Monday, January 12, 2009

A lesson from last year

Well ok - from this December:
Faith and religion…I thought I could live with just the one, and learned I could not, then I thought I had to have both at the same time, but I'm coming to realize that I do not. That my faith must be separate from my religion or the other will erode – that my faith must feed my religion, else the other may corrupt.

5 comments:

murat11 said...

Not that I agree, but amusingly, on a recent Bill Moyers special, one of the spiritual figures opined: "Now, you'll never find God in church..."

jsd said...

murat: oh, that's so sad...especially since each person brings God to church with them, whether they're aware of it or not. but, it is beautiful when the Holy Spirit makes an appearance.

Lee said...

Ok, I read this several times and I'm still struggling with the concept. Can you please expand on it more? I'm really not seeing how the two affect each other as you describe. This might be me not thinking in the same definition of terms or it may be a new intereactive concept I haven't considered yet. Whichever, I'd really like to understand this. It might provide some needed info on my own concerns about my spirituality/faith.

Per yur comment to Paschal, Yes! It is indeed beautiful when the holy spirit pops out and affects things. So intense, and so loving.

Hugs!

jsd said...

lee: i'll try. you can have faith without having religion. some people have religion but no faith.

faith for me is about my relationship with God.

religion is the flavor, the language that I use to speak about my faith, and religion provides a community.

My relationship with God should not be dependent upon my religion (i.e. my community). But faith should be shared within a community.

The ideal situation is when your religious community feeds your faith - when you feel like you've arrived at a homecoming.

I leave the rest for you.

Lee said...

That makes much sense. Thank you! Faith def. fits mine. I hadn't thought of religion in those terms. To me it was more of a structure and set of attitudes pulled out of faith and scripture. Your def. of it helps me see how it provides more and how it interacts. I've been in a church that felt like a homecoming. It was wonderful. Back then I called it "being fed". It was a much more free wheeling church than Rec is, but as I enter more areas of service I'm finding more feeding here. There have definitely been some holy spirit moments, best one was during communion. Have you read purpose driven life? I just read a blurb on a Facebook group page about it and what it teaches (nutshell view). I think that book is in my future so I joined that group. Now I need to get a copy, read it, and then put into practice.

Hugs!