When a person says they are “spiritual but not religious,” what does that mean? It can be understood that what is generally meant is that a person is interested in spiritual realities but is suspicious of the systems and structures that humans use to engage with these realities.

This suspicion should give those of us intimately bound up in these systems and structures pause, and our hearts should go out to those who might make such a claim. 

The claim to be “spiritual but not religious” is problematic in that it demonstrates a profound misunderstanding of the human person. As embodied souls – spiritual and material beings – we encounter the spiritual through the tangible. And this is what religion is – the tangible, audible, visible, touchable, seeable ways in which we connect with the spiritual. The word religion comes from a Latin term that means “to bind.” Religion is how we are bound together with spiritual realities, most importantly, God. 

To be “not religious,” then, is to be unbound, untethered, disconnected from the spiritual. There is a real danger here, for we are religious beings by nature! If we are not tethered to God by practices, teachings, rituals, and sacraments given to us by God, then we will, by nature, bind ourselves to … other things. Lesser things.

In the reading from the Letter of Saint James, we hear a litany of these lesser things. Oh, the temptation to bind ourselves to treasure and luxury and pleasure! Yet none of these things can last. None can carry us through misery in a satisfactory way. None can endure through the doorway of death. They are not enough.

And so, if we are not bound by the obligations, structures, and teachings of religion, we may find ourselves afloat, lost in a sea of choices, none of which can satisfy the deepest of our human needs. 

Our Gospel reading today puts these choices in stark contrast. Whatever it is that we put our trust in, that we seek out to meet our deepest human needs, will either draw us closer to Christ and so draw us to goodness and love, or it will pull us away. One choice leads to life and life in abundance. The other leads to corrosion and misery. 

As we confront this stark choice, we are reminded in these readings that we are not left to simply seek blindly. God prepares and equips leaders such as Moses and the disciples. God sends the Holy Spirit, even to unexpected places. God is working through people of all sorts to provide for our needs and give us a cup of water to drink. God bestows his gifts generously on his people through all the structures and practices of our religion.

As we approach the greatest of these gifts, the Eucharist, let us ask God to show us the areas where we are placing our trust which are outside of his goodness. Let us request the grace to open our hearts to his unexpected gifts. May we be drawn into his life and his love, bound to him in this Blessed Sacrament.