Spiritual
discussions: don’t hear many of those in
the workplace or locker room. In fact, I
do not recall many deeply personal spiritual discussions in church either.
In the
modern, western world, “spiritual” discussion too often means nothing remotely
personal, but more a political bludgeoning to convince the other person they
are wrong. Little wonder spiritual
topics are taboo in polite company. As
for spiritual discussions in church and temple, what if your deeply personal
spiritual experience is not exactly like everyone else’s, and worse, what if it
is not in perfect lockstep alignment with authority and doctrine?! No, church, temple, and mosque are no place
for deeply intimate, spiritual expression.
Then
there are various shamanic, new agey, ancient cum ultra-modern gatherings, but
in those you better tow the line and not dare mention your traditional,
doctrinal, monotheistic beliefs.
Meaningful,
deep, complex, profound, open, personal, intimate, tolerant, welcome, accepting
spiritual conversation….wow!….Wouldn’t that be great?!…..to talk about, and
listen to, that which makes you more than meat?!
In the
last 50 years in the United States a revolution occurred. After multiple centuries of a socially
enforced code of silence, people finally began to talk about the taboo and
forbidden “s” topic….(said in a furtive whisper) sex! (OK, I shouted it). But shattering that taboo was child’s play
compared to tolerating discussion of personal, intimate spiritual
experience. When you think about it, sex
is not really that personal. We pretty
much all share one set or the other of the same parts. How they work and the basics of what we do
with them really only have a few significant variations, if you do not include
details of clothing and angles. Maybe
the great revelation of the sexual revolution was that even in extreme
variations of style, we pretty much share similar basic mechanics and needs.
Today if
you want to talk about something intimate, embarrassing, personal, unique,
individual, and potentially socially unacceptable, bring up….s-p-i-r-i-t-u-a-l-i-t-y (this time I did whisper).
Your hot
date, menstrual cramps, and lust for the new employee are now perfectly
acceptable topics. Daughters teach
mothers about sex, almost nothing has been sold in the United States for 35
years without sex in its advertising, and if you want to be a social pariah,
announce to the world that you do not approve of discussing sex.
But
personal spiritual topics?!….oh my gosh, watch the lunch table clear out if you
start talking about your thoughts on the nature of eternal life. Listen to the awkward silence if you confess
a sense of empty purposelessness, or worse, watch bystanders flee in horror if
you bubble about the morning’s profound serenity as you communed with
sustaining spirits.
Nonchalantly
drop a comment about your Barbie Doll fetish and no one will bat on eye, but
comment on the spiritual tearing of the soul you feel in the presence of
conflict and your friends may deny knowing you.
Five or
six decades of exaggerated openness about sex were supposed to leave us
emotionally healthier. Maybe they did or
didn’t, or maybe they would have if marketers had not coiled around the
opportunity to pervert a good and natural aspect of life into a dominant
priority of life, pursued by the media with a religious ferocity. But we have to ask if those decades of sexual
liberation and commercial exploitation also left us feeling more like meat.
It is
after all, not our sex that makes us human.
However you define and perceive that other (still taboo) “s” word
(spirituality), it is the distinguishing trait of humanity. Aren’t we terribly limiting our ability as a
culture and as individuals to become more human when we proscribe
discussion of personal spirituality?
When we
could not discuss sex, undiagnosed and unrecognized emotional and physical woes
left people wondering in private “what’s wrong with me?”
What
personal and societal afflictions now beset us because, outside the dogmatic
constraints of one’s own denomination, open
– accepting - tolerant discussion of that which makes us more than meat, that
personal experience of the heart that defines our individual humanity, is not
socially acceptable? (Make no mistake, scientists, new agers, and
wiccans can be as dogmatic and intolerant as any Baptist or Wahhabist) Will spirituality ever experience the
liberalization that sexuality experienced in western culture?
Spirituality
lacks the profit driven commercial opportunity that made media and marketing
the powerful allies of sexual liberation.
Spiritual liberation will occur not as societal revolution fueled by
magazine covers and our own lusty passions.
Spiritual liberation will occur only when one person courageously speaks
from the heart and when one person compassionately listens.
Spiritual
liberation will not entail mere discussion of beliefs. How academic, technical, and ultimately
shallow is intellectual belief.
Spiritual liberation will occur when we can give voice to personal,
living, intimate, spiritual experience.
Do we even have words for such expression? Perhaps we have not needed words, for there
was no one to listen. But wouldn’t it be
great if there were, and in the resulting exchange and discovery of words, we
gave and received affirmation that we are more than meat.
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