Back to the Basics in Attachment to God: Revisiting Theory in Light of Theology

112 Attachment theory is a powerful account of the formation of relational bonds that provide for physical survival and psychological security throughout the lifespan. It integrates findings from ethology, and from biological, psychodynamic, and cognitive-affective theories in psychology. Analyses of attachment bonds between infants and caregivers have been extended to attachments between romantic partners and other adult relationships. Work by Kirkpatrick and colleagues from the 1990s (Kirkpatrick 1992, 1994, 1995, 1997a, 1997b, 1998, 1999a, 1999b; Kirkpatrick & Shaver, 1990, 1992; Rowatt & Kirkpatrick, 2002) extended the scope of attachment analyses to the relationship between a believer and God. They argued God is a perfect attachment figure for believers, and that behaviours of believers with respect to God at times of crisis or distress could be viewed as attachment behaviours. This was an important new direction in the psychology of religion. Nonetheless, their theory is limited because it relies on cognitiveaffective approaches to attachment, and neglects a fully-developed theological basis. Todd Hall (2004) more recently presented a relational theory of attachments (including attachment to God), labelled the implicit relational representational theory. It represents a careful synthesis of attachment, contemporary psychoanalytic and emotional information processing theories. However, neither the cognitive nor the relational theories of attachment to God refer to a clearly articulated theological framework. A theological framework is particularly important if psychology is to interact with any confessional theological position, one which assumes the existence of, and revealed nature of, God. This article examines the consequences of such a deficiency, proposes one alternative approach by outlining a corrective grounding in trinitarian theology, and sketches some implications of trinitarian theology for understanding attachment to God.