One of my earliest memories is sitting on the shiny concrete floor of an elementary school gymnasium on a Sunday morning while a forgettable–but I’m sure perfectly pleasant–Methodist pastor intoned a sermon that I didn’t pay attention to a word of. The church we sporadically attended when I was young gave all the kids little play packets to distract us so we wouldn’t disrupt the adults’ worship.
The bag contained toys like blocks and coloring books. I don’t remember the details, but I remember looking forward to receiving that bag every week, the only saving grace to what I felt was a pointless and largely unpleasant experience.
After we gave up on that church, my mom led a Bible study each week with me and my brothers. I don’t remember much about that either, other than how much I whined about having to do it and that once, when we were reading the book of, um, Esther or something, so many grotesque tragedies befell the central heroine that even my mother groaned and rolled her eyes upon reading the latest one, as if to say “come on–this again?”
As soon as I was old enough to rebel successfully, I abandoned Bible study and was a perfectly sanguine atheist for the next two decades. Recently, however–to my surprise and alarm–I’ve been feeling a strange draw toward spirituality and organized religion. Being a young adult in this day and age poses its share of existential challenges, and I believe it is human nature to turn toward the cosmic when pondering such questions.
I’ve come to the conclusion that there are many reasons why spirituality and religion could and would improve my life, and perhaps the lives of others like me. Here are a few of them.
#1: Spirituality is one of the few things that may be able to calm our omnipresent anxiety
Most people my age, myself among them, are pretty concerned about dying, like, most of the time. Perhaps this is a phenomenon that every prior generation has experienced. If so…dang. That’s a bummer.
But gosh, it just feels like there are so many things that could imminently kill us, doesn’t it? Climate change, pandemics, nuclear war, radiation from AI data centers, political opponents with guns, political allies with guns…it is a truly dangerous world out there.
Much has been written about the rise in anxiety among young adults. A lot of that is probably attributable to the internet, ultraprocessed Western diets, and inherited personality traits. But I think those causes mainly contribute to our social anxiety–worries about whether people like us, or whether we will succeed at work, or whether we are inadvertently harming others.
But there is another layer of perpetual stress about our literal, physical bodies and what could happen to them at any moment. If you’re of the female persuasion, take that layer of perpetual stress and double it.
And for better or worse, one of the most straightforward ways to calm anxiety about death is by believing there is something after it. The idea that what happens to us on this mortal realm is far, far briefer than whatever cosmic fate awaits us after death sure does put our mortal concerns in perspective. Regardless of which direction you think you’ll head postmortem, believing in any form of life after death strips the actual event of death itself of much of its significance.
There are many other aspects of religious ideology that are comforting. The idea that there is a larger plan for each of us, for example, relieves much of that pesky pressure to take responsibility for our own actions.
In an age when we are constantly grasping for ways to calm our anxiety, spirituality and religion may be one of the paths of least resistance–and certainly cheaper than medication in the era of big pharma.
#2: Religion keeps our noses clean
I have always agreed with the depressing idea that true altruism doesn’t exist. I think people are motivated to behave ethically because they believe it will either bring them a reward, or that failing to do so will elicit a punishment.
Belief in a god or gods is useful, because it becomes the carrot and the stick all rolled into one.
Cultivating in oneself the belief that someone will notice if you behave badly, and inflict a consequence for that behavior, is an extremely effective deterrent for being unethical in ways that may not be socially obvious. Most of us feel pressure to behave ethically in public, but in the privacy of our own homes or our own heads, who is watching to keep us on the straight and narrow, if not god(s)?
#3: Organized religion provides us with an increasingly rare opportunity to form institutional relationships
I was talking with a much wiser and more erudite friend recently about the topic of my latest blog post–deepening emotional connections with our friends. She pointed out the many types of relationships that serve different purposes in our lives, some of which are aided by emotional connection, some of which are not. There are proximity-based relationships–the friend you text because they live five minutes away from the restaurant you want to go to. There are intellectual relationships–the friend who lives across the country but with whom you have a fascinating meeting of the minds over the phone twice a month. And so on.
My friend said that the one thing she really missed about organized religion was the built-in network of a certain type of relationship that organized religion provides. Your church people are not necessarily people you confide in emotionally. These are not necessarily people you hang out with socially. But they are people whom you could always ask to water your plants while you were on vacation. They are people who keep abreast of the major developments in your life and ask after them week after week. These are people you believe, fundamentally, wish you the best. And they are people that you have a reason–nay, an obligation–to interact with in person on a regular basis.
In modern life, there are startlingly few opportunities for what I’m calling institutional relationships (relationships formed primarily because everyone in the network of relationships belongs to the same group). The work-from-home era has eroded the traditional workplace, where many such networks could once be found. It’s no longer the norm that large extended families all live with or very close to one another. Virtual communities have largely replaced regular in-person meetings of clubs or interest-based groups.
