religion vs spirituality
Seems like these two words are having a serious battle these days. Are you religious or are you spiritual but non-religious, can you be one without the other, and why does it even matter? Before you go off the deep-end with that last comment, yes I know there is a difference and I’m sure it is important to many. Not so much to me. I’m not sure I like dabbling in either of those two worlds.
A good friend of mine sent me a link today of 10 Reasons You Should Never Have A Religion. The post is certainly provocative. It made me think. It made me sad.I see some errors in his writing that are glaring, but my post will not be so much about that.
It made me think because I wonder how much I have given in to many of the things he writes. It made me sad because stereotypes exist for a reason and apparently Christianity has presented itself as a bunch of ignorants who don’t know why they believe what they believe, and this is the side of me that agrees with Steve Pavlina. However, I’ve searched for the ways out, I’ve wrestled with the facts that history presents. It takes pages and pages of books upon books to relay the conclusions I have come up with, clearly I can’t do that here.
So, I’ve got a homework assignment for the small band of you that read regularly. Go take the time to read Steve’s site. Wrestle with it, come to some conclusions and leave a response here of why you think Steve is right or wrong. This will do two things: first, it will give you the opportunity to leave a comment for Steve since he apparently doesn’t allow those on his site, at least for this post; and secondly, it sort of disproves his whole premise, the theme running throughout the entire post (though he may deny this) that Christians can’t think for themselves.
Steve Pavlina
Wednesday, 28th May 2008 at 7:15 am
FYI comments and discussion are encouraged on all articles. On StevePavlina.com comments are handled via the Vbulletin forums. Without this system (or something similar), spammers would overwhelm the built-in WordPress comments. IMO this works better than most blog comment systems because visitors can start their own threads too.
The comment thread for the religion piece can be found here:
http://www.stevepavlina.com/forums/steve-pavlina/18646-10-reasons-you-should-never-have-religion-blog.html
There have been dozens of comments so far.
Heath
Wednesday, 28th May 2008 at 11:49 am
I’m not sure I can internalize and give very much thought to anything Steve said in his post. I believe his post was pure link bait and was written for the sole reason of generating traffic to his website. I would expect his article to hit the front page of Digg.com in a day or so. This post looks nothing like his other posts. This is one of the problems with blogging it’s very hard to discern if someone is being sincere or not. I personally don’t want to add to the buzz around his article anymore than I already have. On a good note it’s exciting to see that Christianity can generate so much buzz. If you read the comments there are several really good rebuttals to Steve already.
Heaths last blog post..James 5
jc
Wednesday, 28th May 2008 at 4:08 pm
I’ll be honest, that was way too long to read in entirety, so I skimmed most of it. It is sad that Steve has such a narrow view of Christianity. It is also sad that Christians are the main cause of his perception. It is interesting that he believes Christians are incapable of thinking for themselves, when most of what I read in this post was not original thinking either. I have heard similar arguments well before Steve Pavlina decided to blog. I will agree that there are self proclaimed Christians that do not know why they believe what they believe, and that is sad. But, mindless following can be found behind most any line of thinking…agnostics, atheists, muslims, republicans, democrats, you name it. The only thing I would like to say to Steve is, I am sorry for what we as Christians have done to create such bitter taste.
jcs last blog post..Prayer (part 3): His will be done
Healic
Thursday, 29th May 2008 at 1:20 am
I read about steve’s “10 reasons” and I couldn’t agree more.I no longer go to church myself for the simple reason I realised that I was not growing.It was the same rituals every sunday and I remember at one time walking out of church in the middle of the sermon.It felt like I had slammed the door on God’s face but I told Him to understand for I couldn’t take it any more.Most of our churches are specialising in making people feel guilty and fearful.I have always questioned the rationale of church going and the teachings people are taught.Anytime you disagree with anything it becomes the devil is feeding you the wrong ideas.Honestly people,could it be that we humans have created God into our image and likeness?We have limited and tied God to our narrow thinking and left the bigger picture. Most churches and sects thrive because they emasculate people’s perception of their God given abilities and also most of us don’t want to be responsible for running our own lives.
