Religion and Spirituality

I was just reading through the various blogs from which I pick up bits of news and there was an item about the Dalai Lama. It came from his Facebook page. There was an additional quote in the Huffington Post about it. Here is what the Dalai Lama is saying:

All the world's major religions, with their emphases on love, compassion, patience, tolerance and forgiveness can and do promote inner values. But the reality of the world today is that grounding ethics in religion is no longer adequate. This is why I am increasingly convinced that the time has come to find a way of thinking about spirituality and ethics beyond religion altogether.

The further quote elaborated on his vision of the difference between religion and ethics:


A metaphor the Dalai Lama likes to use goes like this: The difference between ethics and religion is like the difference between water and tea. Ethics without religious content is water, a critical requirement for health and survival. Ethics grounded in religion is tea, a nutritious and aromatic blend of water, tea leaves, spices, sugar and, in Tibet, a pinch of salt."But however the tea is prepared, the primary ingredient is always water," he says. "While we can live without tea, we can't live without water. Likewise, we are born free of religion, but we are not born free of the need for compassion."

There is a lot to ponder I think. I myself could not live without my faith but what he says about the difference between water and tea strikes me as helpful. 

It does seem to me so sad that at the moment organized religions have, in many places, lost that ability to offer the nutrition that the Dalai Lama is speaking about. 

But then today I was also experiencing a time of religious nutrition from my friend and colleague Sue Mosteller. I was watching a video of a talk she gave a few months ago which was ostensibly about Henri Nouwen the very fine spiritual writer and his meditation on Rembrandt's wonderful painting: The Return of the Prodigal. But there was so much else in the talk that is just full of hope that I want to share the link with you if you have the time.

http://digitalcommons.csbsju.edu/collegevilleinstitute_lectures/2/ 

And then of course don't forget to visit the website of the Charter for Compassion:    http://charterforcompassion.org/

We need always to live ethically but I do think that it is much 'easier' to do that when one can be grounded in a deep awareness of the love that God has for us as we journey through all the troubled waters of life.

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