I'm Spiritual But Not Religious - And Fooling Myself

Are you Spiritual but not Religious?   Here’s why you are an idiot . . .

Why “Religion” is a good word that we need to defend.

By: Msgr. Charles Pope

It is “chic” and, I would add, a “cliche” to hear many people say today, “I am spiritual but not religious.” There is a kind of self-congratulatory tone that often goes with this self description as well, and certainly a lot of cultural approval in the secular West for such dissociative talk.

There is even some acceptance of this notion among more theologically conservative evangelicals who, on account of their “low ecclesiology” also favor a kind decentralized and highly personal notion of faith, and entertain a kind of cynicism to “organized religion.”

The Washington Post had a column on the “spiritual but not religious” phenomenon this past Saturday by Michelle Boorstein entitled simply Religion. I would like to present a few excerpts and then discuss why I think we should not only retain the words “religion” and “religious,” but also be suitably proud of them.

First, a few excerpts from the article, along with a few very brief comment by me in plain red text. The full article is HERE.

We’re no longer “religious.” We’re “holy.” We’re “faithful.” We’re “spiritual.”….Diana Butler Bass, author of last year’s “Christianity After Religion,” who says the word “religion” is laden with negative, hurtful and political baggage. (Perhaps, but so is everything: Government, schools, medicine, science, etc. It would seem this is not unique to “religion” but is the human condition).

The 20 percent of Americans who now call themselves unaffiliated with any religious group see religion as much too focused on rules….(but rules and accepted practices are part of life. I wonder if these same Americans would be so pleased if their dentist or doctor threw rules, protocol or accepted medical practice to the winds? There is a place for “rules” that enshrine the collective wisdom of the ages!) 

On the other side are people such as super-popular shock pastor and writer Mark Driscoll, an evangelical conservative whose sermons have such titles as “Why I hate religion.” He preaches that the institutional church has wrongly let people feel good about themselves for their actions (such as going to worship services) instead of what they believe (which should be the Bible’s literal truth, in his view)….(Yes, here is the “dark side” of  evangelical Christianity and its “americaninst” designer-church mentality. At the end of the day, its extreme form is little different from any other modern deconstructionist, iconoclastic, existentialist, and nihilistic movement. The thinking is “away with anything I don’t like, away with anything that limits me in any way with “rules” that look to balance my little vision with the bigger picture. Away with anything I don’t like or think limits me from being…me”).

Polling shows that young Americans are considerably less apt to have religious affiliations than earlier generations were at the same age. (OK, but polls reflect what is, not what ought to be, or what is correct). They attend religious services less often, and fewer of them say religion is important in their lives. (OK, we have work to do! But that doesn’t make us wrong). But more than nine in 10 people believe in God, according to a recent Gallup poll, a statistic unchanged for decades….(but at some point we must ask if this means anything at all. It is good that they are not outright atheists, but sometimes indifference is a worse enemy than hatred). People are walking away from institutional expressions of church. They’re trying to renegotiate man’s relationship to God,” said David Kinnaman, president of the Barna Group, a major research firm on religion….Now more and more people look to their conscience, however it’s formed, to decide for themselves.” (more on this attitude below). Although some reject the word “religion,” others simply ignore it.

Read the entire article @ http://blog.adw.org/2013/07/why-religion-is-a-good-word-that-we-need-to-defend/