(Video) Spirituality in the Modern World
“Spirituality that takes us away from our humanity isn’t grounded in reality”.
With deep faith running in my family lineage and ancestral line, I, as a teenager, dared to wonder off the bitten path.
I left God; the one who lived in the sky, who was a male and who I was supposed to fear. I also left formal religious institutions struggling to find myself there.
I felt drawn to seek other expressions of the Divine and the mystical.
I became a seeker.
On my path, I studied with spiritual teachers who shared their wisdom and knowledge with me and other students. I read, ferociously. I searched for the mystical in sacred sites.
Enamored, at first, with the freedom and love that spirituality offered; with time, I started to see the shadow of spirituality and spiritual leaders.
I started naming some of my personal truths as they were revealed to me:
Spirituality that tells people to use practices to work “their process”, while ignoring injustice, racism and oppression embedded in the systems we live in, is limited.
Spirituality that only focuses on love and ignores “negative emotions” such as, grief and anger, will drive people into unhealthy relations.
Spirituality that ignores personal power and only invests in growing the power of the “authority” figure, isn’t based on equality.
Spirituality that turns away from war and genocide and says there isn’t right or wrong, is inhumane and promotes indifference.
Spirituality that doesn’t allow feminine expression of the divine is patriarchal and disrespectful of women, especially the power they hold.
Spirituality that says that pain and trauma can be dealt with in a meditation practice is based on denial.
Spirituality that has no room for difference or diversity and comes from the perspective of white privilege, isn’t inclusive.
Spirituality that doesn’t listen to concerns and feedback of people in the community, is avoidant and isn’t relational.
If this topic speaks to you, I invite you now to reflect on what spirituality or religion mean to you.
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