CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE INVENTORY

Abstract

The Christian Experience Inventory (CEI) is a brief, 24-item psychological scale developed by M. G. Alter (1986, 1994) designed to measure the subjective and ongoing experience of believing adults regarding their relationship with God as a Person. The CEI assesses the daily “inner” reality of being in a divinely initiated, interactive relationship and how this influences an individual’s attitudes and values. The scale is grounded in the author’s three-stage model of religious development and yields scores across five distinct subscales: Growth in Faith, Trust in God, Cost of Faith, Concern for Others, and Justification by Faith.

Religious development, according to this model, is a conscious, multifaceted choice leading to a personal commitment to interact with God, thereby influencing one’s values concerning self, others, and the divine. The CEI aims to describe and measure this observable human component of Christian experience.

Keywords

Christian Experience Inventory, CEI, religious experience, Christian maturity, spirituality, religious development, psychological assessment, Alter, faith, justification.

Authors

M. G. Alter

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Christian Experience Inventory (CEI) is to provide a standardized method for assessing the psychological dimensions of Christian faith as experienced by adults. It specifically aims to measure the quality and intensity of a participant’s ongoing, interactive relationship with God, viewing this relationship as a central driver of spiritual and moral development (Alter, 1989).

The scale’s structure allows for the quantification of five key areas of spiritual life, enabling researchers and pastoral professionals to determine a participant’s level of experience—categorized as “modest,” “medium,” or “strong”—within these specific domains. This detailed measurement provides insight into the practical implications of faith commitment on a person’s daily life, attitudes, and values.

Construct

The CEI measures the construct of Christian religious maturity, understood as the daily, interactive experience of a relationship with God as a Person. This construct is based on the assumption that religious development is a transformative process facilitated by conscious commitment and interaction with the divine, rather than merely a chronological progression.

The measurement is operationalized through five core dimensions identified via factor analysis, which are hypothesized to contribute fundamentally to the experience of an ongoing relationship with God:

• Experience of Growth in Faith
• Experience of Trust in God
• Experience of Cost of Faith
• Experience of Concern for Others
• Experience of Justification by Faith

The scale attempts to quantify the resulting values orientation and moral development rooted in this foundational spiritual relationship.

Validity

Validity evidence for the CEI was established by seeking expert opinion on criterion groups related to religious maturity. The author consulted seven religious professionals (both Catholic and Protestant) who were actively engaged in facilitating faith growth in others. These professionals administered the CEI and were asked to classify their respondents into categories of religious maturity: “beginning,” “intermediate,” or “advanced.”

The response patterns from these criterion groups were compared against those obtained from a sample of seminarians and two church groups. Although specific statistical findings were not reported in detail, the author concluded that higher scores on the CEI subscales—particularly Growth in Faith, Trust in God, and Concern for Others—correlated positively with the experts’ designations of higher levels of Christian maturity, providing preliminary evidence of the scale’s construct validity.

Reliability

The stability of the CEI scores was evaluated using test-retest reliability methods. Data was collected from a combined sample of 20 volunteers from an Oakland church and 17 seminarians, with retest intervals ranging from two weeks to three months.

The reliability coefficients, calculated using Pearson product moment correlations, demonstrated varying but generally acceptable levels of stability across the five subscales. Coefficients ranged from .66 for the Justification by Faith subscale to a strong .91 for the Trust in God subscale. These results suggest that scores on the CEI, particularly the Trust in God subscale, are stable over short to moderate time periods.

Factor Analysis

The final 24-item CEI was derived from an original pool of 106 faith statements, with the reduction and organization into five subscales determined through factor analysis. This procedure grouped items that loaded significantly together, leading to the five conceptually distinct factors representing various aspects of the experience of an ongoing relationship with God.

The item distribution across the five factors is:

• Experience of Growth in Faith: Items 2, 5, 7, 11, 12, 22.
• Experience of Trust in God: Items 8, 9, 13, 15, 17, 18.
• Experience of Cost of Faith: Items 4, 10, 20, 23.
• Experience of Concern for Others: Items 6, 16, 19, 21, 24.
• Experience of Justification by Faith: Items 1, 3, 14.

It is important to note that while the factor analysis established the structure for the initial set of items, three “action statements” were later appended to the inventory without subsequent statistical validation. Furthermore, the limited number of items loading onto certain factors (e.g., Justification by Faith has only three items) suggests that interpretation of scores at the individual subscale level should remain tentative.

Instrument

Test Type: Self-report psychological inventory designed to measure Christian experience.

Format: 24 items scored on a 4-point Likert scale, where 3 points correspond to “very much like me” and 0 points correspond to “definitely not like me.”

Language Available: English.

Population Group: Believing adults within Christian traditions (primarily mainstream Protestant and Roman Catholic traditions).

Age Group: Adults (no specific age range provided, but used with church members and seminarians).

