This paper explores the concept that the experience of growth may be structurally similar to the emotional experience of religion and hope. It develops this view by focusing on two studies that involve a series of coping and outcome variables, together with analysis of Park, Cohen, and Murch's (1997) instrument on stress related to personal growth. One study involved parents who lost a child of their own due to an accident or incurable illness, and the second, involved a questionnaire study with spinal cord injured persons. The findings strongly support the view that non-normative life-events may lead to a more coherent worldview, a view that might be more tolerant, more human, and more open to new thoughts. Evidence was found linking the experience of personal growth with involvement in social activity and it also found positive relationships with the variables of distress. It concludes that persons whose lives seem to be meaningful might have a good capacity to link together even detrimental events and still hold a strong sense of coherence. (Contains 16 references.) (JDM)