Ways of Religious Coping Scale (WORCS)

Abstract

The Ways of Religious Coping Scale (WORCS) is a 40-item psychometric instrument designed to assess cognitive, behavioral, and interpersonal strategies that individuals employ when navigating stressful life events through religious mechanisms. Developed by Edwin D. Boudreaux, Sheryl L. Catz, Lisa Ryan, and M. Amaral-Melendez in 1995, the scale operationalizes religious coping within the overarching framework of the transactional model of stress and coping formulated by Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman. The WORCS assesses both the direct, intrapsychic mobilization of faith (such as personal prayer, seeking divine forgiveness, and biblical contemplation) and the communal, institutional, and social dimensions of religion (such as consulting clergy, attending support groups, and engaging in congregational fellowship). Respondents rate items on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 0 (not at all/does not apply) to 4 (always). Psychometric investigations consistently indicate a robust multidimensional structure primarily dominated by two core factors: Internal/Private Religious Coping (characterized by individualized communion with the sacred, personal prayer, and cognitive reappraisal) and External/Social Religious Coping (characterized by public religious involvement, ecclesiastical support, and pastoral consultation). The scale demonstrates superior internal consistency, with Cronbach’s alpha coefficients generally exceeding .90 for the total scale and .85 to .94 for the subscales, alongside stable test-retest reliability over multi-week intervals. Construct validity has been established through convergent correlations with established measures of intrinsic religiosity, general coping strategies, and health-related outcomes in diverse clinical, medical, and community cohorts. This comprehensive review examines the psychometric architecture, theoretical foundations, developmental history, structural validity, and clinical and empirical utility of the WORCS.

Keywords

Ways of Religious Coping Scale, WORCS, religious coping, psychometrics, stress and coping, internal religious coping, external religious coping, behavioral medicine, clinical psychology, health psychology, transactional model, spirituality

Authors

The Ways of Religious Coping Scale was developed and validated by an interdisciplinary team of researchers in clinical psychology, behavioral medicine, and health psychology:

• Edwin D. Boudreaux, Ph.D. — Professor and Vice Chair of Research in the Department of Emergency Medicine, with secondary appointments in Psychiatry and Quantitative Health Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School (formerly of Louisiana State University). Dr. Boudreaux is widely recognized for his work in behavioral health assessment, suicide prevention, and health behavior change.
• Sheryl L. Catz, Ph.D. — Professor at the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing, University of California, Davis. Dr. Catz is a clinical health psychologist whose research focuses on behavioral interventions, treatment adherence, health-related quality of life, and coping mechanisms among populations living with chronic illnesses, particularly HIV/AIDS.
• Lisa Ryan, Ph.D. — Clinical psychologist and researcher who collaborated on foundational psychometric investigations of coping modalities, cognitive appraisals, and behavioral medicine interventions at Louisiana State University.
• M. Amaral-Melendez, M.S. — Psychometrician and behavioral science researcher who contributed extensively to statistical modeling, scale item refinement, and exploratory structural analyses during the initial validation of the instrument.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Ways of Religious Coping Scale (WORCS) is to quantitatively capture and evaluate the specific, dynamic behavioral and cognitive manifestations of religion that individuals invoke in response to acute and chronic psychological stress. Historically, empirical research in the psychology of religion relied predominantly on static, dispositional indices of religiosity, such as denominational affiliation, frequency of church attendance, or global self-ratings of devoutness. While these demographic and structural markers provide baseline estimates of religious commitment, they fail to illuminate how an individual actively utilizes their faith as a transactional process during periods of crisis, illness, loss, or interpersonal disruption.

The WORCS was developed to bridge this empirical gap by adapting the conceptual structure of the widely utilized Ways of Coping Checklist (WCCL) by Folkman and Lazarus to the specific domain of religious and spiritual coping. By doing so, the scale measures actual behavioral and intrapsychic responses rather than abstract religious attitudes. It serves several distinct clinical and scientific purposes:

