What does “spiritual but not religious” really mean? Dr. Ray explains why he thinks the phrase sounds enlightened but is closer to agnosticism, and who ends up setting the terms.
“I’m spiritual but not religious”
Have you noticed that folks like to say things that sound enlightened and smart? But if you spent any amount of time thinking about them or analyzing them, they really are incredibly shallow and perhaps just flat out dumb. One of those, and I’m sure every single person listening has heard someone say it, is “I’m spiritual but not religious.” Maybe you’ve said it yourself at one point in your life. Hopefully you’re not still saying it.
My first response to that is, what in the heck does that mean? You’ve got to define spiritual and you’ve got to define religious. So that’s the first problem: usually they’re self-defined. If anybody says that to you, you could start the conversation by asking, “What do you mean by spiritual?” And then, “What do you mean by religious?”
When somebody says, “I’m spiritual not religious,” I think what they think they’re saying is, “I am not irreligious. I am not an atheist. I am closer to God, if he’s part of their spirituality, and a lot of times he isn’t, than this rote religion type stuff.” So while they mean to imply that they have some more mature kind of spiritual connection to whatever, actually it’s the opposite. They are closer to being agnostic.
“I worship me”
Dr. Ray, what are you talking about? Let me explain, Lucy. I’m spiritual. Spiritual to what? For many it just means, “Well, I believe there’s a higher power. There’s a higher something out there looking over us. This isn’t all there is.” Some of them may even say, “Yeah, I believe that something else is God.” Maybe not the God of the Bible, but the God. Given all that, they feel like they’ve got some kind of connection. They’re not just muddling along, paying no attention to anything other than what is here and now.
Sometimes they will say, “I’m spiritual in the sense that I want a connection to something bigger than myself.” I was watching a sitcom once and she was trying to get her husband to go to church. He didn’t want to go, so he asked her, “Why do you go?” And she said, and I think this captures a vague spirituality, “Well, I just want to think there’s something bigger than ourselves, something more.” All right, that may be a tiny baby step toward God, but it’s meaningless, because what “I’m spiritual” ultimately means is I worship me.
That’s not what it means, Dr. Ray? Of course it does. I define it. I say what’s spiritual. If I have a connection with the universe, or let’s take it all the way out: I like to pray, I believe there is a God, I even believe that Jesus is God. Take it all the way out and somebody calls that spiritual, and then they say, “But I want no part of religion.”
Religion without any rules
Now, here’s the other cliche. What do you mean by religion? Typically they mean rules, regulations, laws, responsibilities, and they want no part of that. All right, then who decides? Obviously you do. If you don’t want any part of what has been traditionally recognized as God in the flesh through Christ, or even if you’re not a Christian, the God who created the universe, if you don’t want any part of his recommendations for moral living, you just know that’s religion. And what do you follow? You follow you. In irony, you’re very religious. Why would I say that? Because you set the terms. If you set the terms on what spirituality is and what is not religious, then you’re 100% following them, because they’re yours. Why wouldn’t you?
I think “I’m spiritual but not religious” is a way of saying, “Well, I don’t think this is all there is, but I still want to live the way I want to live. I still want to do it my way,” in the words of the song. So it’s a nice, enlightened-sounding out. I can decide which of these spiritual commitments I want to follow. I can be spiritual and have sex before marriage. I can be spiritual and believe that it’s OK to kill a baby in a womb. I can be spiritual and not pray but once a month and a half, if life throws something in my way and I better cry out to some being that’s up there somewhere in my spirituality. Yeah, I can do that. That’s all spiritual, isn’t it? Spiritual, meaningless. If it’s not attached to anything, it’s attached to me, the worship of the self.
“Well, I just don’t buy these religions who stand between me and Jesus.” But what if Jesus said, “Here is how you connect with me. Here is how you follow me”? I can just imagine me saying to my wife, “Honey, I got to tell you, I am spiritually married to you, but I don’t really want any responsibilities, any kind of commitment, any kind of moral guidelines to this marriage. Just be satisfied that our marriage is spiritual.” How far would that go? Or with anybody: “Don’t ask me to do anything for you, but just know that I feel spiritual toward you. I feel connected. Well, if you’re sick and in the hospital, don’t ask me to visit you, because that’s kind of like a demand. That’s kind of like a responsibility, and that’s like a religious thing.”
“I’m spiritual, but not religious.” That is one of the dumbest things that somebody can say. And the irony is it sounds so smart, it sounds so enlightened. They haven’t defined spiritual and they haven’t defined religious. And what’s worse is they’ve made religion into something that is not a beautiful way to connect with God and Jesus Christ.
Dr. Ray tackles the hard questions about living the faith in everyday life in Family Faith Under Fire.
Transcript of Dr. Ray’s audio blog, lightly edited for reading.