Spirituality
"Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you perceive it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day. And you will come at last to love the whole world with an all-embracing love."
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
"The same stream of life
that runs through the world
night and day in rhythmic measure.
It is the same life that shoots in joy
through the dust of the earth
into numberless waves of flowers."
Rabindranath Tagore
The future is calling. Are you listening?
The spirit or soul (Spirit Of Universal Life) is what
gives us life. it is what makes us what we are as
individuals as well as members of the community of life:
It is what connects us. Because it is universal, it exists in
all life, not just in human life. Think of your spirit
(and your spirituality) as being one thread in a much
larger tapestry which some call God, some call Gaia, or
creation - or, for that matter, evolution.
Spirituality is a term used to define the relationship
between life and spirit. That relationship could also
be defined as the crossroads between the beliefs we have
and the way we live our lives as a result of those beliefs.
Religion is organized spirituality. Two or more people
who share similar spiritual beliefs and who get together
to worship/pray/sing/dance/express joy or sorrow or in
fact engage in any activity that uplifts the spirit, are
doing religion.
The word religion comes from the word religare, which
means "to bind together". But instead of binding us
together, religion has in fact been used, by the powerful,
to divide us, to create hatred and fear, to engage in warfare,
to create haves and have-nots, to spread jealousy and greed.
I somehow doubt that is what "God" had in mind - regardless
of what God(s) Goddess(es) you may believe in. In fact, I
strongly suspect that the Higher Power is shocked by nearly
every aspect of the way humanity conducts itself on this
planet, in creation. Though there is plenty, we have
mass starvation, a planet being destroyed, non-human life
being driven to extinction at a rate of maybe a couple of
hundred species a day.
Organized religion as we know it is a dying institution.
Those who administrate organized religion blame people or
"the modern world" for their decay. The real cause is
more likely an unconscious (and realistic) assessment of
what has been achieved by organized religion.
And so millions, maybe billions of people are in search
of new spirituality - meaningful spirituality. Perhaps we
need to ask the question "What is it that makes spirituality
meaningful?"
Traditional answers are that it feels right, gives us
peace in a troubled world, assures us that there is
something beyond death and the grave.
If spirituality is just about feelings, then it is no
surprise so many have turned to drugs. The feelings
are immediate, shockingly real and require no great
commitment.
If spirituality is about the need for peace in a
troubled world, then organized religion ought to have
done (and be doing) a lot more to make the world a
better place, thus reducing the need for relief.
And if spirituality is about assurance that we are
more than mortal beings, that "something better"
awaits us beyond life, perhaps that truly explains
why we have allowed our earth to be very nearly
destroyed for the sake of profit and job creation and
greed.
Even among those people who try to live morally, ethical
behavior often extends itself only those people who
they know personally or with whom they have direct contact.
While we might not cheat a relative or a friend or whatever,
we buy products from (or invest money in) companies engaged
in abuse of employees, in child labor, in destroying or
negatively impacting whole communities, in environmental
destruction - for profit.
We do business with these companies because of ignorance (lack
of information) or because they have good prices. "Money
is everything." Money is a problem - not because it is
money, but because it has been given far more value than
it either needs or deserves.
Please feel welcome to send us your
comments,
suggestions
ideas
or request
more
information.
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