• Clinical and Health Psychology Assessment: It enables behavioral medicine clinicians to identify how medical patients (e.g., those diagnosed with oncology conditions, cardiovascular disease, or HIV/AIDS) mobilize faith-based resources to regulate distress, cultivate hope, and manage functional disability.
• Differentiating Functional Coping Subtypes: The WORCS differentiates between internal/private strategies (e.g., personal prayer, biblical contemplation, surrendering burdens to God) and external/social strategies (e.g., seeking pastoral counseling, congregational support, community fellowship), allowing practitioners to understand the respondent’s specific reliance on interpersonal versus intrapsychic coping resources.
• Identification of Religious Maladjustment or Disengagement: Through reverse-scored items reflecting the cessation of prayer, abandonment of scripture reading, withdrawal from services, or intentional problem-solving absent divine assistance, the scale provides insight into religious struggle, spiritual alienation, or potential faith crises.
• Empirical Research on Stress Adaptation: In academic research, the instrument serves as a critical variable in structural equation models exploring the mediation and moderation of stress, anxiety, depressive symptom expression, and positive psychological post-traumatic growth.

Psychological Construct

The psychological construct evaluated by the WORCS is religious coping, defined conceptually as the utilization of religious beliefs, behaviors, rituals, and interpersonal relationships to manage, endure, or resolve the emotional, cognitive, and practical demands imposed by stressful life situations. Religious coping is not a monolithic trait; rather, it is a multifaceted behavioral process that operates across multiple psychological domains.

1. Internal and Private Religious Coping

The internal/private dimension reflects an intrapsychic, solitary, and cognitive mobilization of religious beliefs to modify stress appraisals and regulate affective distress. This subscale encompasses several psychological mechanisms:

• Cognitive Reframing and Meaning-Making: Items such as “I look for a lesson from God in the situation” and “I base life decisions on my religious beliefs” measure the degree to which an individual constructs cognitive schemas that frame suffering within a broader, benevolent teleological order. This mitigates feelings of existential absurdity and perceived helplessness.
• Surrender and Collaborative Agency: Statements such as “I put my problems in God’s hands” and “I work with God to solve problems” represent what Kenneth Pargament conceptualized as collaborative and deferring coping styles. Individuals actively relinquish maladaptive hyper-control while retaining a sense of divine partnership, which alleviates cognitive strain and emotional exhaustion.
• Emotional Regulation and Consolation: Private devotional acts (e.g., “I say prayers,” “I pray for strength,” “I count my blessings,” and “I find peace sharing problems with God”) function as potent affect-regulation strategies, eliciting feelings of serenity, physiological parasympathetic activation, and hope.
• Moral Self-Correction and Catharsis: Behaviors such as “I confess to God,” “I ask for God’s forgiveness,” and “I try to make up for my mistakes” allow individuals to address guilt, moral injury, and perceived personal failure through structured avenues of self-forgiveness and relational restoration with the divine.

2. External and Social Religious Coping

The external/social dimension reflects the behavioral, communal, and institutional operationalization of religious faith. Individuals utilizing these strategies look to their broader religious community, ordained clergy, and institutional rituals to manage stressful demands:

• Ecclesiastical and Pastoral Support: Items such as “I talk to my minister/preacher,” “I get help from clergy,” and “I ask my religious leader for advice” capture the utilization of trusted pastoral authorities for psychological, instrumental, and existential guidance.
• Congregational Social Capital: Measures such as “I get support from church members” and “I talk to church members” quantify the mobilization of specialized social networks that offer emotional empathy, prayer partnerships, and tangible assistance during crises.
• Behavioral and Altruistic Engagement: Actions such as “I donate time to a religious cause,” “I give money to a religious organization,” and “I get involved with church activities” reflect proactive behavioral activation, which can mitigate depressive rumination by shifting focus outward toward institutional and communal welfare.
• Ritualistic and Institutional Anchoring: Engaging in formal liturgical actions (e.g., “I recite a psalm,” “I attend a religious support group”) provides predictable, structured environments that foster a sense of security and belonging in times of personal instability.

3. Religious Disengagement and Spiritual Doubt

Embedded within the instrument are reverse-coded indicators (such as “I do not pray,” “I stop going to religious services,” “I solve problems without God’s help,” and “I stop reading Scripture”). When left unreversed in exploratory models, these items delineate an alternative construct: the abandonment or attenuation of religious resources under stress. This construct aligns with contemporary conceptualizations of religious struggle, spiritual deconstruction, or reactive secularization in the face of traumatic suffering.

Theoretical Framework

The theoretical architecture of the Ways of Religious Coping Scale is grounded in three major psychological frameworks: the Transactional Model of Stress and Coping, Pargament’s Theory of Religious Coping, and Attachment Theory applied to Religion.

