Should We Reject Religion as Outdated?

There is a movement among Christians to reject "religion" in favor of being "spiritual" instead. Adherents to this theology do not seem to like going to church, listening to preachers or taking the Bible literally as the Word of God. This troubles me. We've been warned against spiritualism in Scripture and from the pulpits of Christendom. Unlike my spiritual friends, I am content to accept the Word as my guide and to wait till eternity until God offers me explanations of how everything works,

 before I cast aside religion altogether. Discovering the things we have not been shown yet, should keep me thoroughly entertained for millions of years. God's penmen could only tell us what they saw, what they experienced and what they understood in their walk with Him on Earth, when they wrote all that down. Sadly, we see through a glass darkly. I have found that it takes knowing God in His completeness to find one's way to the truth.

 

I'd be very careful about tossing out all the parts of Christian "religion", including the organized bits, that may not suit our modern clothes. Some ideas could stand to go. For instance, a lot of people stubbornly cling to the idea that God punishes dead folk by chicken frying them for eternity. The thing is Scripture doesn't actually teach that. It was a handy way to keep people afraid and in the pews with their purses opened. That Satan introduced such evil ideas doesn't void all organized religion. Paul warned about that. He says we should meet and work together even more so as we see the end approaching. And if you aren't seeing the signs on the evening news, you're not paying attention.

And if you actually come to know God experientially, you'd know He's not a Hitler or Stalin or Caligula to inflict unfathomable cruelty on creatures He6 lov, and it very specifically teaches that the human soul is not by nature immortal (John 3:16). God truly IS love and knowing that, you'll soon come to realize and recognize what some branches of the church and some churchmen who claim they have spoken for and still speak for God, take his name in vain (a severe violation of a commandment with some pretty harsh consequences).

 

In my study of psychology in grad school, I recognized many of the therapeutic tools we were taught to use were, in fact, the same sorts of things Christ and the apostles built into the church as a way of altering human bad behavior - prayer, praise, study and sharing what we learned from the other four. Turns out, Jesus knew how the human mind works and built things into His church that would help us change our behavior (what we Adventists call sanctification). We get close to emulating religious training with the behavioral/reality therapy techniques psychologists and counselors use. Seems Jesus understood how the human mind works.

 

We're just now catching up and seeing the edges of God's amazingly detailed creation. The sciences, when freed of politics, have begun to see evidence of God as Moses did. Not fully His face, but His "back parts" - the footprints of deity. Physicists, biologists, astronomers and mathematicians have recently begun to discover answers to questions they never thought to ask because they dismissed the idea of a God altogether from the very beginning. Too many approached science by first rejecting the idea of a pan-dimensional being with vast power because of what He is; one described as the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end all at once. That was a pretty scientifically advanced idea for a former fisherman, traveling self-educated preacher, and prisoner of Rome living out on an island in the sea to have come up with all on his own. The remarkable thing is that the Bible we've got is flexible enough to guide everyone from the poor, the uneducated and simple folk to some of the most brilliant intellectuals of our time.

So, we probably should be very careful about rejection "religion" in its entirety and making it a dirty word. Much of the greatest good in history has come from the exercise of Christian religion, from ending the tossing of infants into the fires of Molech and Baal, the forced prostitution in Dagon's temples, the massive human sacrifices of the Aztecs, Mayans and Incans, and the scourge of slavery that persisted for far too long in Earth's history.

Tossing out the religious baby with the truly evil bath of some of the worst cultures in history, could set us back centuries. Already we've sacrificed more than 50 million unborn infants in the past half century or so. Humans have committed genocide on an unbelievable scale and seem to throw a new war every few years with result death and carnage. Does anyone believe it's going to get better if we end Christian organized religion in favor of searching for truth within our own screwed up heads. 

Me, I'm going to seek enlightenment from my creator. Looking around at humans, I don't think I'm going to find truth and goodness in the unconverted human heart. I think that comes from Someone outside ourselves and navel-gazing isn't going to find it.

(C) 2024 by Tom King

 

 

Deepak Chopra is Full of It!

According to Deepak Chopra, "Religion is belief in someone else's experience. Spirituality is having your own." Chopra, in my opinion, is full of crap. Let's go to the dictionary.

A "religion" is a system of belief shared by either a group of people or professed by an individual. This system of belief informs ones actions and behaviors. A religion may be practiced as part of an organized church or association of practitioners. It may feature a belief in a deity, but it does not have to. Atheism, for instance, could be said to be one's "religion".

The term "spirituality" on the other hand, lacks a definitive definition that everyone accepts. Social scientists call spirituality "the search for the sacred" which pretty much means anything you want it to mean. In practice, spirituality generally is treated as a vague feeling of some nebulous connection to some higher spiritual plane by those who claim to be spiritual.

Look, I can buy spirituality as the "search for the sacred", if it results in your actually finding something sacred to believe in. If on the other hand, spirituality is a catch-all term for "believing God, if he happens to exist, approves of pretty much anything you do and most likely won't extinguish you from the university by refusing to prolong your wishy-washy life any longer than the usual threescore and ten, then I don't find being "spiritual" of any practical use.

