religion and spirituality in north america are NOT dead...

For the past year a quirky, contrarian notion about the state of "the church" has been gaining momentum within me. To say that it is at odds with conventional wisdom would be an understatement. Of late, there has been a host of critical commentaries forecasting the inevitable demise of the once mainstream - and now totally side-line - congregations that has become normative. Look at the bottom line they tell us - and then stick a fork in them because they're done. 

At times, I've shared this dour perspective, too and a recent posting from the Gallup Polling Organization states the new normal: U.S. church membership was 73% when Gallup first measured it in 1937 and remained near 70% for the next six decades, before beginning a steady decline around the turn of the 21st century. (read their full analysis @ https://news. gallup. com/ poll/ 341963/ church-membership-falls-below-majority-first-time.aspx)

These metrics are clear: North Americans are voting with their feet when it comes to formal religion. This is NOT in dispute. What my heart and experience tell me, however, is that the obvious is not the whole story. 

You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one who questions the prognosis that faith is on life support in North America. My hunch is that the numbers will get worse before they get better if we're only counting buns in the pews. We know that alienation and social isolation are rampant. So, too, the ugly polarization of the body politic that has given a new lease on life to our periodic pathological rejection of institutions. (see "The 100 Year Extinction Panic is Back Right on Schedule" @ https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/26/opinion/polycrisis-doom-extinction-humanity.html?bgrp=c&smid=fb-share&fbclid=IwAR22osyDUxqj2ARDCyuFvkTNMvym5G85IWHR00eL8i83iFxeXCWDb75Ds and "How We Were Wrong About What Happened to America in 2020" @ https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/31/opinion/covid-2020-recovery-society.html?bgrp=c&smid=fb-share&fbclid=IwAR1Zq5-22oeoYLxLof2gwRn_cTybh9rw7jOPk9VFWQBJRj85NoIsotJx2Vc) The trust we give to our institutions ebbs and flow but even these realities are not the whole story.

As a person of mystical faith, I tend to look for "the eagle within the egg." I mistrust one-dimensional metrics as arrogant pieces of the pie that too often get passed off as the whole. A deeper analysis intuits that we're on the cusp of a radical reckoning that is currently sorting out what adds value to life and what bleeds us dry - and the jury is clearly still out about when the dust will settle. This reckoning is taking place in our race relations, our sexuality and understanding of gender. It is happening in a growing commitment to environmental solidarity and the paradox of participatory democracy. And if you look closely it is shaking out in art, culture, music, fashion, design, literature and the quest for peace as well - and will likely continue to do so unevenly over the next 50+ years - because THIS is NOT the end of the story.

What's more, those practicing a sacramental spirituality that honors the obvious while discerning its deeper insights trust that the presence of the sacred saturates our existence. Of course, there ARE countless congregations that have chosen to become burial societies. For whatever reason, they're too tired, apprehensive, or stagnant to embrace this moment. They refuse to confess with St. Paul that "in everything God works for good with those who love God." Not that all things ARE good, That's romantic BS. But as a funeral liturgy in my tradition puts it: "We are certain that neither death nor life, angels or principalities, things present or things to come, powers, height depth nor anything else in creation will be able to separate us from the love of God made flesh in Jesus our Lord."

What I see repeatedly - in struggling congregations, brew pubs, art galleries

, coffee houses, concert halls, and small dinner parties - is this: we are discarding the toxic elements of our various faith traditions and, like the neo-Jungian author, Thomas Moore observes, we are creating liberating spiritualities that work for us in this wildly secular society. Moore's "A Religion of One's Own" - along with Richard Rohr, Cynthia Bourgeault, Barbara Brown Taylor, Walter Wink, Phyllis Tickle, and others documents what's happening below the bottom line. Beyond the imagination and analysis of good souls addicted to binary vision. Over the next few months I'll be unpacking this reality more thoroughly taking on both the cynicism of conventional wisdom and the exhausting elitism of the so-called cognoscenti.

My take on contemporary spirituality is shaped, you see, by the people who speak to me while playing in both dive bars and upscale trendy wine bars. They yearn for community. And a sense of meaning in pursuit of compassion. Perhaps that's why I've adopted the late Frank Zappa's quip re: jazz. "Jazz isn't dead," he used to say earnestly, "it just smells funny!" So, too the grass roots spirituality that is emerging in 21st century North America.