In a society starved for connection, these institutional relationships can be very appealing. I was recently chatting with my uncle, who after retirement became the leader of several study groups within his church. He was telling me that he gets up at 4:30 in the morning–4:30 in the morning!–every Wednesday to meet his men’s group before their workday begins, and lead the Bible discussion and prayer.
Jeez, I thought to myself when I heard that. I can’t even get my friends to drive downtown on a weeknight. That is an odd and strong type of relationship, if he is willing to get up that early every week for those people.
Another comforting aspect of the institutional relationship is its ability to transcend any individual member of it–including yourself. Specific members of that institution may come, go, or change–but the group as a whole and the ties that bind them together remain unchanged. It feels like a more permanent relationship, somehow. I feel pressure to very actively maintain my friend relationships, because I believe if I stop doing so they will disappear. But if you attend a church, you belong permanently to that network of institutional relationships until you stop going or the church disbands.
But I don’t believe in god(s). What do I do?
If you’re persuaded that some level of spirituality and participation in organized religion could benefit your life, you may now be faced with a thorny obstacle: your lack of belief in god(s).
Have no fear! I, too, must work against my essential atheism. Here are a few tips I’ve picked up along the way.
#1: Don’t strive for soul-deep spiritual conviction
There are multiple types of spirituality. The purest, most idealized form is a true, soul-level belief in god(s).
Unfortunately, that is a form of spirituality that I don’t believe can be forced. You kind of either have it or you don’t–and if you’re like me, you don’t.
But there is a mid-level of spirituality that I like to call circumstantial spirituality. Basically, if you don’t think about it too hard, yeah, sure, you can believe in god(s), or at least act as if you believe in god(s) and most of the time convince yourself that you do.
I liken it to believing in ghosts. Are there ghosts? Who the heck knows! But I have a lot more fun believing in ghosts than not believing in ghosts, so if it ever comes up in conversation or in my own thoughts, I think to myself “yep I believe in ghosts” and just move on before I start questioning it too hard.
Now, is that the kind of spiritual conviction we would be proud to share with our pastor? Of course not! But I’ve found it suffices to help me achieve the first two benefits of spirituality described above (reducing anxiety about death and motivating myself to behave ethically).
If you waste time striving for soul-deep spirituality, you’ll probably still fail to achieve it–and you might be so frustrated with your failure that you can’t even pull off circumstantial spirituality.
#2: Cherry pick your beliefs
There is a school of thought among certain religious people that you can’t cherry-pick what parts of the Bible (or religious text of choice) you believe.
I could not disagree more.
Unless you cherry-pick the Bible, there is simply no ethical way to believe in the Bible. There’s too much problematic nonsense in there.
And whyever couldn’t you cherry-pick the parts of a religion to agree with? We cherry-pick what we believe about virtually every other aspect of our lives. Unless you happen to have met my twin brother, you probably don’t know a perfect person–yet you make friends anyway, by cherry-picking what aspects of their worldview and personality to remember and call to mind when you think about them. If you watch a movie and love it, you cherry-pick the good parts of it to tell your friends about later, and conveniently forget about the third-act plothole that someone pointed out on Letterboxd.
Life is all about cherry-picking, and I see no problem with cherry-picking the heck out of any religion or religions you choose. Pick the stuff you like, and believe in it! For the stuff you don’t like, either forget about it, or use one of those convenient excuses like “The Bible is written by man, who is fallible, so that’s why it’s got some major chaff mixed in with that wheat.”
#3: Practice being judged
This one might sound a little weird. But remember the second advantage of religion discussed above–that god(s) ensure you behave ethically, even when no human is around to judge you?
If you can’t find a way to believe in god(s) quite yet, practice by imagining a human person constantly watching and judging you. You can pick anyone that you ethically and morally admire. If, like me, you have an eye-wateringly virtuous father with a degree in philosophy, pick him! Pick Taylor Swift, if you’re that type of person. It doesn’t matter who you pick, it just matters that you would care if they disapproved of your actions.
Then, imagine that person constantly with you, watching everything you do, and judging you for every thought and action. Is this a particularly pleasant way to live? No. But it both provides incentive to behave ethically, and primes your mental faculties for believing in a cosmic being that is constantly judging you. It greases the wheels, as it were. If the god(s) belief is sticking in your maw, it helps it go down a little bit smoother.
Is religion fundamentally bad?
I predict that some people I know will hate this article, and bring up a whole host of reasons why organized religion is ethically problematic. And it’s true; there are so many people that religion has harmed, so many wars waged on religion’s behalf, so much bigotry and hatred excused by religious doctrine.
I take all of that very seriously. But the benefits of religion that I’ve listed above are, in my opinion, very desirable benefits, and very hard to acquire by any other means. So I’m choosing to believe there is a way to do this–there is a way to cultivate this circumstantial spirituality in such a way that I reap the benefits without participating in anything heinous toward my fellow man.
If I’m wrong, I’m damning myself to an unethical life. I guess I’ll find out at the pearly gates. Or, you know, not.
Welp! 
Leave a comment