Table Of ContentAffect Theory,
Shame, and
Christian Formation
Stephanie N. Arel
Affect Theory, Shame, and Christian Formation
Stephanie N . Arel
Affect Theory, Shame,
and Christian
Formation
Stephanie N. Arel
Boston University
Boston, Massachusetts, USA
ISBN 978-3-319-42591-7 ISBN 978-3-319-42592-4 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-42592-4
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For Rebecca
A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS
I feel deep gratitude and joy that so many people have been willing to
engage in my work. Several people have provided signifi cant aid and ideas
that have made this book possible. Among those who have contributed, I
owe particular thanks to a few.
I profoundly thank Shelly Rambo, who supported this work at its
infancy. She has given me consistent feedback on my writing and has pro-
vided countless opportunities for me to share and receive comments on my
work. Her discerning insights into both the ideas and the writing, along
with her commitment to my project, have been invaluable. Bryan Stone
has, since the beginning of my matriculation at Boston University, been a
trustworthy, insightful, and consistent mentor, guiding me at critical junc-
tures while encouraging great freedom to explore my topic. My friends
and esteemed colleagues Xochitl Alvizo and Kathryn House both contrib-
uted generously to the process of writing this book at pivotal points and
have endured with me through it all. The Center of Practical Theology at
Boston University supported this project since its insemination. Thanks
also to Wesley Wildman, Anjulet Tucker, and Steven Sandage, faculty
members who have met with me at different times to guide my writing,
challenge me intellectually, and help me complete this text.
I am grateful for the editors at Palgrave Macmillan. I appreciate the
generous support of Phil Getz and Alexis Nelson, who saw this process
through to its fruition.
I had the opportunity to present many parts of this work to various
groups. For this, many thanks go to the Body and Religion Group of
American Academy of Religion and the Pacifi c Northwest Region of
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
American Academy of Religion, especially Anne-Marie Ellithorpe, who
encouraged me through Chapter 5 with precise thinking on friendship,
solidarity, and empathy. This same chapter garnered feedback and refl ec-
tion by those at the Trauma and Lived Religion Conference, Amsterdam,
Netherlands. I thank R. Ruard Ganzevoort for his refl ections on trauma
and Srdjan Sremac for his astute observations, and continual support, of
the work on touch and shame.
Many thanks to the American Association of University Women whose
fellowship supported this work at its earliest stages. I owe particular
gratitude to several members of the Society for Ricoeur Studies, includ-
ing George Taylor, Dan Stiver, Roger Savage, Todd Mei, and Joseph
Edelheit, who have supported my interdisciplinary work integrating
shame and trauma with philosophy since I began to undertake it. The
2016 Intercontinental Academia, jointly sponsored by the Israel Institute
for Advanced Study at Hebrew University and the Zentrum für inter-
disziplinäre Forschung of Bielefeld University in Germany, provided a
platform for thinking about trauma and shame in the context of human
dignity. I appreciate the members’ support and encouragement at the fi nal
stages of the project.
I am especially grateful to the participants—religious leaders, theolo-
gians, and a variety of healthcare workers and healing professionals—of
the Journey to Healing International Conference, Belfast, Ireland, where
I fi rst spoke about shame in the context of war, addressing the experiences
of women survivors of rape during the Rwandan genocide, US soldiers
returning from war with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms,
and cultures, like those in Belfast and Bosnia, steeped in war and violence.
Two priests from Belfast and a therapist of African victims of torture shared
about deep wounds suffered in war, urging me to continue this work.
Thank-you to my family members and those who have been like fam-
ily, supporting and encouraging this process: Denice, Garry, Courtney,
YT, Steven, Christina, Chris, Sydney, Shianne, Sally, Nathan, Judy, Bill,
Margena, Marian, Tiffany, Lynne, Laurie, Vanessa, Nancy, Garry, June,
Amy, Doug, Jamie, Ronnie, Bill, Kathy, Arlene, Jessica, Nancy, Tonya,
and Gina. A special thank-you to Andrew for his continual contributions
to deepening this work and without whose unfl agging support this book
would not have been possible.
