Religion and Spirituality - Chapter 1

Locating Spirituality

• Working definition: spirituality designates the logic, character, or consistent quality of a person’s or a group’s pattern of living as measured before some ultimate reality.
• Inclusivity and depth:
  • Spirituality is open and inclusive; everyone has some spirituality, even when not conscious of it.
  • It is located deep within human behavior, shares a root with basic faith or trust, and bears a narrative structure that defines identity.
• primacy and order:
  • Spirituality is foundational for theology; religion aims to reflect and nurture this spirituality.
  • Ultimacy vs idol: the ultimate for which we live should be genuine ultimacy, not an idol (Tillich).
• Distinction and relation to religion:
  • There isn’t a hard, necessary line between spirituality and religion, but modernity introduced some separation (spiritual but not religious in some contexts).
  • Religion tends to be public, institutional, and social; spirituality is more fundamental and interior, serving as the source for religion.
• Two guiding reflections:
  • Part I: Understanding spirituality as a depth dimension of human life and its narrative structure; it grounds and constrains religious reflection.
  • Part II: A method for seeking spirituality through correlation of narratives, illustrated by Tillich and Ignatius Loyola.
• Key figures referenced:
  • Paul Tillich: method of correlation; ultimate vs idol; theology’s relation to spirituality.
  • Ignatius Loyola: an example of correlation in practice via the Spiritual Exercises.

The Narrative Structure of Spirituality

• Core idea: spirituality has a narrative structure that introduces time into experience (before, present, after).
• Historical and temporal consciousness:
  • Meaningful consciousness is always accompanied by memory of the past and anticipation of the future.
  • Without memory and future projection, consciousness would be trapped in the meaningless present.
• Stephen Crites on narrative time: human time is a mixture of what passes away and what endures; narratives rescue identity within passing events.
  • Ricoeur’s formulation: the temporal identity of what endures amid the passing.
• The two big meanings of human life in a story:
  • Ethical dimension: the sphere of values guiding moral decisions and commitments.
  • Metaphysical dimension: destiny or the end toward which life tends; the end game, the ultimate meaning of life.
• The aim of pursuing spirituality: to interpret and understand life in light of ultimate reality, which provides a normative center for action.
• The role of narrative in spirituality: spirituality is not merely a system of beliefs but a lived pattern of life that is intelligible through its story.
• Blondel’s influence:
  • Maurice Blondel’s Action: action as the dynamic of human existence and its interrelation with inner self; not merely external behavior but the living expression of inner agency.
  • The formula we are what we do highlights how decisions translate inner depth into outward character, while recognizing growth, decline, or change are always possible.
• Ultimacy and the “for” of life:
  • The meaning of life rests on an ultimate reference point that has ethical and metaphysical bearing.
• Summary takeaway: spirituality is an existential discipline about how life is lived in relation to ultimacy; it can be studied across traditions and disciplines, but must be anchored in patterns of human living before ultimate reality.

Priority of Spirituality to Religion and Theology

• Definitions and contrasts:
  • Religion: set of beliefs, values, and practices identifying ultimate reality and the relationship to practitioners; tends to be public, social, and institutional.
  • Spirituality: inner logic of life and pattern of living oriented toward ultimacy; the source that religion and theology reflect and nourish.
  • Theology: critical appropriation and nourishment of spirituality; it presupposes spirituality and depends on it for its subject matter.
• Hierarchy and interdependence:
  • Spirituality is prior to religion; religion is prior to theology.
  • Theology divorced from spirituality bears no perceptible relation to reality; spirituality provides the subject matter for theology.
• Religion’s function in culture:
  • Religion can be the substance of a culture only if it supports and expresses the spirituality of those who live in that culture.
  • Without relevance to daily life, organized religion struggles to sustain itself.
• Public vs private spirituality:
  • The separation of religion and spirituality in modern times does not imply that religion must be discarded; rather, religion should reflect and support the deeper spirituality that undergirds it.
• Final claim:
  • Spirituality is prior to religion and to theology; it is the source of religion’s content and the mediator of theological reflection.