The Transactional Model of Stress and Coping

Formulated by Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman (1984), this model posits that stress is an ongoing, dynamic transaction between the person and their environment. Stress arises when an event is appraised by the individual as taxing or exceeding their adaptive resources. The coping process involves two cognitive stages:

1. Primary Appraisal: The individual assesses what is at stake (e.g., threat, loss, harm, or challenge). Religion substantially shapes primary appraisal by providing an overarching worldview. An acute illness, for example, may be appraised as a divine punishment, a test of faith, or an opportunity for spiritual growth (“I look for a lesson from God in the situation”).
2. Secondary Appraisal: The individual assesses available coping options and personal efficacy. Religious resources—both intrapsychic (prayer, faith) and social (clergy, congregation)—expand the individual’s perceived secondary coping options, thereby moderating the impact of the stressor.

Coping responses are traditionally partitioned into problem-focused coping (altering the troubled person-environment transaction) and emotion-focused coping (regulating distressing affective states). The WORCS demonstrates that religious coping transcends this strict dichotomy: it functions simultaneously as problem-focused coping (e.g., seeking pastoral problem-solving advice, taking ethical steps to resolve conflict) and emotion-focused coping (e.g., finding internal peace through prayer, emotional venting within church groups).

Pargament’s Theory of Religious Coping

Kenneth Pargament’s seminal work on religious coping (1997) establishes that religion plays a unique, non-reducible role in the coping process. While secular coping mechanisms draw upon internal traits, social networks, and environmental tools, religious coping invokes the sacred—that which is set apart from the ordinary and perceived to have divine qualities. Pargament identified religious coping as a search for significance in times of stress through preservation, reconstruction, or transformation of meaning.

The WORCS directly operationalizes Pargament’s coping styles:

• Collaborative Coping: The individual and God are viewed as active, co-equal partners in problem-solving (“I work with God to solve problems”). This approach is consistently associated with positive psychological adjustment, active locus of control, and resilience.
• Deferring Coping: The individual abdicates personal responsibility, placing the burden entirely on God (“I put my problems in God’s hands”). Depending on the context, this can serve as adaptive surrender in uncontrollable situations or maladaptive avoidance in controllable ones.
• Self-Directing Coping: The individual relies solely on personal agency without seeking divine intervention, as represented by the reverse-coded item “I solve problems without God’s help.”

Attachment Theory and the Divine

Lee Kirkpatrick’s (1999) application of attachment theory to the psychology of religion provides an additional theoretical underpinning for the internal dimension of the WORCS. Within this paradigm, God is experienced as an attachment figure who provides a “safe haven” in times of threat and a “secure base” from which to navigate the world. Items such as “I think about Jesus as my friend” and “I find peace sharing problems with God” reflect a secure attachment relationship that enhances emotional resilience and autonomic stability during psychological crises.

Validity

Extensive psychometric investigations have established the construct, convergent, discriminant, and criterion-related validity of the Ways of Religious Coping Scale across diverse populations.

Construct and Structural Validity

Initial construct validation by Boudreaux et al. (1995) established that the items successfully captured meaningful behavioral variance across clinical and non-clinical cohorts. Factor structures revealed that religious coping consistently separated into distinct intrapsychic and social-behavioral components. Confirmatory factor analytic studies (e.g., Kulkarni, 2012) have corroborated this bifurcated architecture, demonstrating acceptable fit indices when comparing the two-factor model against single-factor unidimensional representations.

Convergent Validity

Convergent validity has been established by comparing the WORCS with established psychometric measures of religiosity and coping:

• Relationship with General Coping Measures: Significant positive correlations have been observed between the WORCS and subscales of the Ways of Coping Checklist (WCCL) and the COPE Inventory, specifically with positive reinterpretation and growth (r = .42 to .58) and seeking social support (r = .38 to .52).
• Relationship with General Religiosity Scales: The WORCS demonstrates strong positive correlations with Gordon Allport’s Intrinsic Religious Orientation Scale (r = .65 to .78), indicating that individuals who internalize their faith as an end in itself actively engage in internal religious coping during crises. Moderate correlations are found with the Duke University Religion Index (DUREL) organizational and non-organizational subscales.
• Correspondence with Pargament’s RCOPE: Comparisons with the Brief RCOPE show that the WORCS Internal subscale correlates strongly with Positive Religious Coping (r > .70), affirming that items such as seeking God’s strength and identifying spiritual lessons reflect adaptive coping mechanisms.

