Love and Spirituality

Do not hasten in your spirit to be angry, for anger rests in the bosom of fools. –Ecclesiastes 7:9

For what man knows the things of a man except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. -1 Corinthians 2:11-13

All human attempts to explain God are inadequate, and can even distort our priorities, confuse our thinking, and flatten our understanding of the spiritual life. God’s truth, we must rely on God’s power rather than man’s wisdom. -1 Corinthians 2:5

When you do a charitable deed, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, that your...deed may be in secret. –Matthew 6:3-4   “May our gifts be sacrificial, from our hearts, and full of love; Secretive and never showy, Pleasing our great God above. –Sper

Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another. –Galatians 5:26   “Think not alone of outward form; its beauty will depart; But cultivate the Spirit’s fruits, that grow within the heart. –D. De Haan

"We sometimes find when we look at Bible stories that people think they know what they say. When we look more closely we sometimes find that the text is ambivalent." Ambivalent? Unbelievably, homosexuality in Sodom and Gomorrah may not have been the sin which brought God's judgment.. the greatest sin of the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah may have been their lack of hospitality towards guests visiting their city, and not sexual deviance (never mind the mob of queers about to break down lot's front door and rape the guests - Genesis 19:4-9). We have to remember the Hebrews were a nomad people in a dry, hostile environment. Weather and suspicious neighbors made hospitality a matter of survival. Being welcomed in a stranger's home or tent could mean the difference between life and death. The crime was pride. And it was inhospitality.

Unfortunately Church tradition of today has bought into these twisting of scripture and ignores true biblical research to find the truths of scripture. But many Christians and ministers just think they know it all and many are totally unaware of the background of some of their false teachings. This is the true abomination...all the hurt caused by the lies and false teaching instead of loving people just as God created them, regardless of their natural sexual orientation. It is very clear there is no choice in sexual orientation and the terrible hurt and failure of the "change-em" ministries is full of evidence how impossible and harmful trying to change ones God given sexual orientation can be. But ignorance prevails and the lies continues which all Christians should be ashamed of and speak out against. -Cool Cat

O Lord, my heart is filled with love For others who have urgent needs So help me share in every way What I can give through words and deeds. -Hess

The thought manifests as the word

The word manifests as the deed

The deed develops into habit

And habit hardens into character.

So watch the thought and its ways with care

And let it spring from love

Born out of concern for all beings

~ Buddha 2500BC

 "I believe there is a perfect good and there is a perfect evil, it is why we are imperfect, because we need to choose between the two in everything that we do." -Cool Cat

"Our differences should be celebrated not debated." -Cool Cat

It seems to me that the more hate mongering and negative emotions that are spewed from the "fundamental religious" community, the less I wish to associate myself with them. As a result of having read Prayers for Bobby some time ago, and especially now after having seen the movie, I have taken a very hard look at my own spirituality, where it comes from, what it means to me, and how it affects others in my life, particularly those that I love. -rejenna

What does it mean to be Spiritual and Religious?

This is a tricky question, because it really depends on what is meant by all right, by spiritual, and by religious. Let's start with what it means to be spiritual. The derivation of the word spirit comes from the Hebrew and Greek words for breath, air, and wind and their uses. In various biblical passages, God breathes life into humankind, sustains our breath throughout life, revives us when faint or short of breath, and gives us a second wind when we need it, until our dying, when we breathe our last. That's the basic meaning. Then there's Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones, when God infuses new life into the skeletal remains of a former people, dramatically demonstrating God's power to recreate life from death and decay in a real, live old testament resurrection story. In the biblical sense, all living creatures are spiritual by virtue of being given breath in the first place.

There's a derivative meaning, illustrated in Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus in the gospel of John. Jesus is talking about being born again, of spirit from above, and Nicodemus is missing the point. In this sense, the word is used to refer to our awareness of the spiritual dimension of life, our alertness to the holiness in and around us, our capacity to sense the intangible realities of which the bible speaks. This awareness is focused in Jesus' invitation to Nicodemus to enter a new kind of life, characterized by a lively attention to grace through faith (or trust). In this sense of the word, we are all spiritual in differing ways and to differing degrees at various times, as we are more or less aware of the invisible, inaudible, impalpable sacredness of all things. This question seems to be using the word spiritual in this sense, referring to a conscious relationship with all that is holy.

