Spirituality

“Just because religious behavior and affiliation have taken a nosedive in the last 30 years does not mean America is suddenly a secular country.” - RNS

“People are breaking free not with bolt cutters but with deeply personal acts of spiritual rebellion, rejecting the rationalized, systematized, and institutionalized religious constructs of modernity in favor of more dynamic, diverse, and syncretic expressions.” - CPost

“secular materialism is going out of style, being replaced by a renewed fascination with spirituality, the occult, and the supernatural. But this resurgent spirituality is often deeply unserious, treating actual religious doctrines like items on a buffet.” - Breakpoint

“Perhaps Solzhenitsyn was right in his Harvard address, that the Communist East and the Capitalist West were fundamentally the same–deeply materialistic at their core. If this is true, then this resurgent interest in religiosity or spirituality is simply a thin veneer that, when scratched, reveals the same old materialism and secularism.” - Mere Orthodoxy

“The growth of spiritual secularism, or secular spiritualism, does not disprove the secularization thesis, but it does reframe it.” - Breakpoint

“According to a recent article in Psychology Today, those who describe themselves as ‘spiritual but not religious,’ which is over one in five Americans, are at higher risk of mental illness compared to the religious and the non-religious.” - Breakpoint

“We’re no longer trying to argue with ardent atheists but to compel impressionable spiritualists.” - TGC

“…how those who reject the Christian religion—as in formalized membership or participation in a church or denomination—very much want to embrace some kind of spiritual community and gathering.” - Church & Culture

“But what strikes me is that characters in novels, movies, and television shows still can’t get away from SOME idea of a transcendent power that has intentions and person-like agency and meddles in their lives.” - Roger Olson

“Decades of data gathered in a single study released last fall shows that a relationship with God improves mental health and well-being, the study’s creators said Wednesday during the fourth annual International Religious Freedom Summit in Washington, D.C.” - Deseret News