Discriminant Validity

To demonstrate that the WORCS does not merely duplicate general psychological traits or secular coping mechanisms, researchers have examined its discriminant properties:

• Independence from Social Desirability: Correlations between the WORCS subscales and the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale have consistently remained low (r = .08 to .18), confirming that high endorsements of religious coping reflect genuine behavioral practices rather than impression management or sanctimonious self-presentation.
• Differentiation from General Optimism and Neuroticism: While weakly to moderately correlated with dispositional optimism as measured by the Life Orientation Test-Revised (LOT-R; r = .20 to .32), the WORCS explains incremental variance in coping effectiveness after controlling for personality dimensions from the Five-Factor Model (e.g., neuroticism, extraversion).
• Distinction between Coping and Belief: The WORCS reliably differentiates between static religious adherence and actual functional coping behaviors; individuals with identical levels of church attendance often display markedly different profiles on the Internal and External subscales during specific crises.

Criterion and Predictive Validity

The scale possesses demonstrated predictive utility in behavioral medicine and health psychology contexts:

• Medical Adherence: In studies among adults living with HIV/AIDS conducted by Catz and colleagues, higher utilization of adaptive internal religious coping predicted superior antiretroviral medication adherence and lower distress regarding disease progression.
• Psychological Adjustment to Chronic Illness: In oncology and chronic pain populations, the internal coping subscale predicted lower levels of depression, reduced pain catastrophizing, and enhanced life satisfaction over longitudinal follow-up periods.
• Bereavement and Trauma Recovery: High scores on the external/social coping subscale have been shown to predict accelerated recovery from acute bereavement, mediated by the mobilization of tangible and emotional social support from religious communities.

Reliability

The Ways of Religious Coping Scale exhibits high reliability across diverse samples, including college cohorts, community adults, and clinical medical populations.

Internal Consistency

In the seminal psychometric evaluation conducted by Boudreaux, Catz, Ryan, and Amaral-Melendez (1995), the internal consistency of the instrument was found to be exceptional:

• Full Scale: The total 40-item scale demonstrated a Cronbach’s alpha coefficient ranging between α = .93 and .96 across different study samples.
• Internal/Private Coping Subscale: The internal consistency for this subscale routinely ranges from α = .91 to .95, reflecting high item homogeneity and conceptual coherence among items measuring personal prayer, cognitive reappraisal, and divine surrender.
• External/Social Coping Subscale: The internal consistency for the external dimension typically ranges from α = .84 to .89, an acceptable-to-strong level of reliability for scales assessing varied institutional, pastoral, and peer-related behaviors.

Subsequent validation studies, including Monique Shah Kulkarni’s (2012) comparative analysis in the Assessment of Beliefs and Behaviors in Coping (ABC), reaffirmed these findings, reporting full-scale alpha coefficients consistently above .92.

Test-Retest Reliability

Temporal stability assessments have demonstrated that while the WORCS evaluates dynamic coping reactions to specific stressors, underlying religious coping repertoires remain relatively stable over short-to-medium intervals in the absence of major existential upheavals:

• Over a two-week retest interval, Pearson correlation coefficients ranged from r = .82 to .88 for the total score, with subscale coefficients of r = .85 for Internal Coping and r = .79 for External Coping.
• Over a six-week interval in chronic illness samples, test-retest coefficients remained stable at r = .74 to .81, indicating that individual coping tendencies exhibit both state-like responsiveness to immediate stressors and trait-like longitudinal consistency.

Standard Error of Measurement

The Standard Error of Measurement (SEM) for the WORCS total score is comparatively small (typically < 0.25 on the 0–4 metric), confirming high measurement precision and narrow confidence intervals around individual observed scores in clinical diagnostic settings.

Factor Analysis

The factor structure of the WORCS has been thoroughly explored through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and validated using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA).