Every person primarily sees himself or herself as one who serves or one who is served. We either see our primary duty as either to give to the world or to take from the world. The servant, who follows a religion, serves his beliefs whether it be the Golden Rule or the Ten Commandments or whatever tenets his faith offers him as guidance for his life. One who is merely spiritual may drift with whatever winds blow down from above or below as the case may be. Because he has not tenets to his faith, the so-called "spiritual" man may, as Chopra puts it, create his own beliefs from whatever handy materials that suit his own inclinations.

The spiritual man has the luxury of believing whatever is convenient and rejecting anything that doesn't make him "feel" that vaguely self-satisfied emotion that seems to be a primary feature of being "spiritual".  We are in the midst of a paradigm shift where things related to the spiritual life are concerned. We seem to be moving away from a belief that one's spiritual life should be based on reasoned principals which shape our actions and behaviors accordingly. What is being offered instead is a spiritual life based upon, not reason and principal, but upon feelings and opinions  created by our own actions and behaviors, prejudices and personal comfort.

One way, the spiritual life derives from God's guidance. The other way, the spiritual life derives from ourselves and what feels right to us as though we were the god, providing ourselves with guidance. That's pretty much what Chopra says in the quote I led with.

The world is being turned upside down. Soon those whose religion comes from God rather than from themselves, may fall off the planet. I suspect the Second Coming will be timed to catch them.

© 2014 by Tom King

Are You Spiritual or Religious?

When someone asks that question, they're usually of the opinion that being "Spiritual" is superior to being "Religious".  The actual difference between the two terms is largely dependent on how you define the two words. When someone says, "I'm spiritual rather than religious" they usually mean, "I don't like going to church - I find it too restrictive and if I say I'm spiritual I can take the moral high ground and not feel guilty for skipping services." Another of my favorites is, "I worship God in my head, not in a pew." It's very convenient to keep God in your head where no one can tell whether you are acting consistently with your 'spiritual' beliefs. That way you can change them if being consistent with your beliefs gets uncomfortable in any way. Being spiritual may be a religion of convenience and shifting values, but it's still a religion nonetheless.

According to Webster, religion is simply a set of beliefs or a belief system, if you will. Although the term "religion" usually applies to a system of worship of a supernatural being, it can apply to any organized or even disorganized system of beliefs. Technically atheism is a religion.  The twisted belief system of the KKK is religion at its worst. I've known soldiers whose military training left them with beliefs that were every bit as set in psychological stone as that of any religion going.

We all have a religion whether we want to or not. Even the determination not to have a "religion" is in itself the type of belief system that could be thought to constitute a religion. This makes militant atheists froth at the mouth when I say it, because it interferes with their efforts to cast "religion" as a pejorative term and to use it as the universal bugbear and the cause or all war and strife, conveniently ignoring the fact that it was completely nonreligious avowed atheists who were responsible for hundreds of millions of murders in the 20th century. Ultimately, the either/or choice with respect to being either spiritual or religious is a false choice. Any belief system can start wars or commit genocide including atheism or any other ism, if that is going to be your criteria for what constitutes a religion.

Spiritual people have a religion whether they like it or not, however loosey goosey it may be. A denomination is not strictly a religion. It's an organization with a set of religious beliefsn. You may dislike the organization. You may dislike the organization's set of beliefs (it's religion), but don't confuse the building and it's staff with the belief set any more than you'd confuse the United States with the doofuses that go to Washington DC to try and run things.

Beliefs act as a constant; a measuring stick if you will. The behavior of the denomination or individual church can be measured more or less against those beliefs. The misbehavior of the organization says nothing about the beliefs as to whether they are true or consistent. The blame for organizational misbehavior rests at the door of the individuals who claim the leadership or who are part of the membership who support the misbehavior.

There may be problems within any organization without its making the belief system invalid.  People are people, truth is truth. For those of you, for instance, who have left my church and claim to have gained peace and joy and all that good stuff without us, I have to wonder why you still seem so angry with the church you left and feel the need to trash us with such vehemence. We did not hold you in the church. We let you go with a free heart. Of course, we feel your decision was wrong. Of course, we aren't supportive of your new lifestyle where that lifestyle includes things we think are wrong. If you require us to approve of things we cannot approve of, you are going to be disappointed. We can love and accept you and still disagree with your behavior.

Here's where people who are "ex" anything always get their shorts in a bunch. They reject a belief system, almost always with some animosity, and then want those they left behind to either join them in rejecting their former religion or at least to violate our own consciences in some way in order to show we approve of their choice.

You people ask the impossible. Go with God. We think you made a mistake, sure. But then, don't you think we are wrong too?  For instance, my church believes the end of time is approaching and Christ will come soon. If you don't withdraw yourself from "the world", we believe it will take you down with it.  If you don't believe that, well and good. We'll see how it turns out for all of us. Till then, there's no need to snipe at one another. And by the way, you're welcome back whenever you feel the urge to hang with old friends. Just don't come into our house to trash it. We don't do that to you.  If someone from my church does persecute you, just let me know and I'll chastise them about it for you. God is the great judge, not us. That's as it ought to be.

Yours in Christ,

Tom King
A spiritual religious person
© 2013