Sacred Psychoanalysis - etheses Repository - University of ...

PART B. THE ENGAGEMENT OF RELIGION, SPIRITUALITY AND
THE SACRED IN CONTEMPORARY PSYCHOANALYSIS
Part A identified the personal, conceptual, methodological and reflexive contexts of the
researcher. This in turn led to a discussion of issues of definition raised by the terms
religious, spiritual, sacred and contemporary psychoanalysis. The recent place of religion
and spirituality in psychoanalysis was then outlined, with a particular focus on the differing
psychoanalytic cultures found in the UK and the USA. A final section identified the
significant theoretical contributions made by Bion and Winnicott as the foundations they
laid for the inter-relationship of religion, spirituality and psychoanalysis. Here in part B I
take a detailed look at how religion and spirituality emerged in contemporary
psychoanalysis from the 1970s, the date when two crucial writers emerged, detailed in the
next chapter. The following chapters then examine creative forms of theoretical
engagement understood from the following perspectives:
• Christian
• Natural Religion
• Maternal
• Jewish
• Buddhist
• Hindu
• Muslim
• Mystical
• Intersubjective
This history of religion, spirituality and psychoanalysis is a new narrative that offers
revealing insights into the crucial developments that shaped ‘sacred psychoanalysis’.
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