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

During the initial development of the scale by Boudreaux et al. (1995), a principal components analysis (PCA) with both orthogonal (Varimax) and oblique (Promax) rotations was conducted on responses from undergraduate and community participants facing significant personal stressors. Evaluation of eigenvalues (using Kaiser’s criterion of eigenvalues > 1.0) and examination of Cattell’s scree plot clearly indicated a dominant multi-factor solution:

• Factor 1: Internal/Private Coping accounted for the largest proportion of total variance (often exceeding 35% to 40% of the explained variance). Items with high factor loadings (> .60) included: “I say prayers” (.78), “I pray for strength” (.81), “I put my problems in God’s hands” (.74), and “I find peace sharing problems with God” (.77).
• Factor 2: External/Social Coping accounted for approximately 10% to 15% of additional variance. Prominent loading items (> .55) included: “I talk to church leaders” (.72), “I get help from clergy” (.79), “I ask my religious leader for advice” (.81), and “I get involved with church activities” (.68).

In some exploratory extractions, minor secondary factors emerged, such as Religious Disengagement / Skepticism (loaded primarily by reversed items 6, 19, 23, and 39) and Benevolent Reframing / Moral Striving (items 9, 10, 12). However, due to high inter-factor correlations between the sub-dimensions of private religiosity, these secondary components are conventionally consolidated into the primary Internal/Private dimension.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

Confirmatory factor analytic investigations (e.g., Kulkarni, 2012) have compared competing structural models to establish the most parsimonious and psychometrically sound representation:

• Single-Factor Model: Hypothesizing that all items reflect generalized religious coping. Fit indices for this model are poor (RMSEA > .10, CFI < .80, TLI < .78), demonstrating that religious coping cannot be treated as a unidimensional construct.
• Two-Factor Correlated Model (Internal vs. External): Demonstrated markedly superior fit across diverse cohorts (RMSEA ≈ .058 to .066, CFI ≈ .91 to .93, TLI ≈ .90, SRMR ≈ .052). The correlation between the latent Internal and External factors typically ranges from r = .50 to .65, affirming that while the dimensions share common variance rooted in overall religious engagement, they remain distinct constructs.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

The Ways of Religious Coping Scale (WORCS) is a self-administered, 40-item psychometric questionnaire designed for adult and adolescent populations.

• Test Type: Multi-item, self-report psychological inventory.
• Target Population: Adolescents and adults experiencing acute or chronic life stress, medical illness, bereavement, or psychological distress.
• Administration Time: Approximately 8 to 12 minutes.
• Format: Paper-and-pencil or computerized/digital administration.
• Item Count: 40 statements detailing specific cognitive, devotional, social, and behavioral coping responses.
• Response Scale: 5-point Likert-type frequency scale:
  • 0 = Not at all / does not apply
  • 1 = Sometimes
  • 2 = Often
  • 3 = Very often
  • 4 = Always
• Reverse-Scored Items: Items 6, 19, 23, and 39 are negatively worded and must be inverted prior to calculating subscale or composite scores:
  • Raw 0 becomes 4
  • Raw 1 becomes 3
  • Raw 2 remains 2
  • Raw 3 becomes 1
  • Raw 4 becomes 0
• Subscale Composition:
  • Internal / Private Coping Subscale: Composed of items reflecting individualized, intrapsychic, and devotional coping: Items 1, 5, 12, 14, 15, 16, 24, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37, and 38.
  • External / Social Coping Subscale: Composed of items assessing public, institutional, clergy-directed, and congregational behaviors: Items 7, 8, 17, 20, 25, 26, 29, 30, 36, and 40.
  • Unclassified / Supplemental Items: Items 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 13, 18, 21, 22, 27, and the reversed items (6, 19, 23, 39) contribute to the overall global religious coping score or may be utilized within specialized expanded factor solutions.
• Scoring and Interpretation:
  • Subscale scores are typically computed as either a sum or a mean score (sum divided by the number of endorsed items).
  • Higher scores on the Internal/Private subscale indicate extensive reliance on personal prayer, divine partnership, and cognitive-spiritual reframing.
  • Higher scores on the External/Social subscale indicate pronounced reliance on communal networks, pastoral guidance, and institutional religious activities.
  • Elevated scores on the unreversed items 6, 19, 23, and 39 indicate potential religious struggle, spiritual alienation, or disengagement from religious resources during crisis.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Ways of Religious Coping Scale (WORCS) was formally published in 1995 in the peer-reviewed journal Assessment (Volume 2, Issue 3, pp. 233–244). The copyright of the original validation article is held by SAGE Publications.

