Paradigm of Unity as a Prospect for Research and Treatment in Psychology

In: Journal for Perspectives of Economic Political and Social Integration, Band 19, Heft 1-2, S. 207-227

Abstract

Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to show the methodological power and potentiality of the concept paradigm of unity introduced originally in the ceremony on the occasion of honoring Chiara Lubich with the doctor honoris causa title by the Catholic University of Lublin in 1996. Originally this conception was used to suggest the societal activity of Chiara Lubich in building, via the Focolari movement, psychosocial infrastructures for unity in various social domains, (for example in the economy of communion, in politics (politicians for unity project), in public media (journalists for unity), in ecumenism and inter-religious contacts (ecumenical and inter-religion Focolari Centers) This conception is a kind of a great inspiration (a kind of Copernican revolution in the social sciences) which would motivate the social sciences to build their own research paradigm of a type of mental and methodological power and potentiality which could give a new vision of social world (as Copernicus did in natural sciences (Biela, 1996, 2006)). Thomas Kuhn (1962) regarded the Copernician revolution as the one which, in the history of science, best illustrates the nature of scientific revolution. The essence of paradigm in a Kuhnian sense is a mentality change in its nature. Copernicus had to change the well-established geocentric system which functioned not only in the science of his day but also in culture, tradition, social perception, and even in the mentality of religious and political authorities. And he did it in a well prepared empirical, methodological and psychological way.
In a similar way Chiara Lubich created by her social acting a revolutionary inspiration for building paradigm in social science She decided in an extremely difficult and risky situation in 1944 in Trento not only to escape from her own life emergency but she with her friends made a decision to help other people who were in a much more difficult situation to survive. She decided to take a war bombing risk to be with lost children and older people who were in need. It was a practical building of the unity with the real people who were in need. This kind of experience rediscovered the community as a model for the real life and made a concretization and clarification of the charisma of the unity. However, the development of this charisma shows that it is simply a concrete and practical actualization of the new vision of social, economic, political and religious relationships which advises, recommends, suggests, and promotes the unity with others persons (Lubich, 2007).