religion and spirituality

To be clear, let's just start with the dictionary definitions, since there is great mystery in many people's minds about the meanings of these two words that there should not be.

religion - "...the service and worship of God or the supernatural...commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance...a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices...scrupulous conformity : CONSCIENTIOUSNESS... a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith"

religious - "...relating to or manifesting faithful devotion to an acknowledged ultimate reality or deity...of, relating to, or devoted to religious beliefs or observances...scrupulously and conscientiously faithful...FERVENT, ZEALOUS..."

spirit - "...an animating or vital principle held to give life to physical organisms...a supernatural being or essence: as a capitalized : HOLY SPIRIT...SOUL...an often malevolent being that is bodiless but can become visible; specifically : GHOST...a malevolent being that enters and possesses a human being...temper or disposition of mind or outlook especially when vigorous or animated...

spirituality - "...sensitivity or attachment to religious values...the quality or state of being spiritual

So, given these definitions, we could or should also look up several other words to be clear (see the seekers glossary), such as ardor, faith, faithful, devotion, fervent, zealous, vital, immaterial, sentient, etc., but we won't go into those here...

One thing to note is that spiritual does not mean the same as mystical and there seems to be a great deal of confusion over that in many peoples' minds. (mystical - "...having a spiritual meaning or reality that is neither apparent to the senses nor obvious to the intelligence...involving or having the nature of an individual's direct subjective communion with God or ultimate reality)

"Mystical" seems to involve only one's means of perception, one which is inexplicable.

One horribly simplistic explanation of the difference between the spiritual and the material is as follows:

"A man is both material and spiritual - one who is devoid of the spirit is a corpse - one that is devoid of the material is a ghost."

Given that to exist and act in any way whatsoever in this world, "the spirit moves us." We can, however, also develop the spirit, and various pursuits have found ways to aid and guide this development. We seekers use whatever spiritual development tools we find to enhance our experience and adopt them into our practices in our lasting quest for the ultimate experience.

Some interesting usages of these words:

"He was in good spirits."

"That's a high-spirited horse.".

"He's a very spiritual man."

"It's against my religion."

"That's the team spirit."

"He was really dis-spirited."

"I'll get around to it when the spirit moves me."

Some of these may seem simplistic, but they are all describing parts of the same thing - they all refer to the power our spirit has to motivate us to action (physical or mental) or not.

If we are down, it may even be due to poor nutrition or lack of sleep, which shows one simple way the spiritual and material are inter-linked. Seekers therefore see man as a whole being with all aspects inter-playing - we seek the development of the whole man. What motivates us then to get more sleep or eat better? Why, the spirit, of course...or, perhaps the guidance of a more advanced seeker...