Millennials abandon hope for religious institutions but revere human rights
A sea change in the religious landscape of Canada is underway. Led by millennials, Canada is increasingly moving toward a secular culture.
“Spiritual but not religious” has become our new normal.
A 2015 Angus Reid poll found 39 per cent of Canadians identify as “spiritual but not religious.” Another 27 per cent identify as “neither religious nor spiritual;” 24 per cent as “religious and spiritual;” and 10 per cent as “religious but not spiritual.”
What sparked this dramatic change in beliefs and self-identification? And what does it mean for Canadian society?
The rise of “spiritual but not religious” (SBNR) is bound up with the civil rights revolutions of the 20th century. The movement away from religion toward “spirituality” reflects a desire to leave behind hierarchical understandings of religion for a more socially liberal one.
This idea has its critics: Conservative commentators have generally denounced SBNRs, seeing them as narcissistic, lazy and without a clear sense of morality.
This characterization is distorted and leaves out many attributes of SBNRs who display a robust sense of ethics: Mutual respect and acceptance of difference. I believe the ethical core of SBNR spirituality holds human rights as sacred.
In 2015 I began conducting qualitative research with Canadian millennials who self-identify as “spiritual but not religious.” I have interviewed more than 40 millennials about their spiritual lives to better understand their beliefs, practices and values.
FOLLOW YOUR HEART
SBNRs look to self for guidance, above all. They do not appeal to a sacred text, but rather look within for guidance. What their gut tells them, or what their intuition reveals, is what orients them. A number of scholars have deemed it “self-spirituality.”
SBNRs generally believe individuals have a self that is authentic to them (their “true self”) and, consequently, believe we ought to allow individuals to express themselves; that it would be wrong to force them to repress or hide their true self.
It has become commonplace in Canadian society to be told to follow your heart, be true to yourself or stand out from the crowd; and conversely, rare and undesirable to be told to stick to your role, abide by tradition or work hard to fit in.
Self-spirituality prizes individual rights. Moreover, acceptance is considered an ultimate virtue among Canadian millennial SBNRs; given their vulnerability, marginalized identities — be they ethnic, sexual, or otherwise — are considered especially in need of protection.
LAZY AND NARCISSISTIC?
My interviewees’ rejection of religion often derive from their assumption that religious people are not respectful of others’ rights to exist as they are.
Few of my interviewees had any interest in joining a religious institution — they are often deeply suspicious of them and see them as hotbeds of corruption, greed and fearmongering — entirely at odds with and corrupting of an authentic spirituality.
It is perhaps for this reason conservative commentators have generally denounced self-spirituality, arguing its rejection of religious institutions is antithetical to a moral life. Self-spirituality, they argue, leads to either narcissism or hedonism, or both.
Author and Reverend Lillian Daniel argues self-spirituality sits “comfortably in the norm for self-centred American culture,” while Jesuit priest James Martin calls it proof of “plain old laziness.” Others have disparaged SBNRs for their “promiscuity of belief,” condescendingly representing the way in which they approach religion as a “Burger King Spirituality.”
It has been a long-standing conservative critique of social liberalism-that it weakens the binds of tradition and community, placing too much authority on the individual.
miss Yet a these distinct criticisms ethical imaginary crucially at work; one finds affirmed by SBNRs not only an ethic of authenticity, but also an ethic of freedom, and an ethic of mutual respect.
RISE OF MUTUAL RESPECT
The rise of self-spirituality is bound up with the 1960s counterculture and the rights revolution: the civil rights, second-wave feminist and gay liberation movements have significantly shaped contem- porary Canadian culture.
Many social and economic factors led us there — the post Second World Waraffluenceboom, the rise of consumer culture, increased urbanization and the spread of expressive individualism.
Allowing individuals to be their authentic selves has becomeamoral imperative. AsCharles Taylor has written: “One shouldn’t criticize others’ values, because they have a right to live their ownlife as youdo.”
HUMAN RIGHTS AS SACRED
man kheim the Self-spirituality collective rights. argues Sociologist religion conscience sacralizes Emile represents of Dur- hu- the community, and arises out of the fundamentally social nature of human life. What goes by“religion” in anygiven society, according to Durkheim, reflects that which is held to be sacred to a moral community. Self-spirituality is the religion of social liberalism, sacralizing those values and ideals — authenticity, mutual respect, acceptance of difference, individual freedom — most sacred to our society. ibility Although to conservative there is some fears cred- that self-spirituality may inhibit the kinds of commitment and community necessary to sustain both individual and societal well-being, we ought not fall into their trap of thinking it is without moral merit. Self-spirituality is a form of religiosity at home in the socially liberal culture of Canada, and bound up with the rights revolution, which has arguably done more than anything else to define our national identity in the 21st century. Galen Watts is PhD Candidate in the Cultural Studies Graduate Program, Queen’s University, Ontario.
The Canadian Press
This article was originally published on The Conversation.