Good Religion

Wikipedia, the modern displacer of almost all encyclopedias, includes this statement in its definition of “religion:” “…there is no scholarly consensus over what precisely constitutes a religion.”

No wonder I have felt so much like it was not a problem to have a different definition for the word “religion” from almost everyone. It is as vague and multi-identitied as “world view” or “thought process” or “mindset.” My definition is, “the habits of a person that relate to their values.” I shave religiously, meaning every day.

A second meaning I would suggest is “having spiritual expectations or philosophies, usually related to activities or events.” Some people expect to be condemned to eternity in hell if they go fishing on Sunday, for example. I was teaching a minister to read at one point in my ministry. His pastor, who was ordained by the United Pentecostal denomination, told the young man that he was going to hell for being under my teaching, because I both wore shirts with short sleeves and had facial hair on my chin and upper lip.

Another example is having faith to believe the scientifically impossible idea that all matter and all living things are orderly and intricately designed by an accident frequently called a “big bang,” (which would be more miraculous than me raising someone from the dead this afternoon would be). It is reasonable to pick up a book and think that someone wrote it and had something they wanted to say through your interpretation of the letters they put in an orderly fashion in it. It would be religious to think that all the letters just piled onto its pages in an order that told a complicated story.

It is difficult for me to think of a valuable way to use the word religion positively. With regard to my spiritual life and mindset and world view, I think it would be much more appropriate to be “relational” with Jesus rather than to just be “religious.”