Given this definition, it's obvious that there are a lot of folks out there who are spiritual and yet not religious. But what does it mean to be religious? The word comes from a Latin word meaning to bind. So religion is being bound by or binding ourselves to the priority of the spiritual in certain and various ways. When most people use the word, however, they are speaking of organized or institutional religion, as they say, meaning groups who have incorporated themselves into a recognizable not-for-profit entity under the laws of this country. Those who refer to religion in this way often condemn it for its self-interest. Such criticism is justifiable and even traditional, having been made repeatedly within scripture itself, the very scriptures held in such high regard by at least three major world religions.

It's worth noting that the criticism, while justifiable and traditional, is criticism of the distortion and perversion of true religion, which is elsewhere in scripture defined as the sacrifice of a broken and contrite heart. Here's a tricky trap in the question. Whether we're standing inside or out of organized religion, if we're criticizing the other stance without applying the same standards to our own, we're not practicing true religion, defined as humility before God and recognition of our common humanity. That is the summary contained in the great commandment with its corollary—loving God with all we've got and neighbor as much as self.

It's the common humanity part that's the underlying issue of the question. As much as we might wish to, we can't escape being social creatures, only capable of differentiation within society itself. That's who we are, where we run into problems, and where we will resolve them too. Being aware of the spiritual dimension in life means sensing the sacred not only within ourselves but also among us. We can't be healed, made more whole, in a vacuum. The reason religion happens is because we need to work things out together, puzzle them out together, try them out on each other, mess up and labor to do better next time. If we aren't making mistakes, we aren't learning much. The bible calls mistakes sin and learning repentance.

Oftentimes religion is accused of hypocrisy because of the discrepancy between its spiritual vision and its own attempt to live up to it. Yet it's pretty easy to tell when religious groups acknowledge their shortcomings and care for one another and the world even as they struggle to become more true to the vision over time. It's a snail's pace because it involves so many talking at once and tripping over each other. Even so, when folk forbear one another and persevere in faith together, they get somewhere you just can't reach any other way. That's the point, where we might get if we were all on board.

So it's not altogether all right to be spiritual without being religious.It's only partly right for some, some of the time, but it can't be most right in the end, over time. In the end, we can't solve our own problems, in and of themselves, without coming to the awareness that our problems are the world's problems. We're all in this together, for better and for worse. There's really no way to secede from the human race. Certainly, we don't need to submit to someone else's view of religion, but we can't avoid the general conversation, and sooner or later we will need to make some effort on behalf of the whole, the holy. We can't do it all. Neither can we remain on the sidelines. We can only do our part.

We are all spiritual participants. When someone says to me that they have no part in religion, they typically proceed to tell me how they are organizing their relationship with the sacred, complete with ritual practices and devotional exercises meaningful to them, often with other companions so inclined. And I wonder if it will be only a matter of time before they are codifying and anathematizing and generally misbehaving spiritually along with the rest of us. Also, they typically proceed to tell me how and with whom they are still arguing with whatever form of religion has previously been crammed down their throat in an unhelpful manner. It is apparent that they are attempting to reinvent the wheel.

 A religion of one will not restore spiritual community, even though it might be the right place to hang out for a time, to cool off, to reconsider and redirect. Even those who have never affiliated, never had any family background of affiliation, even those cannot escape their engagement with the prevailing cultural stereotype of religion and the impact of religious extremism around the world. Being standoffish implies from whom. It can't be about God and me, only me and the Holy. However frustrating, it's about all of us and our broken community.True religion, while differentiating us, will also bind us together, in service to the holy and for the sake of the world. The religions we have, while imperfect, are the most time tested we have. We might as well see if we can use them for good, for God's sake.

"Be convicted in your own beliefs, do not convict others with them."