Transcending Religion

Valerie Love

A Changed Perspective

A coaching client remarked to me that she no longer felt the same level of enthusiasm about her religion and what it taught as she had previously. She said that her worldview is becoming more universal, and that she no longer buys into the idea that any one religion has an exclusive right to God.

During the conversation she discovered that she had transcended religion; a phenomena that occurs when we get a wider worldview and no longer subscribe to the belief that our particular religion is the only road leading to God.

The religion may still hold meaning and significance for us, and we may still enjoy and engage in its rituals, teachings and practices. But something changes. We have an understanding that the religion now serves a different purpose. No longer is it there to give us the rules of how things work. No longer is it there to teach us how to walk and what to think or believe. No longer is it there to give us the commands and decrees of God. No longer is it there to tell us what God wants of us, and how to do it.

A New Focus

Instead, the religion becomes an enjoyable part of our overall spiritual regimen, not the central focus. Instead, we are sustained, guided, nurtured and transformed by our own individual spiritual practice of prayer, meditation, devotion and communing with The Creator in ways that are personally fulfilling and deeply satisfying. In this state, you know what God wants of you, because you hear The Voice for yourself. You feel the move of the Holy Spirit within your being. Your religion is the icing on the proverbial cake, not the cake itself.

It is then that you realize that if you were on a remote island, where no organized religion existed, you would be no farther removed from God (nor would you necessarily be closer to God) than if you were sitting in a Cathedral worshiping during a service with the choir ringing in the background.

God is not to be found exclusively in religion. The religion is to simply remind you of where God is to be found: in your heart. It is there that The Creator has inscribed the divine will for your life. It is there that The Creator has written the holy law and all its precepts.

You are the 67th book of the Bible.

Every soul longs and thirsts for oneness with The Creator, hence, humans created religion. But don’t get it twisted, religion is a nicety, not a necessity.

The Church of No Rules

I often joke with my kids that I want to start The Church of No Rules. No rules, no dogma, no judgment, no bad, no evil. One goal would exist in this church: to come into closer conscious communion with the Divine, as you personally encounter and experience The Creator, and being and doing what you are inspired to be and do as a result of that conscious communion. After all, what God whispers in my ear is not the same as what’s whispered in yours.

The Purpose of Religion

I understand that religion serves a vital purpose. The root word for religion has the meaning to re-link.

Our only problem is that we think we are separate from God. In the religious tradition I was raised in, God sat on a throne high up in heaven and looked down on all the tiny humans on earth. According to that religion, God was way up there, and I was way down here. That thought didn’t–and still doesn’t–engender a whole lot of closeness between me and God. It actually had the opposite effect.

What I’ve since come to understand and experience is that God is right where I am.

There is no separation between me and God, between you and God, and between me and you.

We are all one, you, me, God.

Religion re-links the human (consciously) with her Creator, where the erroneous thought of separation once existed.

A Soul Encounter With God

You go into a church, hear the music, get inspired by the teacher, read the scripture and feel the spirit. While you’re there, you have a soul encounter with God. You have a direct connect experience. You see the very face of God.

Then you leave, and you may be tempted to think that the religion or the church created that experience for you.

It didn’t.

The church or religion or worship service touched something deep within your being and stirred it up. You already had the spirit in you when you walked into the church. You bought the spirit with you when you walked in the front door. You just needed it stirred up, so that you could feel it, re-member it, and begin to know that it’s with you always.

When you step into a place of worship, a place that has been consecrated for communing with God, a place where the energy has been built up during service after service, a place where the intention is set to have a spiritual experience, that you have one.

The same God encounter could happen while sitting on the beach looking at the sunrise, or playing with a purring kitten, or stroking the hand of your lover, or partaking in a divinely delicious meal with divinely delicious people.

God is in all of it.

God is omnipresent, everywhere present at all times.

Once we’re re-linked, and we re-member the Creator as the Life Force that is expressing through us and as us in each moment, we transcend religion. Not because religion is no longer useful, but because it is no longer necessary.

Even still, the rituals, teachings and practices of religious participation can feed the human spirit, and are to be participated in according to your unique, individualized and very personal faith walk.

As we continue to evolve and mature spiritually, we come to know the universality of God, and the omnipresent nature of the Divine.

We know God as existing everywhere, within everyone, and not exclusively in one religion or the other, but in all religions.

We also come to know that each of us has the ability and capability to commune directly with God.

You were born that way. You don’t need a priest or a pastor or a spiritual guru. Indeed, there is a place for the priest or pastor or guru. They each serve as important guides. Sometimes they are there simply to wake us up and get us started on the path to conscious communion with the Higher Power. But make no mistake, the responsibility for your conscious communion and connection with The Creator is yours, and yours alone. You do what you choose with that relationship.

As you reflect on your religious practice (if you have one) ask yourself if it is fulfilling its role to re-link you with The Great Spirit. If so, great. If not, take time to ruminate and meditate on what would re-link you consciously with the indwelling Spirit of the Living God, and begin making it your spiritual practice. If you already feel consciously in communion with God in a rich personally fulfilling relationship, better still. Your work is not complete. Now it’s up to you to help your brother and sister do the same.

Much love and many rich blessings,

Valerie Love

Tags: Faith, religion and spirituality, Spirituality, worship