I'm spiritual, but not religious...

[altars of radness]

Maybe people are hesitant to investigate someone else's teachings/findings on spiritual topics because they already know, at some crucial, logical, oft-repressed level, that what they're about to study is just more delusional bullshit.

What does this have to do with Tebow blocking on punts..??

Man, you are the Canadian Zerohero. Zzzzzzzzzz....

[Thrashmaster Flash]

I guess I can sort of see the logic of these people's position, in that, if you are willing to make the stretch that there is a "force" in the universe, then it must "logically" follow that the major world religion I am a part of is the only legitimate expression of that force.

I'm sure your use of quotations imply irony, but if not, then I have to say I'm pretty surprised with this statement! Nothing can be less logical than confining "spirituality" within the confines of religion. Although I'm an atheist, I don't necessarily think that entertaining the idea of the possible existence of some sort of higher power is in and of itself foolish, but taking it to the next level and arbitrarily deciding that a particular religion is somehow the "correct" one is possibly the clearest illustration of the general public's inability to employ critical thinking. I will never, ever understand this phenomenon, especially when it comes to people that are otherwise extremely intelligent and thoughtful.

No it's like saying you can't study the foundations of electricity without either going through the painstaking rigors of rediscovering what others have already discovered, or learning from an expert. That's a big difference

It's a pointless difference because no one can "learn" anything about the essence of religion, past the point of religious teachings and doctrine. Religion is inherently an unknown variable, so anything taught from one "spiritual" person to another is nothing more than opinion and personal belief. What have other people discovered with regards to religion? What can an "expert" offer that unquestionably has more value spiritually than any random person on the street?

A person can absolutely feel spiritual (disclaimer: I do not, clearly) and not have any interest in framing that feeling of spirituality in the context of modern religion. Your analogy to untrained fighters doesn't hold here, because fighting is an art that can be taught and learned. It is tangible. Nothing can be truly known about the basis for religions, or of spirituality; therefore, there is no such thing as teaching spirituality—only teaching doctrine.

[Chad]

[doubleblumpkin]

these people 'hate' religion because they'd like to think that life and beauty and power and enlightenment and love never has any cost whatsoever and jsut want to download it off napster have a coke or whatever.

For the most part this thread is giving me a headache, for the most part people's beliefs give me a headache.

[riley-o]

I guess I'm curious what you guys' idea of "spiritual" is-- is it just acknowledgement that there may be some divinity or design, or is it an active pursuit of understanding and closer connection/intimacy with whatever you consider to be higher ? If it's the former then it's just a stagnant meaningless "what if ?" that floats around your head while you chase it like butterflies in a field. If it's the latter, then, even if you don't agree with someone's end results, doesn't it make sense to try to understand the paths taken to arrive there ?

I feel like we're all talking about different things here. If your aim is to commune with whatever you think God is, learning the different ways other people do it will be a benefit. If your aim is to go "man.. it's like, the cosmos man, wooooowwwww..." then congratulations, mission is already accomplished.

[doubleblumpkin]

I guess I'm curious what you guys' idea of "spiritual" is-- is it an active pursuit of understanding and closer connection/intimacy with whatever you consider to be higher ?

I don't know what this thread is trying to accomplish but I would say it's an active pursuit of the divine through whatever channels necessary. I subscribe almost 100% to what Anthony De Mello has to say. I don't want to pigeonhole myself into the class that the original CNN author talks about but I don't prescribe to a specific religion or doctrine exclusively because I feel like every religion has so much to offer.

>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q57cFQkb ... re=related<

[Spiritual Retreat Master]

"I'm spiritual, but not religious." This empty yet hip claim does nothing but fall prey to the English idiomatic proverb about both having and eating one's cake.

[Zerohero]

how bout the honest upgrade...

I'm not spiritual nor religious.. but if there is life after death, I'd rather be pounding virgin tail while watching Hendrix jam with John Entwistle than shovellin' rocks for ol' scratch no matter how groovy he looked on metal album covers back in the day.

[Necrometer]

I guess I'm curious what you guys' idea of "spiritual" is-- is it just acknowledgement that there may be some divinity or design, or is it an active pursuit of understanding and closer connection/intimacy with whatever you consider to be higher ? If it's the former then it's just a stagnant meaningless "what if ?" that floats around your head while you chase it like butterflies in a field. If it's the latter, then, even if you don't agree with someone's end results, doesn't it make sense to try to understand the paths taken to arrive there ?

