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L’Arche community. In this study, the phenomenology and psychology of transformation in L’Arche are viewed ultimately in the context of Christology and Trinitarian theology.
The second broad conviction is that focusing on a unique expression of spiritual growth in one particular community can further illumine the meaning of transformation in the Christian theological, spiritual, and pastoral tradition. That is to say, a careful investigation of the experience of transformation in the context of L’Arche can disclose something that may be universal and paradigmatic of the action of God's grace. It can offer insight into how prayer, community, and relationships of care and service mediate grace in other communal and ecclesial contexts such as the family or congregation. The theological claim made here is that transformation in the context of L’Arche reveals foundational insights into the actual experience of the Trinitarian economy of God's salvation. Those insights have important implications for the spiritual life and practice of the church as a whole.
Based on a critical appropriation of the contributions of theorists such as Sandra Schneiders, Nelson Thayer, James Fowler, and Gerald May, I explore in the first chapter the way in which spiritual transformation in L’Arche is a more specific instance of Christian transformation. This is defined generally as a process of change in consciousness, identity, and behavior brought about by the experience of and response to God in Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit present in the community of faith. In the context of L’Arche, the power of the Holy Spirit is seen to be mediated in relationships of communion with others, particularly the weakest members. In this opening chapter, the work of James Fowler is also advanced as a resource for developing the necessary analytic framework for the study of Christian spiritual transformation. I outline how this study has been inspired by this framework and seek to clarify some of its main elements.
The second chapter is a literature review in which the perspectives of several major theorists of transformation are analyzed and evaluated. The aim of this chapter is to demonstrate how current extant approaches to spiritual transformation and religious conversion neglect certain constitutive