How I lost my religion, but kept my faith.
Let me start this week first by apologizing. I am 20 hours late in getting this blog done. I am sorry. I know where I am sorry, which is that it decreases my chance to interact with you all, but perseverance is the word of the semester for me.
I make choices each semester on which books I buy and which ones I’m willing to borrow from the library, and for some reason, I chose to make this a library book. Unfortunately, it was only through an audiobook app, so my quotes are slightly different. Russell Moore’s book Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America was full of so many revelations and feelings that I resonated with, so I kept my audio library app open and kept hitting the bookmark tab. Perhaps I should’ve bought this book?
One key concept and idea I gleaned from this book was the author’s hypothesis on why young people were leaving the church. He seems to want to name the problem, perhaps to stop those of us from being cynics, but acknowledge a healthy level of skepticism. I struggle to keep myself in a healthy, skeptical space and not slip into cynicism, though I am sure I have been there a few times, especially in the last few years. “When people accept futility and absurdity as normal, the culture becomes decadent. The term is not a slur; it’s a technical label. The fact that so many, both those leaving and those staying, are giving up on the situation ever changing is a sign that we in American Christian life have started to accept futility and the absurd as normal.”[1] I often find myself in an apathetic space, especially when it comes to the evangelical church and politics. People I love, I’m afraid to say, if I were honest, I feel as if they have slipped into the absurd. I try hard not to judge, and I almost don’t want to know so I don’t feel tempted to judge. Talk about avoidance.
I have felt tired for a long time of the hypocrisy of the church, and I just have not had the heart or desire to go back…yet. I pray for what our author noted: a heart of tranquility. “The cross was the losing side of a culture war. It’s not just that Jesus opposes both the way of Pan and caeser, but that he does so that is not frantic or furious; he has the tranquility that comes from the confidence that the church will be built and that nothing, not even the gates of hell could overturn that promise.”[2] This is how I have kept my faith after losing my religion. I believe in God and God’s promises, and I have found my faith in the great cathedral of the Earth.
In 2022, I took a Celtic Christian pilgrimage to the sacred island of Iona, Scotland, with about 30 other people worldwide who read John Phillip Newell’s books on Celtic Christianity. I found my faith. It’s in the “thin spaces” such as this island, where the separation of heaven and earth is almost non-existent. “Living on this little holy island of Iona, in the Hebrides, which, as an Irish priest friend of mine once said, has about it ‘something of the freshness of the first day of creation,’ I as well situated to receive the richness of Celtic spirituality’s way of seeing, but it has been mainly over the intervening years that I have reflected and worked on this book, asking the questions, ‘how does a spirituality that is so creation-focused relate to life in the city and the way most of us live today?’.” [3] “In Celtic wisdom, we remember the earth as sacred. Every tree and bush, every flower and creature, every hill and mountain is on fire with the Divine. The life within all life is holy. What we do to the body of the earth is what we do to God.” [4] I found God in connecting to nature, the love of nature, and the beauty of all creatures. This is where my faith lives. God speaks to me through walking, through fall colors, through my connection to myself, through my body. My faith is alive and well; my prayer is through movement, my eyes, and my breath!
Today is All Saints Day in traditional churches. It is a day of remembrance of those we’ve lost and to honor this time when they are closer to us than any other day. In Celtic tradition, today is the Celtic New Year festival of Samhain. “Samhain (Sow-en) means “summer’s end.” [5] “The Festival of Samhain marked the start of Winter when beasts were brought in from the hills to the nearby fields for winter slaughter or for overwintering in barns. Samhain was a liminal time in which the world of the living and the ancestral realms overlapped.”[6] I know many people may find this too close to Wiccan. There are ties, but it’s a cultural festival that is the same as Dios de la Muerte, All Saints Day, and Halloween. This is a time to remember our ancestors and where we come from, to show gratitude for the harvest, and to rest and cozy into the Winter darkness.