I feel like we're all talking about different things here. If your aim is to commune with whatever you think God is, learning the different ways other people do it will be a benefit. If your aim is to go "man.. it's like, the cosmos man, wooooowwwww..." then congratulations, mission is already accomplished.

this is a good post that clearly strives to illuminate, and I hope to respond soon

[Spiritual Retreat Master]

I feel like we're all talking about different things here.

That's because most are talking about "different things" rather than clearly defining two rather simple terms. As a result, a morass of presumptuous confusion ensues. I'm immaterial, but not devoted.

[storm shadow]

For hundreds and hundreds of years, human "spiritual" practice consisted of orthopraxy - ritual, worship, being part of a community of believers, etc. This is still true for most religions, but in the west (read: Christianity) there's been a gradual shift towards orthodoxy - believing in specific doctrinal precepts, e.g. Christ's divinity, etc.

So, what does the title claim actually MEAN? Because it seems to implicitly reject both ideas of approaching the holy, and it seems like bet-hedging for nervous Pascal's wagerers who don't like "organized religion" but are reluctant to identify as atheist, have residual fears of damnation left over from religious childhoods, etc.

It's a little bit like when people claim to be apolitical, not realizing by doing so they're basically just validating the status quo (whatever it may be). Which leads to FBTS's point:

the dominant ideology today is basically 'fulfill' your potential...for the most part these people 'hate' religion because they'd like to think that life and beauty and power and enlightenment and love never has any cost whatsoever and jsut want to download it off napster have a coke or whatever.

Bingo. The basis of SBNR, like most other modern ideas, is laissez-faire capitalism and a "freedom of choice" where none of the options are really different or meaningful. It's religion as cafeteria, where you can pick and choose the bits you like while discarding anything that's not useful or pleasurable. Have it your way.

I feel like this is talking past what most of you guys are saying, but that's because I categorically reject the idea that the experience of the sublime is necessarily connected to some divinity.

[Necrometer]

For hundreds and hundreds of years, human "spiritual" practice consisted of orthopraxy - ritual, worship, being part of a community of believers, etc. This is still true for most religions, but in the west (read: Christianity) there's been a gradual shift towards orthodoxy - believing in specific doctrinal precepts, e.g. Christ's divinity, etc.

I think the SBNR thing has arisen in an attempt to get back to this orthopraxy, but the prevalent nowadays orthodoxy presents a hurdle that must be cleared and as a result people try to distance themselves from the orthodoxy by adopting spiritual individualism that is so easy to bash because there's no unifying body.

Do you think there are existing communities for "spiritual" people who don't want to be Christian/Jew/Muslim/Hindu? Is Buddhism in USA the closest thing to functional orthopraxy?

I think "spiritual freedom" is important and should not be scoffed at. I guess this thread is sympathetic to the best of the SBNR crowd; like any crowd there are plenty of airheads. I'm most curious about the non-airhead portion, to which I optimistically seem to belong.

Also I want to be clear and reiterate that I believe there is no unifying order or will in the universe beyond the laws of physics, and that spirituality is something that is (based on current evidence) uniquely human and would not exist without us.

I categorically reject the idea that the experience of the sublime is necessarily connected to some divinity.

So would you categorize yourself as religious? Spiritual? Y/N on each, please! I would categorize you as SBNR but it seems you wouldn't; which brings us back to Riley's request for a definition of spiritual.

From earlier:

ive felt grounded in a my own experiences and sensations and ive manufactured my own idols and and my totems of personal significance

this is 100% spirituality IMPhO

if this is a semantics thing by all means offer up your own lexical placeholder for "transcendent shit in a human's head/heart that is undeniable yet would be 100% abolished in a human-free universe"

Useful?

[storm shadow]

Do you think there are existing communities for "spiritual" people who don't want to be Christian/Jew/Muslim/Hindu? Is Buddhism in USA the closest thing to functional orthopraxy?

I categorically reject the idea that the experience of the sublime is necessarily connected to some divinity.

So would you categorize yourself as religious? Spiritual? Y/N on each, please! I would categorize you as SBNR but it seems you wouldn't; which brings us back to Riley's request for a definition of spiritual.

From earlier:

ive felt grounded in a my own experiences and sensations and ive manufactured my own idols and and my totems of personal significance

this is 100% spirituality IMPhO

if this is a semantics thing by all means offer up your own lexical placeholder for "transcendent shit in a human's head/heart that is undeniable yet would be 100% abolished in a human-free universe"

Useful?