Population Details: The normative sample comprised 125 voluntary respondents primarily from two large Presbyterian churches in California. The sample was highly educated, with the majority holding college or graduate-level degrees.

Test Methodology: The CEI is a pencil-and-paper inventory that requires minimal administration skill. It is quickly completed, usually within 10 to 15 minutes, and is suitable for use with individuals, groups, or entire congregations. The language is explicitly religious, which the author notes may limit its applicability across certain theological spectrums.

Keywords

Christian maturity, faith measurement, religious experience, M. G. Alter, psychological scale, pastoral psychology, religious commitment, spiritual assessment, Likert scale.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Not provided in source content.

Affiliation Email addresses: Not provided in source content.

Correspondence Address: Directions for scoring and interpretation are available directly from the author, M. G. Alter, though a current correspondence address is not specified in the source material.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The scale itself is not explicitly published within the primary academic articles (Alter, 1986; Alter, 1989). Interested parties must contact the author, M. G. Alter, to obtain the instrument, scoring instructions, and necessary permissions for use. The foundational theoretical work was published in 1986, marking the approximate test year, with subsequent empirical validation published in 1989.

Reference’s

Alter, M.G. (1986). A phenomenology of Christian religious maturity. Pastoral Psychology, 34, 151-160.

Alter, M.G. (1989). An empirical study of Christian religious maturity: Its implications for parish ministry. Pastoral Psychology, 37, 153-160.

Alter, M.G. (1994). Resurrection psychology: An understanding of human personality based on the life and teachings of Jesus. Chicago: Loyola University Press.

Muse, J.S., Estadt, B.K., Greer, J.M., & Cheston, S. (1994). Are religiously integrated therapists more empathic? The Journal of Pastoral Care, 48, 14-23.

Items of the CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE INVENTORY

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

The following items are designed to help us understand how people experience faith in their lives. The statements vary widely, and not all will apply to you and to your experience. Some may even feel offensive to you. That is expected. Simply mark them as seems correct for your experience of faith and continue on. Please answer spontaneously without pausing to ponder any one item. Most participants report that the questions took them about 10 to 15 minutes to complete.

In the blank to the left of each statement, circle 3 if the statement is very much like you and your experience; circle 2 if the statement is somewhat like you and your experience; circle l if the statement is not much like you and your experience; circle O if the statement is definitely not like you and your experience.

1. 3-2-1–0 l. My imperfections don’t bother me as much as they used to because God’s acceptance of me is more important even though it’s hard to accept.
2. 3-2-1–0 2. I’ve found again and again that when I live in the Spirit of the Gospels prob­lems don’t overwhelm me and life is meaningful.
3. 3-2-1–0 3. I am realizing that I have areas of “light and darkness,” or good and evil, in my life, but God’s transforming power is of greater importance.
4. 3-2-1-0 4. I feel that I am doing something wrong in my prayer life when I can’t feel God’s closeness.
5. 3-2-1-0 5. The goodness imdmercy of God have begun to come alive for me.
6. 3-2-1-0 6. If I take Jesus’ teachings seriously, it makes good sense to feel concern for flood and disaster victims.
7. 3-2-1-0 7. It seems that the Spirit of God pushes me into new cycles of learning and growth.
8. 3-2-1-0 8. In my relationship with God, I sometimes feel like talking a lot and some­ times very little, but I always know God is there.
9. 3-2-1-0 9. I sense that God has always been in my life.
10. 3-2-1-0 I0. Because of my commitment to God, I am sometimes called to say hard things in spite of my reluctance.
11. 3-2-1-0 11. I feel I know or will know what God wants our relationship to become.
12. 3-2-1-0 12. I am learning to trust my ongoing relationship with God.
13. 3-2-1-0 13. Even amid confusion and turmoil I find comfortable peacefulness in God’s love.
14. 3-2-1-0 14. The Christian understanding that I will never be perfect is a relief.
15. 3-2-1-0 15. I have no doubt that I continue to be held in God’s hand.
16. 3-2-1-0 16. My faith leads me to an active concern for people and for the whole living world.
17. 3-2-1-0 17. In times of greatest distress, I am most deeply aware of God’s faithfulness.
18. 3-2,—-1-0 18. Whatever happens, I will find that the Spirit of God moves in my life.
19. 3-2-1-0 19. To be serious about Christian values means that I take an active interest in justice for all people.
20. 3-2-1-0 20. I feel troubled when I realize how much I participate in a sinful society.
21. 3-2-1-0 21. My Christian faith pervades my entire life.
22. 3-2-1-0 22. Within the past two years, I have taken a class or workshop or participated in some other activity which directly influences my faith development.
23. 3-2-1-0 23. Within the past year I have felt it necessary to speak out on some issue be­ cause of my faith.
24. 3-2-1-0 24. Because of my faith, I participate practically, financially, politically or prayerfully in helping people less fortunate than I am.