The important thing is not to stop questioning.
Here’s a simple scenario: People in a group tend to have a similar description of supernatural agents, a local doctrine of what gods or spirits are up to. The very fact, that people in a group share this religious ideology and perform important rituals together, sharpens their perception that they are indeed a group with clearly marked boundaries. Worshiping the same gods creates a community and by implication gives that extra edge to the feeling that people with different gods or spirits really are potential enemies. Indeed, people who become deeply involved in religion, for whom it is a matter of vital importance that their doctrine is the only source of truth, will not hesitate to massacre the ones who seem not to acknowledge this obvious fact, or whose commitment is too luke-warm. The most heinous crimes will be a celebration of the True Faith. This is how gods and spirits lead to group cohesion, which leads to xenophobia, which leads to fanatical hatred.
In the most diverse traditions, one can find movements entirely focused on a return to the religious values of earlier times and supposedly perverted by modern developments. Although such movements are as diverse as the contexts in which they arose, there are some common trends, and the legitimization of violence in the service of a religious restoration is one of those trends.
Sound familiar? Those words I just read were from a book called, Religion Explained, by Pascal Boyer, published earlier this year.
I’m not in a good mood lately! Especially not when it comes to “religion!” I feel kind-of irritated with religion, and not especially disposed to raising the question that’s my assignment for today: “Why do we need Religion!”
Why, indeed! To create dangerous boundaries of exclusive ideas in minds and hearts that over and over again result in conflicts and violence?
When Michael and I decided to do this series on THE BIG QUESTIONS, we never knew we would be delivering them under the shadow of September 11th.
We never knew that each question chosen would have to be engaged within the prism of a new world-view created by religious extremists, hell bent on destroying us.
Why do we need religion? Not for outcomes like these!
Not too good having a grumpy minister just when you came here to grapple with a perfectly decent question, is it? OK, I’m calming down!
Truth be told, there are, in this congregation of liberal religionists, almost as many of you who think we don’t need religion, as those who think we do, to one degree or another. The ones who think we don’t need religion are often thinking about not needing more “traditional, dogmatic” religion, the kinds that bind one to a particular set of beliefs. Our free thinkers, who take free will seriously, might object to the way this particular Big Question is posed. Maybe it should be a question like, “What is a religion I can feel comfortable with?” Or maybe, simply, “Why is there religion at all?”
Let’s get down to the basics. Religion starts with a question about meaning.
What’s true? What matters? Why is there something instead of nothing? Who am I? What should I do with my life? Why do I suffer? Why must I die?
In a lighter vein, we might add this question, seen recently on a tee shirt: Suppose the hokey-pokey IS what it’s all about?
In many ways, “Religion” is the Mother of all Big Questions. You have a Big Question? You go to Mom. Mom presides over all the temples, churches, mosques, and other places of worship; the holy sites, sacred relics, religious artifacts, cave paintings, and so on, where people go to make sense of the Big Picture, and to make sense of their living and dying. I think we may be one of the very few religions in Mom’s tent that starts out saying to its initiates: “To question is the answer!”
The human realm is like an echo chamber – it’s a little speck in the vastness of eternity, a valley between mountains that hide the larger view. We sense something beyond the mountains, but when we call out our deepest questions, they reverberate against the opaque mountain rock and bounce back to us, changed, but essentially unanswered. “Who am I?” we call out. “Hello, is anyone out there?” we hear as an echo.
In our little corner of the universe, we don’t get many answers; mostly we hear our own questions, and the echoed questions of our ancestors, reverberating through time.
Scientifically speaking, an echo is a repetition of sounds produced by the reflection of sound waves from an obstructing surface. Spiritually speaking, when you send out your deepest questions—like sound waves going forth into the universe—the translucent walls you create in your own mind act as the obstructing surface. The same you, that calls out the questions, sends them right back.
Hazrat Inayat Khan’s poem, “Why?” describes this predicament:
“Why,--what are you?”
