Sermon on Interspirituality

Interfaith is easy to explain but the Interspiritual part of this new spirituality is a little more complex. It is very personal to each of us and, I believe most importantly, it's transcendent. It breathes new meaning to spirituality in a culture mired in consumerism and self-centered fear. Interspiritual means we may or may not believe in a Higher Power. It means that we can live deeply spiritual lives without ever stepping foot into a church, synagogue, mosque or the like.  It means we don’t have to define each other as one religion or another. It means that how we live our lives and treat others is more important that what any one of us believes in, or what we think know about God, Nature or the Universe.

Interspirituality is transcendent because the simple of peace of interfaith gives us the room for a new spirituality that is not always rooted in a historical tradition but springs from, dwels in and resonates with diversity, diversity of people, diversity of spiritual practices, diversity of thought.

Why am I personally involved in this Interspiritual movement? I believe, our institutions have failed us, spiritually, politically and culturally.  For me, many of these spiritual institutions left us without a spiritual community that was open to change, open to all people regardless of sex, sexual identity, creed, religion or lack of religion.

These institutions failed to adapt to the ever advancements of science and simply the reality of evolution and earth science on this planet.  They stuck their heads in the sand in held onto to practices and ideas that are quite frankly outdated and sexist. I am not saying anything that is not true. Simply stating what we all know but are on some level afraid to face.

Please don’t misunderstand my intention, it is not to bash religion.  Those of you who know me, know that I respect and even cherish religion as base of spirituality.  I believe that the great religions of the world gave us the framework for living a spiritually based life.

What we humans have done with that framework, well sometimes I am ashamed of us…  I know what we are like with the framework that gave us the Ten Commandments, the Eightfold Path, the Vedas, and the Tao. I can’t imagine what our global community would be like without these things. I know what we are like with them.

So what about Interspiritual makes it different from traditional paths?

I mentioned the transcendent part earlier, for me, similarly to the way those institutions failed us, on the Interspiritual path each of us needs to continue to change and grow in our own spirituality.

The God, Goddess or idea of a power greater than ourselves we had as children needs to mature within us.

You see, when our love of life and each other becomes shaken because these spiritual and societal institutions behaved in ways that we feel are not acceptable;  When our love of life and each other becomes shaken because life on life’s terms proves that really bad things happen to good people; when our love of life and each other is shaken from the loss of a loved one, or a relationship becomes so toxic we have to sever it;   When our love of life and each other is shaken to the core of our being, (long pause) we have no choice but to grow spiritually.  How many of you have experienced this type of spiritual growth?  I am not a masochist and I don’t believe that spiritual growth requires this type of pain, but I know from firsthand experience that it is when life takes my breath away that I grow the most spiritually.

We as spiritual beings know intuitively that there is more to this life than meets the eye.  More to living and dying and breathing than quite frankly anything anyone including science has an explanation of.

And we all know intuitively we don’t need priest or other clergy between us and this Spirit.  We know the places we feel it, and we know when we are farthest from it. Most days it is as close as our breath, if we stop to look for it.  This for me is an Interspiritual approach to spirituality. It means that my path is not your path, even though we may meander the same paths together for a time. I will learn from you and you will learn from me and we will learn from each other.

Collectively and individually we will do the one thing the traditional institutions have failed us with, we will change and grow spiritually in spite of them and sometimes in spite of ourselves.  We will find a path to love of life that works for us. So maybe they did not fail us at all, maybe they are facilitating our transformation.