Spirituality and an Irish Atheist – Me

It is Sunday and it has been a while since I got deep so ….

I am an atheist and one of the things that irks me is the assumption that because I am an atheist I cannot be spiritual. This sentiment is generally formed into a question by theist friends and colleagues. Sometimes I get it as a direct question “How can you be spiritual? You are an atheist for goodness sake!” or as the rather more condesending qualitative dismissal of me as an “incomplete” person, complete only when I understand God. In fairness the former is a good question and although the latter fair skunders my pish my answer to both is short, absolutely yes I can be an atheist and be spiritual.

Let me explain that.

Since I am of necessity a naturalist my spirituality has at it’s base, human experience – experiences that define the thoughtful participation of human beings in this world. Otto Rank described what I mean as a sense of awe, wonder, and humility before the “mystery of being.” Freud talked of  an “oceanic feeling … an ego-dissolving sense of eternity”

Since I am a glass half full sort of chap, I am of the opnion that I am a better person because I can make a connection to and share an empathy with other living things. When faced with amazing things like Fibonacci Spirals, the colours in a sunset or the odd things that go on in the quantum mechanics I get hit with a type of stunned silence (which is very odd for me) it makes me want to both speak in hushed, respectful tones and at the same time stand up cheer and applaud!. So part of my spirituality is a sense of something outside of me that is both beautiful and sublime. I do not need to ascribe some transcendental force to experience or explain these feelings.

I would also include emotions like human love and human relationships in general. The birth of my son  showed me that there is nothing in life more important and more worthwhile than protecting and nurturing your children. Similarly it is my experience that sex, family, personal growth, and awareness of human compassion all engender a sense of a beauty and value and a connectedness thats is best described as spiritual.

I paint and importantly the absence of a meaningful religious spiritual experience does not stop me enjoying my creative process neither does it hinder my enjoyment of the creative processes of others. It is the inspiration to expose part of our inner selves with a wider audience that marks this as “spiritual” for me.

My non-religious spirituality calls me to be a better parent, a better husband and a better friend. It calls me to be better and to make the world better, not because a supernatural being wills it of me, but simply because the world would be a better place even if I try just a little bit harder to achieve these goals.

There is nothing above that demands or necessitates a “God.” Many theists chums would say that these point to or somehow emanate from, “God”. Sorry,  “God” is an interpretation you give to the experience, but it is not the experience itself and necessitating the existence and belief in a “God” to make it in some way more valid ,is for me just not necessary.

So my understanding of atheist spirituality simply amounts to the same things that move, inspire all sensitive people, religious or not. It requires only that I exist as a human being in the world and take note of the beauty around me, luxuriate in my relationships with others and then use the inspiration that gives me, to try and make the world even a little bit better. “God” may be behind it all or may not. For my part, at least, I do not find it makes any a single cintilla of difference one way or the other.

Simply put – The world is good. Go make it better.