“I am the cry of the hungry mind.”
“Why,--what do you signify?”
“I am the knocker on a closed door.”
“Why,--what do you represent?”
“The owl which cannot see during the day.”
“Why, what is your complaint?”
“The irritation of the mind.”
“Why,--what is your life condition?”“”I am shut up in a dark room.”
“”Why,--how long will your captivity last?”
“All night long.”
“Why,—what are you so eagerly waiting for?”
“The day-break.”
“Why,--you yourself are the cover over the answer you want.”
We’ll only know what the soul and mind hunger for, if we let ourselves be hungry long enough to feel its presence.
In one of Rumi’s poems, he writes,
“Let yourself be silently drawn,
by the stronger pull of what you really love.”
We perhaps need not to stand in our own way to the heart of the matter; to feeling fully alive. "Follow your Bliss!” as Joseph Campbell said; it will be meaning enough.
Well, I’ve got to admit I’m also grumpy about something else.
This is the kind of subject – this particular question – that has been written about by all the great minds. It’s something that everyone has an opinion on. I’m not at all sure I have anything to add. You can pick up a million books about – you can read a zillion sermons. There are the traditional tracts; there is the new stuff I enjoy about science and religion and the new spirituality; there’s interesting stuff about God being hard-wired into human brains, or human propensity for religion found by social scientists studying the counterintuitive workings of the mind.
But, although I personally experience religion as a repository for curiosity about life, a unique opportunity to experiment with growth in relationships and creativity in expression of celebration and service, I know that I continue to feel resistant to religion in general.
When I went over to the Mosque on Rt. 7, the day they had the Open House, I had a brief conversation with one of their members. I encouraged him with questions about Islam. He was happy to tell me the basic teaching – which is that there is one God and His name is Allah, and that all people must submit to Him.
I was, of course, very pleasant and friendly -- certainly respectful – but I could feel a real shiver at my core. The thought of submission doesn’t sit well with me.
God, for me is a concept, an abstract, or at best, a poetic idea. I can handle it, but my heart isn’t there. And, if the idea of God becomes connected with total dominance, I could go ballistic! The thought of submission absolutely repulses me. I feel a visceral antagonism.
Most Gods, most religions, expect something of you. Submission, maybe – that’s a strong word -- but certainly sacrifice and discipline to some extent. I tussle with discipline, but manage to make my peace with it. I don’t do well at all when it comes to sacrifice.
Obviously I was drawn to religion; look at who I am, where I am, and, it took a lot of discipline to get here. I can only figure that I was “called” to ministry by my own strong desire to grow in certain ways. The things I resist are my growing edges toward health. Somehow I have to find my relationship to them; to move into the shadow to find the light.
Health might mean submitting to my Higher Power. I don’t know. It seems to work in the 12-step programs.
Sacrifice I can’t even begin to understand, and yet, I know I must.
The image of Jacob wrestling with the angel is more my speed. I feel combative, and yet, I feel a strong need to be blessed. Go figure!
But, somewhere in all of this is lodged that irritating question: “Why Do We/I need Religion?”
I’m a well-educated skeptic whose relationship with religion is testy, and who has a strong psycho-spiritual longing for connection with what is deeply universal. There’s a new label going around – “Neoagnostics!” That’s for people like me who, along with the skepticism, have those inexplicable metaphysical feelings. We sense something important that eludes our most trusted tools of intellect and learning, and causes ambivalence and longing. Unlike believers, we neoagnostics don’t have ready answers to the question of meaning. Unlike atheists, however, we are drawn to the possibility of something else.
I look for answers in nature, in art, in science. Winifred Gallagher, author of a lovely book called, Working on God, says this for me: “I tried to answer, or at least muffle, the question [of meaning] in all the obvious ways—love, achievement, stuff, therapy. The question always returned. … I had dismissed religion as anachronistic wish fulfillment—half Brothers Grimm, half Hallmark, dreadful at worst and limited at best—that failed to jibe with my accumulating knowledge and experience.”
