's attempts to define emotions as construals. I think that emotions are feelings prompted by construals—such that (as our friends in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy tell us) if we change our construals, our understandings and valuings, of things, we will change our emotions about them. Emotions, I aver, depend on both our cognitions and our affections—our values—so that in a certain situation we see that A is the case and we value B, so we experience the emotion C.

But never mind this terminological quibble, because I don't think much depends on it in benefiting from this wise and gracious book. Roberts tells enough stories to let the reader know that he is not overly impressed with his own emotional and spiritual maturity, even as he has enough to spot, at least eventually, what's going on in his life and to share it with us to good purpose. At times one might wish Roberts to have quoted a little less (he has read impressively widely, but sometimes the erudition slows the exposition) and to deliver his own thoughts a little more. At his best, he offers a striking phrase that presses home his most important insights, such as the following I offer as a taster for what I found to be a truly edifying read:

"The emotional person...is weak nor because he has emotions, but because he has such poor ones, or such a limited repertoire" (16).

"We act from duty only because we are not yet spiritually moral. The perfected saint feels few duties, but many joys and sorrows" (71).

"Don't give up. Indeed, you'd better not give up. For God, who is in control of things, is going to make complete justice and perfect love the very structure of the world. In trimming down your moral vision, you're setting yourself at odds with the Creator of heaven and earth" (72).

"Perhaps the most powerful solvent of the self-encased self is another's relentless love for it" (74).

Christian hope is no mere wishful thinking, but "a deeply etched hopefulness, a character trait that [one] carries into the most diverse and unconducive situations of [one's] life.... Hopefulness becomes a toughness, an independence from one's environment, a way in which [one] transcends [one's] immediate situation" (156-57).

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay...

So, I probably need to go back and look at sections of this book.

Human emotions is a complex topic.

I think I can buy his definition of emotions as: concern-based construals.

That makes sense. But I mean it’s such a complex reality that I’m not sure this is an adequate enough description. It may be.

I was expecting kind of a different book, but I guess the title does lend itself to the book I just read.

I think my favorite chapter was the last one on compassion, specifically Christian compassion. In this chapter he shows an awareness of communal righteousness, of biblical justice. And he really emphasizes the love of God in Jesus and as Jesus expressed it (incarnating, identifying, sacrificing, humbling).

My least favorite chapter was on gratitude. I don’t think he showed a similar awareness of the importance of communal righteousness with this virtue. He seems to suggest that gratitude looks at someone’s evil (mixed with good) and says, “I see the evil, but he meant well.”

I don’t think that is the proper response to evil. I don’t think we are to use gratitude as a way to excuse someone’s evil, after all, evil/sin harms people and it offends against God.

It IS possible to appreciate and express gratitude for the good even when it be mixed with evil (heck, most of our behaviors are mixed), but we never say, “I see the evil, BUT...”

We say, “I see the evil AND I see the good.”

I know, I know, one little word... BUT that one little word changes everything!

“AND” says we can confront the evil while also affirming the good, “BUT” says we must ignore the evil for the sake of the good. (I’m not saying we must always confront every evil we see right on the spot, but I am saying we don’t ignore it simply for the sake of the good).

I have a few other reservations about the book, but I’ll leave off for now.

It is a fairly good book, worth reading, and spurs the mind to think deeply on how, as Christians, we see/interact with our emotions and cultivate virtues.

[Don Fast · Rating 1 out of 5]

Confused Author

I was very disappointed in what was presented as Christian by Mr. Roberts. His writing came across as a secular/unsaved psychologist attempting to explain biblical concepts from an unredeemed heart. I couldn't finish the book. I didn't want his pagan, posing as Christian thoughts in my brain. II Corinthians 10:5. I have been a Jesus inside of me Christian since1977. A fultime youth pastor and head pastor for 15 years and fultime substance abuse counselor for another 20. I do not want his thoughts in my head.

[David Rodriguez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is single-handedly responsible for showing me exactly what I wanted to do for my doctoral dissertation. This man's insights and philosophical work are phenomenal. I've had the honor of meeting him during my graduate studies, and he is definitely a man that you see Christ in, and he is a man that literally embodies what he writes on moral emotions and virtue.

[Jeffrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was very excited to read this book, but came away from it with my expectations diminished. This book is not bad, in fact it is poetic and true in many places. It seems that a lot of what this author is saying in this book rests on previous works that he sits in the first two chapters. This, perhaps, is why I felt less than exuberant when I finished, the book seemed to skirt around possible important developments in the text to focus on other topics. The author is quite poetic though and he diagnosis humanity quite well. He divides his work into three sections: the first section (Chapters 1 and 2) indicate the nature of emotions, that is concern-based construals, which involve our beliefs and desires, are interpretive, move us to act; they are episodic and indicate the nature of our internal lives; they are perceptual, that is they impress on you they are not sensations; emotions do not involve assent, you don't have to agree with your emotions; emotions have reasons behind them, moods have causes. Moreover, the author notes that we can change the way we feel by challenging our perceptions (remember, emotions are interpretive), act contrary to our emotions ("living" in an emotion can fuel it), and we can build a character that helps dictate the source from which our emotions flow. The rest of the book deals with this. In section two, the author spends the next four chapters discussing how one might build a passion for God (through recognition of need of God, through need for eternal life, a moral life, and humility). The chapter on humility is profound and a great chapter, worth the book in-of-itself. The last section deals with six emotions of the transformed Christian life, moving them from emotions to character traits.

[Skipr · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm tempted to give this book 5 stars. But, I'll hold off for a few months, and see if I still feel that way.

This is not an easy read. An indication that I was going to have to think about what I was reading came early on when Roberts makes the claim that he essentially spends the rest of the book explaining, namely that "emotions are concern-based construals of our situation." Roberts persuasively argues that a spiritually mature person doesn't just "do" the right thing; her actions are coincident with strong emotions that are based on proper concerns. (Concerns such as the desire for God and His kingdom.) Acting compassionately is good, but not as good as BEING a compassionate person who actually feels compassion for her neighbor. How does a person become a compassionate (or joyful, or peaceful, or humble, or any of the other virtues) person? Roberts explains that it begins by seeing (construing) the world and our situation through what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. Building on that foundation, we develop spiritual emotions and passions by practicing seeing situations - especially suffering - in light of our concern for Christ and his ways. It doesn't happen overnight.

[loafingcactus]

I was exposed to this book in Chapter 2 of Not the Way It's Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin, which is essentially a summery of the previous version of this book. After looking at the first few pages I am more inclined to read Faithful Feelings: Rethinking Emotion in the New Testament were I to get around to reading a book on theology of emotions.

[Tylor Lovins · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is wildly uninteresting.