Spent a delightful afternoon yesterday at Hattie B's and Bobby's Dairy Dip with Younger Daughter. Might even call it spiritual.
The question of humanist spirituality came up. To me, it means being gratefully aware that I'm alive, breathing, thinking, enjoying, loving… as Marc reminds us to remind ourselves every morning.
And it means what Andrew Copson said:
A vast literature both popular and academic has investigated and promoted the concept of a materialist and non-theistic spirituality. Five aspects emerge from those various works that also accord with what I personally would describe as a spiritual experience. So, for this humanist at least, spiritual experiences, in no particular order:
- are positive experiences – and at the more powerful end of experiences in general, causing a surge of feeling;
- are fleeting – and we become conscious of them only when they are underway or are over;
- are personal and individual experiences – they're subjectively experienced even when they're shared;
- are not not intellectual or rational experiences – although they occur within ourselves and minds, they're not experiences to which you can ascribe any meaningful analysis (neither are they irrational experiences!).
- take you (metaphorically or imaginatively) outside of yourself – you feel as if you are connected to something bigger or more than yourself in some way.
And don't underestimate the spirit of ice cream following hot chicken on a perfect spring afternoon.
