Spirituality vs. Religion

I wanted to post about a struggle I have had for a while. It's the title of this post: Spirituality vs. Religion.

For a long time of my life, I thought you couldn't have spirituality without religion. Maybe to some of you that sounds absurd. Yet that's exactly what I thought up until about two years ago or so.

I was raised as a Lutheran. My mom went to church fairly regularly, but my dad didn't. It's not that he was against religion, he just didn't seem to care. However, my mom thought it best that I attend Sunday school and learn about God.

I did pretty well, and learned a lot of things about God, and Jesus, and the Bible, etc. When I got into 4th grade, it was no longer just Sunday school, but also an hour's worth of class on Thursday nights, too. That's when things started getting serious. At this church you got confirmed at the end of 8th grade, so we began taking tests and having homework, working toward confirmation and becoming (trumpets please) a member of the Church!!

I continued to learn more and more, but I also asked more and more questions. I don't know if any of you have seen the movie 'Contact', but Jodie Foster's character says something similar to what I did in classes, such as asking "where did Mrs. Cain come from"? We were also taught some other things that bothered me, such as when animals die they can't go to heaven because they don't have souls and because they can't understand/believe in God/Jesus. Whether that was true or not, that kinda bugged me.

They were also very eager to teach that other religions are wrong, and that we should pray for their souls since they don't believe the "truth" of Jesus. And I couldn't help but think that if Christianity really was the truth, then why do other religions even exist in the first place?

I was always very interested in science and space, and noticed that I was getting a lot more solid answers out of watching TV shows like Nova and Cosmos than I was getting answers from my church teachers. Plus, so many people I knew in my life were dying all around me that I was getting a sour taste in my mouth about God. I loved these people, why did they have to die???

Around the time I was 12 or 13, I had had enough of too many contradictions and answers along the lines of "because the Bible says so" and friends and relatives dying; I chose to be atheist. But, heh heh, I didn't tell my mother at the time. So I continued to attend classes and used those opportunities to learn even more about the ins and outs of Christianity and it's flaws. Sure there were good moral lessons to be learned, and Jesus said plenty of things that made a lot of sense when you think about them. But when I learned that there are plenty of other philosophies out in the world that said the same thing, I realized Christianity is not 'all that'.

It was a little hard on me after being confirmed. With my mother deciding that I had reached a level of "spiritual maturity", she no longer forced me to go to church. So I never went back, telling her I felt no need to worship God at a church (I was still leaving out the 'I don't believe in God' part -- hey, I was 14). And yes, I got the "after all that schooling you went through" speeches from her, but I never asked for it in the first place... I'm not sure if she was willing to accept that, because one day the pastor from the church showed up unannounced at our door (while my mom was conveniently not home, no less) to talk to me about my reasons for not attending. And I told him the same thing, which technically was the truth -- I didn't see any point in having to go to church in order to worship. If I wanted to worship God, I could do it in my own way, right in my own home.

So what did they do? I got excommunicated. Thanks for being such an understanding and tolerant religion! You don't want to solidify my thinking any further, do you!?

So atheism was the direction I stayed in for many years, up until I got to my mid-twenties, when I realized that my scientific mind was not satisfied that I had made a 100% decision to not believe in God with no true proof. Proof and facts are things that really work for me, man, and here I was saying "There is no God" when I damn well had no proof one way or the other. So I changed my way of thinking and realized I was more agnostic than anything else. I remain agnostic to this day.

Now, the point I'm getting at is this: because of my strong feelings associated with words like 'God', 'Church', 'Jesus', 'Holy Spirit' and 'Spirituality', I just reactively identified all those words with religion. But spirituality really doesn't have to only refer to religion. I didn't get that. I spent most of my life without any kind of idea of what my 'spirituality' was about. I didn't believe in sin, in life after death, in miracles, in blind faith.

But then about two years ago something happened that was too mysterious for me to say "I can explain this". I'm not comfortable getting into the whole story right now (believe me, that would be quite another long long long long post), but it shook me. Not enough to say "God is the answer", because it had nothing to do with God. But it certainly did have to do with life after death. (Note to Lightworkers: I have a brief explanation of what happened on my Lightworkers profile page)

I began to examine what I believed to be my truth. It still doesn't involve religion, but I have come to grasp the idea of "there is so much that we don't understand". I began to look into what the concept of energy is all about. What existence is all about. What the true "spirit" is all about. And I had my eyes opened up to a whole other world out there of people who considered themselves "spiritual" who had no problem spitting all over religion. Some called themselves Metaphysical, some called themselves Lightworkers, some called themselves New Agers. Some called themselves "reformed Chrisitians (or enter other religion here). Some called themselved Human.

I examined all the other philosophies and religions of the world more than I ever had before. I looked into Judaism and it's mystical aspects, Islam and all it's aspects. Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Zen, realizing that those last three were more 'ways of living' rather than 'worshipping a Supreme Being'. I also looked into the "New Age" religions and Wiccan/Pagan religions, as well as those of Native American and Inca/Aztec/Mayan societies. And I realized that rather than ignoring them and shaking my head at them for all these years, I should have been embracing all of them to whatever varying degrees I felt comfortable with. Each one has something to teach us about how to live positively and believing in ourselves to go forging our own lives (granted the eastern philosophies do a better job at that part).

I particulary resonate the most with Taoism. I can't explain it, but as soon as I read the Tao Te Ching...it's words just touched me more than the Old Testament rules ever did.

In fact, I went on a little getaway recently, and I picked up a great book that lists out many of the similar sayings of Buddha, Jesus, Krishna and Lao Tzu. I find it amazing that all these teachings happened in various spots across the world, but all were thought up around the same time (give or take 700 years).

Spirituality to me now means that there are things out there that are beyond my control, and that's OK. Doesn't mean it's divinely guided.

Spirituality to me now means that there are things out there that will always be beyond my knowledge, but to really examine, think, and feel about those things that I do know.

Spirituality to me now means that I can examine my feelings and love them, live them, get lost in them.

Spirituality to me now means that life always balances itself out. The Yin-Yang symbol means so much more to me now.

Spirituality to me now means that sometimes the 'holiest' of my moments can come from something as laughing, or listening to music, rather than being repentent and sorrowful and feeling guilty.

Spirituality to me now means to be fully present in the here and now, rather than dwelling on the past or worrying about the future.

Spirituality to me now means living a moral life, "do unto others as you would have them do unto you", without thinking that I'll burn for eternity for breaking somebody's rules.

Spirituality to me now means that the universe is a much better place when love is the focus. But to also know that love will at times be balanced out with it's opposite -- hate -- whether we want it to or not.

Spirituality to me now means to JUST BE.