Scott Fillmer
Thursday, 29th May 2008 at 4:33 am
I have to agree with Heath here a little, I do think some of this was link bait, but the content came from somewhere. I think besides the traffic it generated for him, seeing the response above, at least it has generated some discussion on actual topics, that is good.
jc
Thursday, 29th May 2008 at 10:22 am
To Healic: Are you growing now that you are not going to an organized church? I believe that a lot of Christian “churches” have drifted from the true foundation and purpose of the church established Acts. However, I believe there are organized churches (and I feel like I am apart of one) where the goal is to breakdown the molds that tradition has formed of church and to (pardon the cliche pun) “be the church” to the community, and to the world around us by spreading the love of Christ, which is what the original church was tasked with doing. I am somewhat confused by your comment because most what you typed leads me to think that you believe in God. However, if you actually agree with everything Steve said as your first line indicates then maybe not. If you are a believer, I am curious what you are personally doing to spread the love of Christ around the world without being involved in a community of believers? (If not, nevermind that question) I am not saying that you have to be a part of an organized church to do this, because the original church went out on their own, but it sure helps now that there are more than a handful of believers in the world. IMO the arms of many can reach out much further. Just curious.
Velvet
Sunday, 1st June 2008 at 2:33 am
I agree with Healic. People don’t want to believe it because it’s like letting go of something. You feel that you’re being attacked. I have felt like that, from my old religion when others talked bad about it. But it’s so true, you don’t grow. Ever sense I left my religion I felt so much free, life is hard but I can experience different roots instead of taking just one. That is the problem with religion you tend to take one root in life, not different options in life. That is what life is all about experiencing different roots in life. I don’t blame my religion, I believe it was an awakening for my personal growth. You don’t have to be in a group to give love and be apart of something. We are all one in life. I just see it an ego thing, we want to be part of something to feel connected. When we are already connected as one.
Jim Mroczko
Sunday, 1st June 2008 at 6:29 pm
As I read Steve’s article I couldn’t help but feel that we’ve hurt so many in the quest for a relationship with “God”! I was raised Catholic and can believe by his comments that Steve is basing the “Christian Religion” on the virtues and doctrine of Catholicism. There are portiions of his commentary that every pastor or ministry leader needs to listen and understand the depth of frustation that has made him run away from organized religion. I am very passionate about the need to qualify that I prefer to consider myself a follower of Jesus rather than a card carrying Christian. Steve’s article is proof of an opinion I’ve had for years as it relates to denominations and organized religion – denominations have done more to push people away from the Kingdom and can be used as a tool of the evil one. Our pulpits tend to promote a great deal of the material that Steve accuses of – that part I agree! If we choose to worship or exercise our “religion” by showing up on Sunday to have all truth imparted during the course of a 30 minute message, and then go about our normal day to day then you are being spoon fed. As a disciple of Jesus we have a reasponsibility to know who He is both by knowledge but by relationship as well. As i read other replies above, i hear tendencies that are common in our churches today that we have to be gathered in a building called a church in order to be an active club member but in order to be part of the true church, it is about the body of Christ which is us as a disciple of Jesus. Matthew 18:20 clearly says that wherever 2 or 3 are gathered in His name He is there. Though I enjoy going to the church building on Sunday my support and growth comes during the week when I get together with my brothers and dive deeply into the Word. Religion has no place in my life, itks the spirituality that is a direct result of an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. The Acts church is a good model for defining “church” – a body of believers sold out to communicating the good news walking under the power of the Holy Spirit. I could write a lot more from my heart on this but won’t. The last thing I’ll comment on is another good topic for your next one Brian – Steve said that Faith is Fear and I would suggest that to have fear would mean lack of faith and to have complete faith would then be an abandonment of fear!!! In summary intimacy in the relationship with Jesus Christ is the gauge of spirituality and all religion signifies is the status in the club – in my opinion.
Cyllya
Wednesday, 18th June 2008 at 4:13 pm
Steve’s not saying you shouldn’t believe in God (or your equivalent). He’s just saying:
(a) Before you decide you believe in God, you should decide whether you REALLY believe in God or just think of yourself as believing in Him because your parents told you anyone who doesn’t is a Bad Person and you haven’t really thought about it since.
(b) Don’t believe in priests, rabbis, etc as if they were God. They’re actually just humans, and may not be very nice ones.
(c) Just be sensible, etc…. E.g. don’t act like you think a particular book IS God Himself–a God that’s not capable of analogy, no less.
