Books on spirituality and religion that I'm reading or rereading at the moment....
These wonderful books are all available from your local bookseller, or if you absolutely must, from a big box store. |
A Word About Spirituality and Religion
My own spiritual and religious odyssey isn’t particularly interesting, but as it is a common thread running through all of my work I would like to share one brief story. By my early 30’s I had long abandoned traditional threads of religion. I had flirted with various New Age ways of thinking but like so many around me I eventually gravitated toward various “eastern” philosophies. During my second year of grad school I took a course which immersed me in serious and critical inquiries of society (bless you Leo Marx). This study caused the philosophical/spiritual ground I was standing on to begin wobbling rather badly and it completely crashed after reading Karl Marx (no relation to Leo). I was done: religion was indeed the opiate of the masses. Everything that a good skeptic will tell you fell onto me in one festering heap. In this inarguably cruel and unjust world, where was God? Yet another random shooting last night. A newlywed couple killed by a drunk driver as they were leaving the wedding chapel. A five year old molested by her father. Children born with incurable diseases. Starvation. Ethnic cleansing. Earthquakes. Jeffrey Dahmer… If you’ve ever known skeptics you’ve heard observations like these and really, they have a good point. If God is looking out for us, where is God? Is God uninterested? Vengeful? Expecting some odd atonement? Perhaps God just stepped out for a smoke? It happened fast: overnight I became an atheist. It wasn’t really a decision as there were simply no other options and I had no intention of being what I referred to as a “lazy agnostic.” And anyway, being an atheist doesn't make one a bad person. I came to believe, and still believe, that it is better to do "good things" for the sake of goodness rather than being good out of fear. Motivation matters. I was "in" and stayed in for well over a decade before recognizing the numerous flaws of atheism. During this atheist period I had become friends with a number of the other faculty where I was teaching. These were friends with whom I could both joke and have serious conversations. A great group. One day I was talking with my friend “Jeff” about his views on religion and spirituality. Jeff was a person of deep and studied convictions but as he spoke of God I dismissively brushed him off saying, “Well Jeff, I’m still waiting for my burning bush. That’s what I need. Give me a burning bush and I will believe!” I continued, chuckling, “Burning bush. Ha! Burning bush…” Jeff calmly looked at me and sternly replied, “Glenn, you won’t think it’s so funny when it happens.” His implication was that in my lifetime I would in fact experience a "burning bush" and that I would likely find it deeply disturbing, if not frightening. (Note to Jeff: forgive me for being such a jerk.) Hmmm… turns out Jeff was right. It would be decades later, but I finally and unexpectedly had my “burning bush” and no, it wasn’t funny. But neither was it disturbing nor frightening. From that moment I’ve never doubted the existence of God. I understand and am aware that God is woven into everything and that the soul continues. Of course, some of my understandings were undone with Rae's passing, but that's another story... Finally, for me the word “God” is just a finger “pointing at the moon,” and there are many other equally valid descriptors for this Infinite Source. My interest is in the “moon” at which we are pointing, not the words used to describe it. What a wonderful and great mystery…. |