Caitlin Matthews, The Celtic Spirit: Daily Meditations for the Turning of the Year gives us daily meditations reflecting nature, ourselves, and God. Today is day one of the meditations, and here is a reflection exercise for us all as we enter this year,
“Spend part of this day assessing your place in life: look at the unfinished. Assess your current spiritual position, scrutinize your motives, clarify your commitments; recognize and discard inappropriate patterns that no longer serve you”.[7] This is my plan, and I will try to do this year-long meditation book again. It’s been a while.
[1] Moore, Russell. Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America. (USA, Penguin House, 2023)Chapter 1: 1:05:05
[2] Moore, Russell. Introduction: 37:39
[3] Newell, John Phillip. Listening to the Heartbeat of God: A Celtic Spirituality. (New York, Paulist Press, 1997), pg ix.
[4] Newell, John Phillip. Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul. (New York, HarperCollins, 2021),Pg 149.
[5] Matthews, Caitlin. The Celtic Spirit: Daily Meditations for the Turning of the Year. (New York, HarperCollins, 1999), pg 4.
[6] Matthews, Caitlin, pg 387.
[7] Ibid, pg 4.
About the Author
Jana Dluehosh
Jana serves as a Spiritual Care Supervisor for Signature Hospice in Portland, OR. She chairs the corporate Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging committee as well as presents and consults with chronically ill patients on addressing Quality of Life versus and alongside Medical treatment. She has trained as a World Religions and Enneagram Spiritual Director through an Anam Cara apprenticeship through the Sacred Art of Living center in Bend, OR. Jana utilizes a Celtic Spirituality approach toward life as a way to find common ground with diverse populations and faith traditions. She has mentored nursing students for several years at the University of Portland in a class called Theological Perspectives on Suffering and Death, and has taught in the Graduate Counseling program at Portland Seminary in the Trauma Certificate program on Grief.5 responses to “How I lost my religion, but kept my faith.”
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C’Mon, Lady! My heart was buring as I read your post! I could feel my heart rate going up just like I was cycling through a forest! First of all, what book would you recommend that would get me in touch with Celtic Christianity?
Second, I loved when you wrote,“thin spaces”… “I found God in connecting to nature”… “God speaks to me through walking, through fall colors, through my connection to myself, through my body.”… “my prayer is through movement, my eyes, and my breath!”
All of this reminded me of Forest Bathing, which connected me so deeply to how you connect with God. Thank you Jana for sharing how your soul thrives in this world. In fact, your way of being enables you and us to lose our religion while keeping our faith. I was so encouraged by your words. Thank you so much, young lady!
Todd, seriously want to shrink you and keep you on my right shoulder as my angel:). You are such an encourager and appreciate your friendship. I hope we can all lose our religion but keep our faith. Thank you for noticing that in my post.
Your response just simply brought a smile to my face. Thank you, Jana! 😊
Life happens right, better late than never! You said, “I struggle to keep myself in a healthy, skeptical space and not slip into cynicism, though I am sure I have been there a few times, especially in the last few years.” Your post verbalizes what many people, including myself, have been thinking for a while. Once you see or experience new things (and realize God is there as well), moving back into a limiting space where judgment, closedmindedness, or “uptightness” is part of the culture is less than appealing. Finding that balance between critical thinking and cynicism can be tough.
We’ve probably chatted about this before, but it really comes down to openness for me these days. Christian apologetic thinking says, “Everything here is good”, and shuts a blind eye to the suffering, pain, and idolatry the religion is bringing to some. This closes down an openness to hear anything that might challenge tradition or doctrine. On the other end is cynical thinking (speaking from experience) “Its all bad!” which shuts down there being any good or God in any of it, which forfeits the transformation that has and does occur in many of these religious spaces. These are both ditches I’ve fallen in and still fall in from time to time, more in the latter after acknowledging the limitations of my faith and religion. Appreciate you sharing your journey! I am also gravitating to other traditions and finding God there as well, which is beautiful. Sorry such a long reply!
Perseverance. Good word.
And good blog post.
Seriously, compelling Jana.