The God/Spirituality versus Religion Question

My nephew asked me recently what I thought about the whole God versus religion, or Jesus versus religion, controversy. He shared with me a video by a hipster-Emergent type. It actually was pretty good for the most part.

Sometimes people say they are spiritual, not religious. Sometimes people insist one can only find or know God through a particular church or religion. For them, there is only one true church or religion.

My own belief is that the truth does not fall neatly into the religion versus God/spirituality framework.

I have experienced God both within and without the boundaries of religion. I have experienced God's grace powerfully in Church, especially in the Blessed Sacrament. But I have also experienced God's touch and healing through a number of different channels- through a lover, through a cathartic moment in therapy, through music. God has manifested powerfully through all these channels for me; I cannot deny my experience.  I have experienced God both in the Church, and completely outside of any religious context. God's grace and healing often do not come in religious envelopes.

Those in the “God/Jesus/Spirituality – Not – Religion” camp sometimes cannot honor that some people find true solace and healing through their religious observance. Religious traditions and practices often are time-tested methods for helping people to know God. These same venerable practices might get in the way or become ends in themselves for some people.

Religious people, especially the scrupulously orthodox, often cannot acknowledge that the Spirit blows where it wills, as it says in John's gospel; we hear the voice thereof, but we know not whence it comes or whither it goes. Some religious people really see themselves as gatekeepers, wanting to control access to God. But it is ridiculous to think God can be circumscribed.

This week in our Daily Office readings, Jesus will tell the woman at the Jacob's Well that the time is coming when people will not worship God “on this mountain or in Jerusalem.” No one can franchise God. God operates in freedom.

I will say one thing, as a person who is in fact “religious” (that is, I have daily religious practice and go to church): Religion sometimes strikes me as placing distance between people and the divine. I do not believe that there is any distance, for as St. Paul says, quoting the Greek pagan poets, “In God we live, and move and have our being.”  I think knowing God is to acknowledge the true state of things, the divine in and all around us.

Religion at its best helps us to open up to God and others; it provides for community and worship. At its worst, it becomes oppressive, an idol. It can be a barrier to God.

I believe that Christianity has it right in insisting on God's grace, God takes the initiative toward us. The Eastern Religions are correct in recognizing God's Presence everywhere (the Bible teaches us this too, but it is somehow lost on us). We must be open.

So whether we are religious or not, we can be open to God's activity and presence in our lives. We can seek God. God is already seeking us. It is only a matter of us recognizing it.

The question is not so much God/Spirituality versus religion; the question is, how big are our hearts? How open are we to the Divine Presence?