Young Children and Spirituality

Abstract

The term ‘spirituality’ is notoriously challenging to define, partly because it is reliant on translating inner feelings and experiences into words or other modes of expression, which will be interpreted in a multitude of ways depending on the audience’s own inner spiritual and cultural landscape. In describing spiritual concepts, we are reduced to using terminology such as ‘self-transcendent,’ ‘sacred,’ ‘awe-inspiring,’ or ‘connecting’ as we attempt to communicate ethereal experiences and beliefs. The difficulties with expressing spirituality are further compounded when applying the notion to young children. Typically, when we refer to ‘young children’ we mean children aged from birth to eight years. What then, is spirituality for this age group? The extant studies about young children’s spirituality are interested in how young children operate holistically. This makes an extremely important contribution as the spiritual dimension can be lacking in many studies about holism in which spirituality might be conflated with culture or well-being. Scholars of children’s spirituality contemporaneously understand this age group to primarily experience the world (and therefore potentially spiritual experiences) though their bodies. As such, readers are reliant on those scholars’ observations and interpretations of when and how children experience reverence and wonderment, and even the divine, based on young children’s nonverbal expression as much as what they say. Descriptive accounts are frequently the primary source of data and are often the only mechanism a reader can use to assess the credibility of a researcher’s claims. This makes for a field of research that is not without its challenges. A further challenge is untangling spirituality from religion or religious practice and understanding them each as constructs that are often interwoven but that can exist without the other. The intent in the present review brings together literature that has attempted to address the sticky terrain of children’s spirituality with three primary foci, which are (1) spirituality as distinct from religion, (2) young children as those aged eight years old or younger, and (3) enough descriptive detail for the reader to probe the authors’ assertions about children’s spirituality. While there are considerably more sources addressing spirituality in publication than what is represented here, there is a paucity which foregrounds these three factors. A final note is that two significant themes have not been addressed here: (1) ecospirituality and children’s relationships to nature, and (2) young children’s spiritual development. While many of the articles in the present review refer to these two themes, they have not been special foci as they are thoroughly addressed in a separate Oxford Bibliographies in Childhood Studies article “Spiritual Development in Childhood and Adolescence” by W. George Scarlett.

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