If you personally have a logical productive reason for going to church, I’d guess Steve would probably agree with you.
@Heath: I don’t know, I think it seems similar to his other posts. Higher on the provocative scale, sure, but it’s not like everything he does is very tame.
Enoch Tan
Wednesday, 30th July 2008 at 9:40 am
Hi,
I read Steve’s post on Religion some time ago, and now I have finally released a free article on my paid membership site which is The Answer for Christians regarding his rebuttal against Christianity. What Steve says is only a half truth, but alas he can’t see past his judgements regarding Christianity.
Here is the link to the free article on my website:
http://www.mindreality.com/majority-of-christian-theory-is-so-incorrect
(The Majority of my articles are protected with hidden content that are exclusively for paid members)
Regards,
Enoch Mind Reality
Douglas Nidoi
Monday, 8th September 2008 at 4:34 am
Steve Pavlina’s comes across as a trully great mind who is trying his best to be relevant to the needs of the world in this day and age, but needless to say, his efforts are somehow misguided.
Most personal development Gurus, love to think they have discovered ..or are on their way to discovering the one silver bullet, that will solve all the world’s problems, and in most cases couldn’t be further from the truth.
If only Steve knew how much true christianity agreed with him on values such as Compassion, love, personal development, and several other issues that he regularly discusses on his blog, maybe he’d not be so much against christianity.
1. God is love ..not the catholic church ..nor anyone that assumes to represent him. Any disambiguation of the two, would be a grave mistake.
2. True prayer according to true christianity is not a constant pleading to a stiff necked God who does not care, but the ability to stand up as a christian, loved by God to create from your spoken word what did not exist before, because of who you are in Christ.
New convenant prayer is indeed prophecy.
Check out cyberanger.blogspot.com/2007/09/short-sermons-by-pastor-joseph-prince.html – 43k -
3. All this nonsense about subjective reality, and objective reality is ..to say the least, needless because if an individual is going through life, peering at it through all these “lenses”, one might wake up one day to be shocked to discover that truth was staring them in the face all this while, to which they chose to be oblivious.
All other things being equal, the simplest solution is normally the best. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_Razor
4. “Truth” and “reality” are two completely different things. One acid test for truth is that it doesnt change, or morph with time, it’s timeless. Personal development theories, Church doctrines, philosophies, individuals, belief systems, moral values, religous organizations ..all these change with time. The only thing that does not change with time is “Truth”. Truth in the person of Christ.
It is no wonder that even a mind, with such an unusually high IQ like Steve’s on attempting to read the bible concludes thus:
“By putting forth confusing and internally conflicting information, your logical mind (i.e. your neocortex) is overwhelmed. ”
The Bible says our thoughts (reality) are not God’s thoughts(Truth) ..it is for this same reason that Jesus became truth, to show us what Truth is. Had it not been for this our human faculties, would never have been able to understand truth.
Attempting to explain truth to our present consciousness and awareness as a reality outside this logic would be like explaning the internet to an ant, or fitting a 3 dimensional model on a two dimensional scale.
This is precisely why Jesus came. For an experience of reality, one can look to anything ..the catholic church, lucid dreams e.t.c. ..however for an experience of Truth look to JESUS alone. And this, it has to be said is not a limbic or primitive mode of thinking.
5. Steve likes to criticize those who follow the OR model as dogmatic thinkers who dont know what it is to look throuth the SR model. This he says is, unlike those who subscribe to the SR model who at least have an idea what it feels like to peer through the lens of the OR model.
Using this same logic may I pose this question to steve. Can you objectively verify that you know what it feels like to have a personal relationship with the person of Christ? (not ..serve as an altar boy ..nor read the holy scriptures, or anything else that might be perceived as a misconstrued substitute for a personal relationship with Chirst)
Only when this question can he be answered in positive, does it make sense for an attack on christianity.
6. Steve call’s the time spent in Christianity a waste of time. He calls it a “toilet bowl management system” Steve however would be surprised to discover how temporal and insignificant his alleged “precious minutes of time” eventually are in the general scheme of things.
Albert Enstein once said “the only reason why time exists, is so that everything does not happen at once”
What do you do with a linear scale of infinite length ..like that of time?