Again, I feel like a lot of the time "spiritual" is a way to have your cake and eat it too--rejecting religion, but avoiding identification as wholly secular, atheist, etc. In that sense, there are literally limitless communities for such people, insofar as there's nowhere they're really excluded from.

But I also think you're obviously a lot more sincere and inquisitive about all this than your average fuzzy-headed New Age yoga housefrau. I think there are a lot of communities for people who feel "grounded in my own experiences and sensations" and have "manufactured their own idols and totems of personal significance"--most obviously, music and art scenes. But I don't really understand why this has to be identified as "spiritual", especially since modernity has manufactured countless lexical placeholders, ranging from high-brow stand-ins like "sublime" and "transcendent" to the more familiar and idiomatic "brutal" or "cult"--or perhaps best of all, simply "heavy".

And if you believe that all of these fall short and only "spiritual" works, that kind of circles back to the same question. I feel like SBNR is this stubborn attempt to return these experiences to an encounter with the Holy, and my response to that is why not pursue religiosity?

As for me personally, I obviously reject "spirituality" and I'm certainly not religious--but I also accept that a lot of my beliefs and allegiances have been described by pretty sharp thinkers as secular religions, and not without reason (e.g. liberalism, Marxism, etc). But I would definitely consider myself a secular humanist, and an atheist. If I'm a believer of any kind, it's (like most here I reckon) in what Joe Carducci (himself a lapsed Catholic) called "the Electric Church", but again I don't really see the need to imbue it with any godliness beyond that.

[featherboa]

I feel like white people need to be cut some slack. They have no 'spiritual' heritage left. If we take that definition I posted as a starting point -rejecting materialism, but also leery of formal religion- where do they go from there? Back to Christianity? (Western) Christian thought is how we got to materialism in the first place -From Augustine's hierarchy of beings, to Descarte's "the universe is a clock and only humans have souls/minds", to now. I'm not a philosophy history person so fill in the gaps charitably for me.
Appropriating other culture's stuff as your own isn't the right way to go about it either. You can't just declare yourself Hopi or something. I guess you can if you want, but fuck you.

[badgevvrecker]

theres always the Eastern Orthodox Church for honkies......

[fallbacktostone]

i'm going to go back to flirting with jainism.

[Chad]

[Spiritual Retreat Master]

[takeasneededforpain]

I feel like white people need to be cut some slack. They have no 'spiritual' heritage left. If we take that definition I posted as a starting point -rejecting materialism, but also leery of formal religion- where do they go from there? Back to Christianity? (Western) Christian thought is how we got to materialism in the first place -From Augustine's hierarchy of beings, to Descarte's "the universe is a clock and only humans have souls/minds", to now. I'm not a philosophy history person so fill in the gaps charitably for me.
Appropriating other culture's stuff as your own isn't the right way to go about it either. You can't just declare yourself Hopi or something. I guess you can if you want, but fuck you.

materialism was a war waged AGAINST Christianity. Descartes was the beginning of an inflamed mankind, clinging to its own temporal form, loving its own body, feeding every whim and despising what came before.

for westerners, there is no tradition healthy enough to shelter under. eastern orthodoxy is the closest.

but an established tradition is still necessary. the drugged, poisoned uncertainty of western man is a direct result of his flailing, useless fight against tradition. the sad need to be an ''individual'' has deprived your kind of higher spiritual aspirations, and turned humanity into a faceless, gutter-dwelling mob.

You mean, like the Christian church? The gray slavery of devotion to an alien god and his bastard rape baby?

Mary should've jammed a coathanger right through her cherry and fixed the problem before it poisoned the rest of humanity.

[Chad]

always off the mark, always missing the heart of any meaningful matter

[Zerohero]

yeah i toadally woundn't fuck girls claiming to be spiritual not religious...
or girls that believed in jesus, or girls that were into wicca, or girls that listen to bauhaus.. or girls that e make arts n crafts, or girls that go to bingo, or.........

[riley-o]

Just go ahead and shoot me in the fucking face for participating in a religion thread here..

[doubleblumpkin]

I don't prescribe to a specific religion or doctrine exclusively because I feel like every religion has so much to offer.

LOL

I wouldn't expect anyone that calls alcohol god to understand

[badgevvrecker]

Just go ahead and shoot me in the fucking face for participating in a religion thread here..

sure, come to arkansas.

[Spiritual Retreat Master]

this is a good post that clearly strives to illuminate, and I hope to respond soon

this is a good post that clearly strives to illuminate, and I hope to respond soon