The increasingly common refrain that “I’m spiritual, but not religious,” represents some of the most retrogressive aspects of contemporary society. The spiritual but not religious “movement” – an inappropriate term as that would suggest some collective, organizational aspect – highlights the implosion of belief that has struck at the heart of Western society.
Spiritual but not religious people are especially prevalent in the younger population in the United States, although a recent study has argued that it is not so much that people have stopped believing in God, but rather have drifted from formal institutions.
And remember a spiritual person is not necessarily a Christian spiritual person. Heck, you could worship tree spirits and be spiritual.
I was recently appointed as chaplain for a large shooting club and the president of the club informed me she was spiritual but not religious. When I asked her what that meant, she mumbled something like trying to be good to people and follow God. She seemed sincere but I had no sense she cared about her personal salvation; everything seemed focused on the here and now. Jesus Christ did not seem to be in her vocabulary.
There is an echo here from the Gnostic idea that matter is bad and spirit is good. Hence all spirituality is good. This is a denial of the existence of evil and a dangerous idea.
I sometimes joke that I’m religious but not spiritual. 😎
The question is worth discussing, but this is a truly poor piece of writing, filled with logical fallacies, reductive thinking and reasoning so foggy it reads like satire. To wit:
“Theirs is a world of fence-sitting, not-knowingess, but not-trying-ness either. Take a stand, I say. Which one is it? A belief in God and Scripture or a commitment to the Enlightenment ideal of human-based knowledge, reason and action? Being spiritual but not religious avoids having to think too hard about having to decide.”
The author lives in a strange world, where there are only two choices, and the choices are “a belief in God” or “a commitment to the Enlightenment ideal of human-based knowledge, reason and action.”
Pick one, I guess.
The issue of “spiritual but not religious” does not turn on a yes/no response to the question “do you believe in God?” It is the definition of “God” where the rubber meets the road.
As to “Enlightenment ideal of human-based knowledge, reason and action” it dos not appear this writer knows much about the Enlightenment. If he did, he’d see how much capital-E Enlightenment effort was focused on reconciling the seemingly contradictory impulses of belief in God and “human reason.”
#5 — good points.
Frankly, I’m surprised that many people would want to identify as ”religious” considering all of the notoriously bad behavior that self-described religious people are engaging in around the world. I probably fit the definition but wouldn’t describe myself thusly. The word is tinged with what could be arrogance. Rather, I’d hope I could self-describe as faithful.