Christian faith and recovery from substance abuse, guilt, and shame

ABSTRACT

Although guilt and shame, on one hand, and spirituality, on the other, are known to relate to recovery from substance abuse, the connectedness of these emotions, spirituality, and recovery has hardly been touched in research. This study, drawing from rich qualitative data consisting of the interviews of 21 former substance abusers, each interviewed twice, targets this relationship and analyses how spirituality, in this case more precisely Christian faith, relates to guilt and shame during the process of recovery. Since self-conscious emotions are at least in part socioculturally constructed, Christian faith is seen as a cultural tool that is influencing the ways how to define and cope with guilt and shame in recovery. Both academic and practical conclusions are drawn from the data.

KEYWORDS:

• Christian faith
• guilt
• moral shame
• recovery
• shame
• spirituality
• substance abuse