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I started calling myself a "spiritual atheist" a couple of decades and some back. Since then, I've come and gone from that label, and maybe refined what it means to me, but it's still the core of my faith, or lack of.
I do not believe in any power beyond the dispassionate mechanics of the universe and human will.
I do believe that ritual and ceremony are an integral part of what it means to be human, to exercise that will
To find meaning to our lives when the universe offers none. To let us find ourselves in the complexity of our consciousness. To bring us together in communion and community, because we are a social species.
If you honour me by including me in your ritual, I will do so with full respect. I will not believe what you believe, but I will believe in you and the importance of what you do.
In recent years, I've been calling myself Humanist. Because that's a label that doesn't (as often) need explaining. It's frequently there as a tick-box. It's close enough to who I am to say that I would want a Humanist funeral, for example. But I think it's still missing the sense of spirituality that's part of the human experience. It's so difficult to describe how I experience it. How rituals of faith simultaneously have meaning and are meaningless.
And, as I light a candle to mark the solsice at the turning point in my Secular Syncretic Season of Lights, I realise that this is something that has drifted out of my life in recent years, as I've lived in isolation, and had nobody to share even a private communion with.
I don't know what to do with this realisation. But as with the meaningful meaningless rituals, I note it, and let the dispassionate universe bring what it will into the space I give it.
I do not believe in any power beyond the dispassionate mechanics of the universe and human will.
I do believe that ritual and ceremony are an integral part of what it means to be human, to exercise that will
To find meaning to our lives when the universe offers none. To let us find ourselves in the complexity of our consciousness. To bring us together in communion and community, because we are a social species.
If you honour me by including me in your ritual, I will do so with full respect. I will not believe what you believe, but I will believe in you and the importance of what you do.
In recent years, I've been calling myself Humanist. Because that's a label that doesn't (as often) need explaining. It's frequently there as a tick-box. It's close enough to who I am to say that I would want a Humanist funeral, for example. But I think it's still missing the sense of spirituality that's part of the human experience. It's so difficult to describe how I experience it. How rituals of faith simultaneously have meaning and are meaningless.
And, as I light a candle to mark the solsice at the turning point in my Secular Syncretic Season of Lights, I realise that this is something that has drifted out of my life in recent years, as I've lived in isolation, and had nobody to share even a private communion with.
I don't know what to do with this realisation. But as with the meaningful meaningless rituals, I note it, and let the dispassionate universe bring what it will into the space I give it.
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