By LEONARDO BOFF*
We capture the emergence of the spiritual world, of the so-called natural spirituality, and we verify its pressing relevance in the face of the many crises that plague all of humanity.
There are many who are fed up with material goods and the consumerism of our culture. As a counterpoint to this situation, we are witnessing the emergence of the spiritual world, of the so-called natural spirituality, and we are seeing its pressing relevance in the face of the many crises that are devastating all of humanity.
In such critical moments, human beings delve into their depths and ask themselves basic questions: What are we doing in this world? What is our place in the world as a whole? How can we act to ensure a future that is hopeful for everyone and for our Common Home?
This concern for the spiritual world is not a monopoly of religions. It also exists in the human pursuits of young people, intellectuals, famous scientists and – to our surprise – major businessmen who have shown interest in the subject.
The fact that they show interest in the spiritual world, that is, in spirituality, attests to the dimensions of the crisis that afflicts us. It means that the material goods that they produce, the productivist and competitive logic that they practice, the universe of commercial values (everything has become a commodity and has its price) that inspires their practices are not capable of addressing the serious questions of human life. There is a deep emptiness, an immense hole within their being. I am convinced that the spiritual world, or natural spirituality, inherent to our nature, has the capacity to fill it.
It is important, however, to be critical, because there are real companies that handle spiritual discourses that often speak more to the pockets than to the hearts. There are religious leaders who are an expression of the market with their preaching of the gospel of material prosperity and, more recently, of domination. They win over many faithful believers in good faith, for their own monetary interests as pastors.
However, the permanent bearers of the spiritual world are generally ordinary people who live the righteousness of life, the sense of solidarity and cultivate the space of the Sacred, whether in their religions and churches, or in the way they think, act, interpret life and care for the environment.
What is important, however, is to recognize that there is a worldwide demand for non-material values, because material values are insufficient to appease the human being's desire for something higher and better. Everywhere we find people, especially young people, indignant at the destiny previously defined in economic terms, when it is said that "there is no other alternative" (TINA=There is no Alternative). They refuse to accept the paths that the powerful define for humanity to follow. These young people say: “We will not allow them to steal our future. We deserve a better destiny, we need to drink from other sources to find a new path.”
Therefore, it is important, from the beginning, to introduce a distinction – not a separation, but a distinction – between the religious world and the spiritual world, between natural spirituality and religion. In fact, the Dalai Lama did this brilliantly in the book An Ethics for the New Millennium (Sextante, Rio de Janeiro 2000). I would like to mention a topic from the book whose understanding I share and make mine.
“I believe that religion (religious world) is related to the belief in the right to salvation preached by any faith tradition, a belief that has as one of its main aspects the acceptance of some form of metaphysical or supernatural reality, possibly including an idea of paradise or nirvana. Associated with this are religious teachings or dogmas, rituals, prayers and so on.”
“I consider spirituality (spiritual world) to be related to those qualities of the human spirit – such as love and compassion, patience and tolerance, ability to forgive, contentment, notion of responsibility, notion of harmony – that bring happiness both to the person himself and to the others".
“Ritual and prayer, along with the questions of nirvana and salvation, are directly linked to religious faith, but these inner qualities need not be. There is therefore no reason why an individual cannot develop them, even to a high degree, without recourse to any religious or metaphysical system” (p.32-33).
As can be seen, someone can be religious without necessarily being spiritual. Just as someone can be spiritual without being religious. The ideal would be to be religious and spiritual at the same time. But not necessarily.
There is a whole research, done especially in the USA, which involves psychologists, educators and the new science which has deepened natural spirituality, that is, spirituality as an objective fact of human nature. Famous became the “Manual of Psychology and Spirituality” by Prof. Miller, which brings together the main studies on psychology and natural spirituality. It emphasizes that, regardless of religion, “each child is born with the innate capacity for spiritual development, a capacity that must be understood as a natural dimension of the wholeness of the human being; it guarantees an important and vital support for resilience, provides meaning and purpose for the development of the person’s emotional, social and moral cognition; this capacity innate can mature both within and outside institutional religion”. Based on these studies, Steven Rockefeller, philosopher and one of the main authors of the Earth Charter, proposes a “spiritual democracy”, therefore an original fact that should be present in democracy, from the earliest childhood and in the school curriculum (Spiritual Democracy,NY 2022).
Living the natural spirituality, given by our human nature, with the values mentioned above, which are also the same as those of the historical Jesus, can signal paths that point us towards an eventual successful exit from the many crises of the present times. The invisible of the spirit is part of the visible.
*Leonardo Boff is an ecologist, philosopher and writer. Author, among other books, of Caring for our common home: clues to delay the end of the world (Vozes). [https://amzn.to/3zR83dw]
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