Finding One’s Spirituality

• The central problem: how does one locate a viable spirituality in a plural, often secular, environment?
• Typical paths and tensions:
  • Some are socialized into a tradition and later critically reappropriate it to shape their spirituality.
  • The aphorism that one can be spiritual but not religious describes a modern condition that complicates reappropriation of public spiritualities.
• Three guiding observations to understand how one seeks spirituality: 1) Private vs public spirituality:
  • Augustine’s story: private searching without public tradition can be unfulfilling; his turning point was to turn to a public tradition for guidance.
  • Sandra Schneiders on private spirituality: an idiosyncratic stance with no external authority can lack doctrinal claims, moral authority, or social responsibility; commitment tends to be limited without institutional or communal affiliation.
  • Implication: some degree of communal or institutional affiliation helps sustain commitment.
    2) Sacred vs mundane narratives:
  • Stephen Crites distinguishes sacred narratives (which shape identity over time) from mundane narratives (everyday life events).
  • Sacred narratives are large, internalized, and often transcend conscious control; mundane narratives ground those stories in daily reality.
  • A conscious spirituality requires critical appropriation of sacred narratives to orient everyday life.
  • Quotations: sacred stories big in scope, mundane stories bring them down to earth and interact critically with them.
    3) Pluralism as a given and grace as unconditional:
  • Pascal’s wager was for a simpler religious landscape; in plural urban environments, many religions and subcultures exist, and God's grace, if unconditional, should be available noncompetitively.
  • Still, one must navigate innumerable narratives to find a viable spirituality noncompetitively.
• Toward a method: correlate personal and sacred narratives (Tillich’s program)
  • Tillich’s hermeneutical lineage: Schleiermacher → Heidegger → Bultmann → Gadamer → Ricoeur.
  • Knowledge is interpretation; interpretation occurs from inside the interpreter’s own story; we cannot escape our own standpoint.
  • Tillich’s correlation: place past narratives into dialogue with present existential questions; the public content of faith is drawn from revelatory events, while the present question gives form to interpretation.
  • The content of the public narrative (e.g., Christian faith) is found in its revelatory events and historical sources; interpretation must be in dialogue with existential questions.
  • Fusion of narratives: the public spirituality and the individual’s narrative fuse; the interpretation illuminates both sides and creates freedom for the seeker. The fusion is bidirectional.
• Practical aim: an authentic correlation requires the inquirer’s existential engagement; authenticity cannot be judged solely by external cultural details.

The Example and Technique of Ignatius Loyola

• Ignatius as illustrative case:
  • Basque noble (1491–1556); life of courtier, pilgrim, Jesuit founder; conversion after a battle wound; initiation of the Spiritual Exercises.
  • The conversion and the Exercises began with a focus on gospel narratives, saints’ lives, and a deliberate ordering of life around Christ.
• Three points drawn from Ignatius that demonstrate correlation of narratives: 1) Ignatius’s conversion owes much to narrative power:
  • While recovering, he read a life of Christ and saints; two saints (Dominic and Francis) inspired him to imitate their paths.
  • He copied the words of Jesus from the gospels and set out as a pilgrim to imitate Christ’s life.
    2) The structure and aim of the Spiritual Exercises:
  • The “Call of the King” considers Jesus as leader; the seeker is invited to join a campaign under a superior ruler who embodies the divine will.
  • Jesus is presented not only as someone to be adored but as a leader to be followed; the imitation of Christ forms the center of this spirituality.
  • The Exercises order life around the rule of God: justice, care for the oppressed, critique of power, and love for enemies.
  • The correlation of lives and fusion of narratives is the core to the Exercises’ effectiveness.
    3) The experiential method of the Exercises:
  • The basic units are contemplations of scenes from Jesus’ life; contemplations cover Jesus’ birth, public ministry, passion, death, resurrection, and appearances.
  • Practitioners imagine themselves within the gospel scenes, hearing voices and participating in actions; this imaginative immersion is the bridge across time.
  • Practitioners then bring the stories forward into their own lives by correlating their possibilities with the gospel narrative.
• The broader takeaway from Ignatius: the Exercises exemplify how a public sacred narrative can be correlated with an individual life to reorder one’s spirituality and align it with ultimate reality.
• Pluralism and universality: Ignatius’s approach shows that correlation of narratives is not unique to Christianity; similar correlation is possible across religious and nonreligious traditions, supporting a pluralistic spiritual landscape.

The Question for Religion in the Twenty-First Century

• The central question: will religion continue to be the substance of culture in a new critical, global, plural world culture?
• The proposed answer:
  • Religion can only claim the status of the substance of culture if it actively supports and expresses the spirituality of those living in that culture.
  • If religious life becomes mere institutional behavior with little bearing on daily life, it cannot sustain itself.
  • Religion should offer a narrative that is relevant to the spirituality of a culture; doctrine and moral codes remain necessary but exist to support spiritual integrity.
• Positive reframing:
  • The tradition’s stories must take precedence over mere doctrinal systems; spirituality remains the core substance of culture.
  • The goal is to nurture spirituality with new possibilities for human freedom and commitment, enabling a public spirituality that remains autonomous yet interpretable in personal lives.
• Closing takeaway:
  • Spirituality is the substance of a new world-culture; enduring religious life depends on nurturing that spirituality and providing meaningful, noncompetitive paths for belief and action in a plural world.