Editorial
Paying Attention to Spirit
by Paul Chaffee
Hundreds of thousands of pages have been written detailing the history and doctrines of our particular religious traditions, most of them demonstrating how different we are from each other. But across the wide range of religious communities, there is a shared recognition and engagement with expressions of Spirit (variously defined) that animate life and give it meaning.
Photo: Unsplash
Spirituality has thousands of expressions, each one bringing the follower back to the ‘heart of things’ and our place here. Spirituality tends not to get preoccupied with truth-statements or doctrine, which show us our differences. Rather, spirituality takes us places beyond words, to experiences that defy explanation, to insights which defuse our differences. It is so powerful that some traditions have discouraged its discussion,
A couple of years before I left teaching to attend seminary, a group of ministerial students chained themselves to the furniture in the president’s office of the school where I eventually enrolled. The protesters would not leave until their single request was honored: that the seminary include at least one course in spirituality. I knew then that this seminary would be a good fit for me. Nearly half a century later that same seminary is rich with spirituality offerings and participates in all sorts of interracial, interfaith, and interspiritual activities.
Things have changed in this digital age, including our understanding of Spirit. Today it has become easier to see that the inner life, the deepest values and assumptions we make, the practices we follow, can guide us well, or not. Spirituality can be abused and misused, particularly by ego-centered leaders. That said, the upside is that your sense and experience of Spirit can contribute to my sense and experience of Spirit, and vice versa. That connection is the kind of bond that could help save the Earth and humankind from the dangers we face.
In the days since the internet started to blossom, spiritual practices have become unhinged from the traditions where they first developed. The very multiplicity of spiritual options today is changing the face of religion everywhere. Recordings and perfumes and resorts are trading in spiritual language and sacred images. At the same time, happily, the manifold opportunities at sites like Spirituality and Practice and, more recently, Religica, offer seekers a kind of richness and variety of opportunity that our grandparents could not have begun to imagine, much less our earlier forebears.
This month’s TIO looks to some of the traditional ways to become spiritually engaged as well as to younger voices who are seeking spiritual practice in the midst of chaos and cultural collapse.
Header Photo: tOrange.biz