What Is Spiritual?

What does it mean to be spiritual? Like many words, it can carry very different meanings for different people.

For some, the word “spiritual” brings a sense of peace, hope, and reassurance. For others, it stirs up difficult memories and emotions. Much like the words “God” or “religion,” it often comes with a wide range of personal associations.

Why do some people embrace spirituality while others strongly resist anything that resembles it?

In many cases, it comes down to personal experience. Each of us has encountered environments or expressions that were labeled “spiritual,” and those experiences can vary widely.

Because of this, we could spend hours discussing definitions and still miss what the word truly represents in people’s lives.

Like many of you, I have had a range of spiritual experiences. Some were so unhealthy and distorted that I wanted to distance myself completely. Others were so genuine, life-giving, and meaningful that they drew me in and left me wanting more.

Over time, I have come to see that spirituality, like many things, has the potential to be either deeply healthy or deeply harmful.

With that in mind, I do not blame anyone for wanting to avoid unhealthy or toxic expressions of spirituality. In fact, that instinct can reflect a kind of wisdom. At the same time, a life without any form of healthy and genuine spirituality often leaves a sense of emptiness, as though something essential is missing.

It seems that many of us have an inner awareness that life is more than what we can see and measure. To ignore that dimension is, in some way, to ignore part of what it means to be human.

We live in a time of extraordinary progress. Science, technology, medicine, and many other fields have advanced in remarkable ways. Yet these alone cannot fully answer our deepest questions or guide how we ought to live.

Without a healthy and authentic spirituality guiding us toward love, truth, connection, peace, compassion, and justice, our progress can easily be misused. In the wrong hands, even our greatest advancements can contribute to harm rather than healing.

You might respond by asking whether religion and spirituality themselves have caused harm in the world. That is a fair question, and the honest answer is yes. They have, at times, been used to justify violence and injustice.

The reality is that anything in human hands can be distorted. Power, influence, politics, money, and even spirituality can be misused.

This is why the content of our beliefs matters so much. What we believe about the world shapes our values and priorities. If we see life as accidental and without deeper meaning, that perspective will influence how we live. If we believe in a harsh and unyielding God, that belief will also shape our actions and attitudes.

Over the years, I have spoken with many people who describe the kind of God they cannot believe in. Often, when I listen closely, I realize that I do not believe in that version of God either.

At some point, each of us must take responsibility for our own beliefs. Are they worth living by? And if we follow them, will they lead to greater good in the world?

For me, being spiritual means being connected to the One I believe is the source of love, goodness, truth, creativity, beauty, peace, justice, and life.

It means trusting in a God who is at work bringing healing to a broken world and who invites each of us to take part in that work. It means growing in love toward God, toward ourselves, toward others, and toward the world we share.

I am not sure where you stand, but this is a vision of spirituality that I can embrace.