Finally, I dedicate this book to Rebecca Daugherty, who deserves more
thanks than I can give her here.
C
ONTENTS
1 Introduction 1
2 Interpreting Shame Affectively 2 3
3 The Cover-Up 63
4 Masked Shame 91
5 Touching Shame: A Pathway to Disinterment 1 25
6 Empathic Engagement 159
7 Conclusion 1 77
Bibliography 1 85
Index 2 03
ix
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
Christian rhetoric and practice shape not only minds but also bodies. 1
The consequences of discourses, liturgies, and ceremonies intended for
Christian formation are signifi cant. Attending church to fi nd solidarity,
seek guidance, and connect with God, participants present themselves to
be changed by worship. In the desire for spiritual growth, they expose
their most vulnerable selves. Susceptible and open, they avail themselves
to be modeled, and traces of the Christian tradition remain to emerge in
their behavior, words, and deep-seated beliefs.
Christian adoration of God, no matter which denomination, includes
a willingness, even a desire, to be shaped. Worship serves to offer a prom-
ise, alleviate pain, and offer hope. In the desire to connect with God and
community is an entreaty to mitigate human suffering. Shame, one of the
most ubiquitous and potentially damaging states, often plays a role in such
suffering.
Complicated and painful, shame evinces human sensitivities and weak-
nesses. Yet, shame is a normal part of human life that shared and faced
assimilates into the varieties of experience with little detrimental impact.
However, not addressed, shame is interred, 2 stored in the body to function
maladaptively in the Christian self. In the process of interment, messages
about shame internalized as beliefs, values, and norms, or externalized
through projection onto others, emerge viscerally as affects in the self.
Present experiences of shame reinforce memories of past shame—burying
© The Author(s) 2016 1
S.N. Arel, Affect Theory, Shame, and Christian Formation,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-42592-4_1
2 S.N. AREL
the affect deeper. Although interred shame is detrimental, the affect serves
a very natural biological, neurological, and social purpose. Understanding
the role of visceral, innate shame and its involvement in attachment phe-
nomenon is critical for developing a responsible theological anthropology
of shame.
The project of uncovering and highlighting where shame appears in
Christian language and practice is a formidable one. Shame once recog-
nized is often so painful it readily escapes our view. But envisioning shame
as a part of the Christian self recognizes the whole self and lifts up the
reality that theology both participates in and potentially disinters shame
from the Christian self. 3
A theological dimension to research on shame’s role in self-
understanding in the humanities and the social sciences fosters a recogni-
tion of how religion and culture together participate in shaping shamed
bodies. Further, engaging affect theory and trauma studies with theologi-
cal anthropology provides the analytic lens that lends itself to capturing
the essence of shame carefully distinguished from guilt, deeply associated
with embodiment, and closely related to attachment.
The affect of shame functions naturally in the body, relying on rela-
tionships of interest for its emergence, but also potentially interfering
with secure relational bonds. 4 When a person meets with disapproval or
disgust, shame innately motivates the turning of the head or the down
casting of the eyes to reduce facial communication and prohibit expo-
sure. 5 This behavior inhibits or restrains the affect of interest or enjoy-
ment but does not completely eradicate it either. For example, a child
shamed loses all muscle tonicity and drops to the fl oor, crying in pain,
but also beseeching love from the caregiver in front of whom shame
emerged in the fi rst place. In toxic shame, an individual often seeks isola-
tion, unable to tolerate high levels of others’ affect and therefore refut-
ing connection. Subsequently, reclusiveness and detachment replace
social engagement and intimacy. This reticence as a result of shame poses
a challenge for a Christian tradition built on the concept of communion
and empathic connection, where a person’s presence, even to touch, is a
mundane expectation.
A reading of seminal texts well known within the Christian tradition
demonstrates how shame persists thematically present in those texts in
ways that cannot simply be assimilated into a discourse of guilt. Shame is
not as easily recognized as guilt and has more pernicious effects, unless
guilt itself goes unrecognized. 6 Moreover, in order to address the way