What if religion could be about something else—what if I need something after all?
Why do we need religion?
Spirituality, or Religion, is a long brave search for the truth about existence. It is a long, slow process – a patient growing into wisdom. You have to be high on growth!
A particular awareness that is growing in all of us since the 1960’s is interdependence with all of life. These days, we need religion to help us to discover and be in awe of the relatedness of things.
Thich Nhat Hanh, the Buddhist monk, uses the word, Inter-Being to describe the state of harmony where all of life is seen as a whole. I’d like to share with you one of his teachings I witnessed a few years ago when he was a guest at a temple in northwest DC.
He was sitting on some pillows arranged for him on a platform in the filled auditorium. He had a piece of paper in one hand and a match in the other. He asked us to imagine all of the elements that make up the piece of paper: the pulp from the tree; the soil, the water, and the sunshine that fed the tree; the glue and dye and chemicals that were used to make the paper. He explained how the piece of paper is the tree; it was in the tree all along; it was in the seed of the tree all along. It was in the soil and sunlight that nourished the tree. If you could see deeply enough into the nature of things, you could see the piece of paper in the river water that fed the roots of the tree. You could see it in the glue and dye and chemicals that were mixed with the pulp to make the paper. Is the paper soil? Is it the tree? Is it glue, or dye? No, but without any one of these parts of the paper—stretching all the way back to the seed, the rain, the clouds, the sky, the sun—we would not have this sheet of paper. Even the person who ran the machine that mixed the pulp with the glue is in this piece of paper, and his parents, and his family, and his thoughts and feelings.
Then Thich Nhat Hanh lit the match and held it to the paper. We watched it burn. He asked, “Where is the paper now? Where is the tree? Where is the sunlight? Where is the man? Have they become the smoke? Are they these few ashes?” We all sat quietly thinking about what he said and what we experienced. Then he asked, “And now, where’s the smoke?” The air is clear. “Is the smoke those clouds? Is the paper the blue sky? Is the tree the air we are breathing?”
Thich Nhat Hanh’s paper meditation temporarily suspended our sense of the real. Distinctions between things blurred. Duality perception ceased, and unity consciousness, or an experience of Inter-Being became the reality.
Here is the same experience of Inter-Being” from the Navaho tradition. It is a prayer or meditation to take with you on the trail, or on the path:
The mountains, I become part of it.
The herb, the fir tree, I become part of it.
The morning mists, the clouds, the gathering waters,
I become part of it.
The wilderness, the dew drops, the pollen,
I become part of it.
I truly believe that, today, this is why we need religion – to bring to us the truth of existence – an awareness of the deep interdependence, connection, and oneness of all things. And then to live our lives in congruence with that oneness.
Benediction
Take courage friends.
The way is often hard, the path is never clear,
and the stakes are very high.
Take courage.
For deep down, there is another truth:
you are not alone.
--Wayne B. Arnason
Amen, Shalom, and Blessed Be!
Reading Suggestions
*Poem used for Meditation -- “The Invitation,” by Oriah Mountain Dreamer, from Dreams of Desire, published by Mountain Dreaming, 300 Coxwell Avenue, Box 22546, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M4L 2A0 in 1995.
The Seeker’s Guide: Making Your Life a Spiritual Adventure by Elizabeth Lesser, 1999, Villard Books, Random House, Inc., New York.
Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought by Pascal Boyer, 2001, Basic Books, New York.
Why Religion Matters: The Fate of the Human Spirit in an Age of Disbelief by Huston Smith, 2001, HarperCollins Publishers, New York.
Working on God by Winifred Gallagher, 2000, Modern Library and Random House (1999), New York.
Chalice Lighting Words by Albert Einstein taken from The Hand of God: Thoughts and Images Reflecting the Spirit of the Universe, Edited by Michael Reagan, 1999, Andrews McMeel Publishing, Missouri.
