The God

The God

Friday, February 9, 2007

Question of the week?

Which is more important....to be religious or to be spiritual?
Posted by at

3 comments:

m said...

I don't think this is an "either or" thing. People can be both religious and spiritual; they can be religious but not spiritual; they can be spiritual and not religious.

I believe spirituality is personal and that religion is communal. People gravitate toward religion for community--to be with others who share their beliefs and values.

February 9, 2007 at 2:13 PM
Greg said...

In the basement of a church, I attended an AA meeting for a class I took on addictions. An AA member gave me the best distinction between religion and spirituality that I’ve ever heard: “They meet upstairs to try and avoid going to hell – that’s religion. We meet down here because we’ve already been there – that’s spirituality!”

I will save you from a forty-mile-long epistle on what I believe to be the differences between religion and spirituality. The main reason being, I haven’t given those two terms enough thought to write something that long. =) Nonetheless, I’ll give my two cents worth.

I don’t think that one is necessarily “more important” than the other. I believe we are all spiritual beings, but not all of us hold to a particular religion. We are all religious about some things in the sense of being dogmatic about or devoted to certain causes. But, not everyone makes personal claims to a religious tradition per se.

Spirituality, to me, is that which connects us, not only to other human beings, but also to the outer interconnectedness of every thing. Even atheists are spiritual beings, spiritually involved in the interconnectedness of all things.

Spirituality is inward. Religion is outward. Religion is an organized establishment. While religion may give a sense of connectedness with other individuals, it is not the innate connection with all things that spirituality gives. Religion is “man made.” Spirituality, as I’ve already pointed out, is innate.

Rabbi Harold Kushner, in his book, “The Lord is My Shepherd,” says, “Religion is our human response to the dual reality of being alive and knowing that we have to die.” Religion is a human attempt to bring about a sense of meaning and purpose out of what otherwise seems to be a pointless existence. Religion can be good. Religion can be evil. (Dr. Charles Kimball has written an excellent book, “When Religion Becomes Evil.”)

Religion often separates humanity into groups of saved and unsaved, loved and lost, we versus them. Spirituality celebrates our diversity, and by our similarities, connects us.

February 9, 2007 at 3:00 PM
SpiritualJourneyMan said...

I can actually agree with parts of both of your comments on this question. However, there is another part to my answer to this question.

Yes...spirituality is personal and yes, everyone is to some extent spiritual. In my humble opinion, it is better to be spiritual than to be religious.

There are those who are both and they are, in general, wonderful people. There are those who are simply spiritual and are, also, wonderful people.

Then there are the others....those people who are religious without being spiritual at all. Oh they claim to be, but they aren't...not really. These are the people who use religion as what it was designed for...political control. Religion, to me, is a creation of man and is used more often than not as a means to control the masses.

Spirituality is a part of us body, mind and spirit! Religion is not.

Spirituality is connectedness to that which is greater than us all. Religion is not.

Spirituality is yearning for and communing with that which we all belong to, whether you call it God, Great Spirit, Goddess, or Universal Energy. Religion is not.

February 13, 2007 at 11:14 AM

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

The Goddess

The Goddess

DECLARATION OF THE FOUR SACRED THINGS

The earth is a living, conscious being. In company with cultures of many different times and places, we name these things as sacred: air, fire, water, and earth.

Whether we see them as the breath, energy, blood, and body of the Mother, or as the blessed gifts of a Creator, or as symbols of the interconnected systems that sustain life, we know that nothing can live without them.

To call these things sacred is to say that they have a value beyond their usefulness for human ends, that they themselves become the standards by which our acts, our economics, our laws and our purposes must be judged. No one has the right to appropriate them or profit from them at the expense of others. Any government that fails to protect them forfeits its legitimacy.

All people, all living things, are part of the earth life, and so are sacred. No one of us stands higher or lower than any other. Only justice can assure balance: only ecological balance can sustain freedom. Only in freedom can that fifth sacred thing we call spirti flourish in its full diversity.

To honor the sacred is to create conditions in which nourishment, sustenance, habitat, knowledge, freedom, and beauty can thrive. To honor the sacred is to make love possible.

To this we dedicate our curiosity, our will, our courage, our silences, and our voices. To this we dedicate our lives.

Taken from The Fifth Sacred Thing by Starhawk