Religion in Human Experience

100:6.1Evo­lu­tion­ary re­li­gions and rev­e­la­tory re­li­gions may dif­fer markedly in method, but in mo­tive there is great sim­i­lar­ity. Re­li­gion is not a spe­cific func­tion of life; rather is it a mode of liv­ing. True re­li­gion is a whole­hearted de­vo­tion to some re­al­ity which the re­li­gion­ist deems to be of su­preme value to him­self and for all man­kind. And the out­stand­ing char­ac­ter­is­tics of all re­li­gions are: un­ques­tion­ing loy­alty and whole­hearted de­vo­tion to su­preme val­ues. This re­li­gious de­vo­tion to su­preme val­ues is shown in the re­la­tion of the sup­pos­edly ir­re­li­gious mother to her child and in the fer­vent loy­alty of non­re­li­gion­ists to an es­poused cause.

100:6.2The ac­cepted su­preme value of the re­li­gion­ist may be base or even false, but it is nev­er­the­less re­li­gious. A re­li­gion is gen­uine to just the ex­tent that the value which is held to be su­preme is truly a cos­mic re­al­ity of gen­uine spir­i­tual worth.

100:6.3The marks of hu­man re­sponse to the re­li­gious im­pulse em­brace the qual­i­ties of no­bil­ity and grandeur. The sin­cere re­li­gion­ist is con­scious of uni­verse cit­i­zen­ship and is aware of mak­ing con­tact with sources of super­hu­man power. He is thrilled and en­er­gized with the as­sur­ance of be­long­ing to a su­pe­rior and en­no­bled fel­low­ship of the sons of God. The con­scious­ness of self-worth has be­come aug­mented by the stim­u­lus of the quest for the high­est uni­verse ob­jec­tives—su­preme goals.

100:6.4The self has sur­ren­dered to the in­trigu­ing drive of an all-en­com­pass­ing mo­ti­va­tion which im­poses height­ened self-dis­ci­pline, lessens emo­tional con­flict, and makes mor­tal life truly worth liv­ing. The mor­bid rec­og­ni­tion of hu­man lim­i­ta­tions is changed to the nat­u­ral con­scious­ness of mor­tal short­com­ings, as­so­ci­ated with moral de­ter­mi­na­tion and spir­i­tual as­pi­ra­tion to at­tain the high­est uni­verse and super­uni­verse goals. And this in­tense striv­ing for the at­tain­ment of super­mor­tal ide­als is al­ways char­ac­ter­ized by in­creas­ing pa­tience, for­bear­ance, for­ti­tude, and tol­er­ance.

100:6.5But true re­li­gion is a liv­ing love, a life of ser­vice. The re­li­gion­ist’s de­tach­ment from much that is purely tem­po­ral and triv­ial never leads to so­cial iso­la­tion, and it should not de­stroy the sense of hu­mor. Gen­uine re­li­gion takes noth­ing away from hu­man ex­is­tence, but it does add new mean­ings to all of life; it gen­er­ates new types of en­thu­si­asm, zeal, and cour­age. It may even en­gen­der the spirit of the cru­sader, which is more than dan­ger­ous if not con­trolled by spir­i­tual in­sight and loyal de­vo­tion to the com­mon­place so­cial obli­ga­tions of hu­man loy­al­ties.

100:6.6One of the most amaz­ing ear­marks of re­li­gious liv­ing is that dy­namic and sub­lime peace, that peace which passes all hu­man un­der­stand­ing, that cos­mic poise which be­to­kens the ab­sence of all doubt and tur­moil. Such lev­els of spir­i­tual sta­bil­ity are im­mune to dis­ap­point­ment. Such re­li­gion­ists are like the Apos­tle Paul, who said: “I am per­suaded that nei­ther death, nor life, nor an­gels, nor prin­ci­pal­i­ties, nor pow­ers, nor things pres­ent, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any­thing else shall be able to sep­a­rate us from the love of God.”

100:6.7There is a sense of se­cu­rity, as­so­ci­ated with the re­al­iza­tion of tri­umph­ing glory, res­i­dent in the con­scious­ness of the re­li­gion­ist who has grasped the re­al­ity of the Su­preme, and who pur­sues the goal of the Ul­ti­mate.

100:6.8Even evo­lu­tion­ary re­li­gion is all of this in loy­alty and grandeur be­cause it is a gen­uine ex­pe­ri­ence. But rev­e­la­tory re­li­gion is ex­cel­lent as well as gen­uine. The new loy­al­ties of en­larged spir­i­tual vi­sion cre­ate new lev­els of love and de­vo­tion, of ser­vice and fel­low­ship; and all this en­hanced so­cial out­look pro­duces an en­larged con­scious­ness of the Fa­ther­hood of God and the broth­er­hood of man.

100:6.9The char­ac­ter­is­tic dif­fer­ence be­tween evolved and re­vealed re­li­gion is a new qual­ity of di­vine wis­dom which is added to purely ex­pe­ri­en­tial hu­man wis­dom. But it is ex­pe­ri­ence in and with the hu­man re­li­gions that de­vel­ops the ca­pac­ity for sub­se­quent re­cep­tion of in­creased be­stowals of di­vine wis­dom and cos­mic in­sight.