This semester our college group is using as a guide during our Tuesday Night Bible Study the Brian McLaren book, Naked Spirituality. We have had two excellent Bible studies to date, marked by spirited conversation, small group study of Bible passages, and reflection. Our group doesn’t shrink from honest, deep thinking when it comes to studying the issues of our time and how the Bible speaks to us about them.
Naked Spirituality addresses the basis of belief, the tenets and premises on which true religion is built. McLaren defines ‘religion’ by using it’s root — ‘lig’ as in ligament — to explain that pure religion is that which binds us together, as ligaments connect bone to bone in the body. This true religion allows all of us — the bones — to work together as we were meant to do.
Spirituality is addressed four ways. First, being ‘spiritual’ means that life has a sacred dimension, separate from facts and figures. Second, being spiritual may mean recognizing the fragility of organized religion, and the many ways we can let our ‘religion’ run off-course. Third, spirituality entails seeing a sacredness in the integration of the physical and the spiritual, seeking to be genuine in our approach to life. And fourth, spiritual people seek ways to nurture the sense of holiness in and around them.
Join me as I pray for our young adults, as they seek to live as genuinely spiritual folk in this everyday world.