From a strategic point of view what matters more? ..is it the direction the linear scale is going (heaven or hell) …or the measurements of that scale?( ..in the grand scheme of things)
Check out http://douglasnidoi.blogspot.com/
7. Steve likes to refer to the ego (the soul) ..and the consciousness or awareness (the spirit man) …Like most of the information on Steve’s site, if identified by more accurate names most of the information on Steve’s site is actually not new to most theologians.
What most personal development gurus will never admit to …is that 90% percent of their most effective strategies are got straight from the teachings of Christ, and just because they dont know it yet, ..does not mean it is not true.
8. Steve says he came to restore precision to the field of Psychology, because ..and I’ll paraphrase “…he is a trained computer programmer who was shocked to discover how much Gray, there was in the field of psychology as opposed to the Black and White he employed to such great success in the computer gaming and shareware industry.”
This apparently may seem to make sense but there’s probably a good reason why fixing the ..never ending problems of the human race might not have, so be so analogous to fixing a bug in a computer application.
The Human being was the creator’s master piece, and its going to take more than one life time of dedicated study of literature on personal growth and personal development to fix the problem’s of mankind.
I’d suggest checking up with the creator’s manual. The BIBLE.
9.Dismissing christianity on the basis of the 10,000 year timeline from creation to now is besides the point. And even if it were the point, there are several congruent arguments that more compatible with mainstream scientific thought on the issues of geology, cosmology and the age of the Earth. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Earth_creationism)
10. On his blog Steve states thus :
“Faith is the coward’s substitute for courage. It’s also really good marketing if you’re the one who controls the faith. If you’re afraid or unwilling to assume total responsibility for your life, you’re a perfect match for religion.”
True faith is in christ. Not in man made religions. Because this faith is based on a knowledge of a love that remains steadfast no matter what, it eventually casts out fear. Fear to fail(..which is the single most motivation for taking up personal development theories in the first place), Fear of rejection, fear to relate and so many others.
It is fallacious to claim that the entire christendom structure thrives on striking fear in the hearts of men.
That claim may apply to just some religous denominations, but not all denominations, and definately not Christ himself.
God is love! He has enough money and he most certainly does not love people to get money from their pockets into his coffers. Rather it is the opposite; He lives to love and is thrilled at the prospect of getting money from his coffers and filling those pockets. Just becasuse God is modest, and does not leave a visible trinklets and trail coins from his treasure house to the pockets of Christians does not mean this is not true.
Josh
Monday, 15th December 2008 at 2:36 am
I think alot of you seem to be confusing his address of religion with a personal attack on God, Jesus, etc. He’s not saying that it’s stupid to believe in them or that it’s wrong. He is saying (if I understand it correctly) that people accept things too readily and become intolerant of everything else. They give their trust and credibility to someone who shouldn’t have it. You can establish and believe in God, and Jesus without religion. He is saying that people give up their thinking, ideas, and minds to religion, rather than thinking it through. Steve’s article is eloquent, and is my favorite read on the site so far, its written with a passion that has something to say I enjoyed it!
Joshs last blog post..The Skeptics Universe
Jessica
Thursday, 18th December 2008 at 2:27 pm
I love Jesus Christ,I have searched many many Gods & Goddesses,and you know what there lacking life. Jesus has my back,He is my best friend my personal confidante,and my King.
Do you know why arrogant people hate Christianity so much,it is because they don’t get it,their minds and spirit choose to be closed.Also Christianity is a very very easy target to mock. Jesus doesn’t sit around and try to stop infantile tantrums. Now I would really be quite interested to see Steve and the other babies mock Muhammed,Islam or their followers. Would not be the smartest action would it? And I am NOT religious to my husband kids or pets,I love them,therefore I am not religious to Jesus because He too is part of my family and my life.Not all Catholics and Baptists are blind sheep, they love their beliefs and would also like to be respected too. I sense religous desparation with many many Law of Attraction followers,but so what,with a little bit of education,a job application,and networking,you would be amazed at the “secret” that is the REAL Law of Attraction : action! And yes you just might find the “darkworkers” may be your best allies in helping you to attain those items just ask them!
steve
Monday, 12th January 2009 at 5:27 am
The post seems filled with hate and fear to me, not the ideas of a balanced and open mind.