ABSTRACT

This article presents a striking finding of our research into the religious identity commitments and process of religious identity development of emerging adults who grew up in strictly Reformed contexts in the Netherlands. We observed a recurrent theme in the life story accounts we studied. Almost all the participants expressed that they feel or felt not good enough for God or believers within strictly Reformed contexts. In this article, we explore this theme and show how feelings of not being good enough are related to various aspects of participants’ strictly Reformed upbringing, such as specific beliefs and specific ideal images. In addition, we show which experiences go along with feelings of not being good enough. Last, we discuss the findings, provide suggestions for future research and point to directions for further reflections by educators.

摘要

本文介绍了我们对在荷兰严格改革宗背景下长大的新兴成年人的宗教认同承诺和宗教认同发展过程的研究的一个惊人发现。我们在所研究的生活故事叙述中观察到一个反复出现的主题。几乎所有的参与者都表示，在严格的改革宗背景下，他们觉得或觉得对上帝或信徒来说不够好。在本文中，我们探讨了这个主题，并展示了不够好的感觉如何与参与者严格改革教养的各个方面相关，例如特定的信仰和特定的理想形象。此外，我们展示了哪些经历伴随着不够好的感觉。最后，我们讨论研究结果，