Authentic Religion or Spirituality

“…Spirituality, or authentic religion, dawns when the individual takes control of his or her spiritual life. If religion is a passive affair in which the person simply goes to church, synagogue, temples, or mosque out of a mechanical commitment, then it has little meaning beyond community. Religion and spirituality by definition have to engage the whole person, especially the inner life. 

We have to take a religion to ourselves, shape and add to it from our own life experience, learning, and aspirations. Then it becomes something of great value.”

D.H.Lawrence

Wayne Teasdale offers us his explanation and commentary on Lawrence with an emphasis on personal responsibility using these words:

“…Spirituality, or authentic religion, dawns when the individual takes control of his or her spiritual life. If religion is a passive affair in which the person simply goes to church, synagogue, temples, or mosque out of a mechanical commitment, then it has little meaning beyond community. Religion and spirituality by definition have to engage the whole person, especially the inner life. 

We have to take a religion to ourselves, shape and add to it from our own life experience, learning, and aspirations. Then it becomes something of great value.”

Teasdale explains this idea further…

“Although he is a great proponent of synthesis in the study of religion, Huston Smith, the venerable sage of the religious and spiritual life as well as comparative religion, corroborates D.H. Lawrence’s insight adds that authentic spirituality cannot simply mean a grab bag of beliefs and practices. A faith that really means something in a person’s life, a faith that nourishes and inspires, that is a source of insight, strength, encouragement and guidance needs to be cultivated, protected, and never taken for granted. 

As I have come to understand it, faith is an ongoing dynamic process that might, at times, need a respite or a temporary landing place for synthesis and further study, but then becomes active and inquiring again until the next place of assessment and is reached. 

Then, again, it moves, expands, deepens. Faith is to be considered a pillar of one’s spiritual life, it cannot be sufficient to hold up or support the entire spiritual quest. Faith requires its own support; it requires reason and experience to maintain its balance, perspective, and vitality.

I was struck by Smith’s description of faith as not being a “grab bag of beliefs.” I have found that it often does become such a collection of unsafe, enlarged ideas, or a set of ungrounded and separate concepts and scattered bits of understanding… This approach, of accumulating bits and pieces of information, including a variety of rituals and allied practices, serves the spiritual ingénue and the beginner quite well as it satisfies our curiosity and our fascination with whatever new idea, concept, ritual or guru that is out there. Much of what passes for the “New Age” is filled with grab bag practitioners who may be quite sincere in their intent, but lack the sense of cohesion and coherence necessary to deepen or ripen their approaches and practices.