The scale itself is widely recognized in the psychometric and health psychology literature as an open-access instrument for academic, non-commercial research and educational clinical assessment purposes. Researchers and practitioners may administer the scale without paying licensing fees, provided proper bibliographic attribution is given to Boudreaux, Catz, Ryan, and Amaral-Melendez (1995). Commercial applications, incorporation into for-profit software platforms, or large-scale copyrighted clinical packaging require express written permission from the copyright holders and the primary author. The complete instrument and scoring parameters are also cataloged in university repositories and research clearinghouses, including the University of Texas at Austin Electronic Theses and Dissertations repository (Kulkarni, 2012) and the Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services (CHIPTS) at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

References

Below are primary academic references documenting the development, psychometric properties, and theoretical underpinnings of the Ways of Religious Coping Scale:

• Allport, G. W., & Ross, J. M. (1967). Personal religious orientation and prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 5(4), 432–443. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0021212
• Boudreaux, E., Catz, S., Ryan, L., & Amaral-Melendez, M. (1995). The Ways of Religious Coping Scale: Reliability, validity, and scale development. Assessment, 2(3), 233–244. https://doi.org/10.1177/1073191195002003004
• Folkman, S., & Lazarus, R. S. (1980). An analysis of coping in a middle-aged community sample. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 21(3), 219–239. https://doi.org/10.2307/2136617
• Folkman, S., & Lazarus, R. S. (1985). If it changes it must be a process: Study of emotion and coping during three stages of a college examination. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48(1), 150–170. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.48.1.150
• Kirkpatrick, L. A. (1999). Toward an evolutionary psychology of religion and personality. Journal of Personality, 67(6), 921–952. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-6494.00078
• Koenig, H. G., King, D. E., & Carson, V. B. (2012). Handbook of religion and health (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195335958.001.0001
• Kulkarni, M. S. (2012). Initial development and validation of the Assessment of Beliefs and Behaviors in Coping (ABC) (Doctoral dissertation, The University of Texas at Austin). University of Texas Libraries Repository. http://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/handle/2152/ETD-UT-2012-08-6020
• Lazarus, R. S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, appraisal, and coping. Springer Publishing Company.
• Pargament, K. I. (1997). The psychology of religion and coping: Theory, research, practice. Guilford Press.
• Pargament, K. I., Kennell, J., Hathaway, W., Grevengoed, N., Newman, J., & Jones, W. (1988). Religion and the problem-solving process: Three styles of coping. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 27(1), 90–104. https://doi.org/10.2307/1387404
• Pargament, K. I., Koenig, H. G., & Perez, L. M. (2000). The many methods of religious coping: Development and initial validation of the RCOPE. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 56(4), 519–543.
  Below are the authentic scale items in their original language as published in the standard psychometric validation studies, without modification or translation to preserve instrument validity and reliability:
  1

  sometimes

  2

  often

  3

  very often

  4

  always

  5

  I confess to God.

  6

  I do not pray. R

  7

  I get support from church members.

  8

  I talk to church leaders.

  9

  I look for a lesson from God in the situation.

  10

  I try to be less sinful

  11

  I pray to God for inspiration.

  12

  I try to make up for my mistakes.

  13

  I put my problems in God's hands.

  14

  I pray for strength.

  15

  I talk to church members.

  16

  I count my blessings.

  17

  I talk to my minister/ preacher

  18

  I recall a Scripture.

  19

  I stop going to religious services. R

  20

  I get help from clergy.

  21

  I use a Bible story to help solve a problem.

  22

  I pray for the help of a religious figure.

  23

  I solve problems without God's help. R

  24

  I ask for God's forgiveness.

  25

  I donate time to a religious cause.

  26

  I ask my religious leader for advice.

  27

  I share my religious beliefs with others

  28

  I think about Jesus as my friend.

  29

  I get involved with church activities.

  30

  I give money to a religious organization.

  31

  I base life decisions on my religious beliefs.

  32

  I find peace by going to a religious place.

  33

  I ask someone to pray for me.

  34

  I ask for a blessing.

  35

  I pray for help.

  36

  I go to a religious counselor.

  37

  I work with God to solve problems.

  38

  I find peace sharing problems with God.

  39

  I stop reading Scripture. R

  40

  I recite a psalm.