religiosity without religion: spirituality without spirits. a non-theology

From a Buberian perspective, a relationship with God engenders an experience that cannot be reproduced in the form of rituals and cannot be reenacted in the context of institutional temples. A conventional religion is, for Buber, a frozen reminder of an original experience. In Zen, the important concept is to reenact in one's own life the experience of the pointing directly to the essence of one's being. That pointing cannot be ritualized or reenacted with the help of or by recourse to symbolic sacraments. In a sense, these rituals and institutions take the place of the real experience.

Concerning so-called spirituality: Since the terms spiritual and spirituality are often used interchangeably with the term religion, and since in addition many define themselves as spiritual though not religious, we need to insist that our religious outlook is not spiritual, it is religious in the sense of the term religiosity or relationship. We have to clearly define what the usage of the terms spirits or spiritual mean? when making a claim concerning existence, we must first need to define what the term existence means and what conditions need to me met before we can argue that something exists. If by using the term spirit we mean to describe by means of a word the various functions localized in the mind, then we can still agree to use the term spirit instead of simply reverting back to the term mind, as long as we all agree as to what the referents to the term actually are. I tend to demand that I'd be shown that something can be identified under a microscope before its existence could be claimed. When it comes to God, proving his/her existence is an act of no-faith.

If we are to define the Buberian and Zen takes on religion, I would attempt to illuminate them through the following clumsy formulations:

1. Dialogue as the practice of non-attachment-engagedeness. I-Thou, in contrast to I-It is a relationship where the operational modus vivendi is aptly described in Zen as non-attachment. Attachment is the It relationship.
2. To the extent that the concept and/or the reality of a personal and communal relationship with a God is posited or needed or desired, the practice of dialogical ecology entails a god-engagement or religiosity without and instead of conventional and institutional religion, (religiosity and Spinozean knowledge of the third kind.).
3. The sense of reverence/owe, that accompanies religious practices are to be developed without ritualized worship or idolatry, (the poetry of the insentient).
4. To the extend that a conceptual construct of a God is posited, needed or desired, dialogical ecology means faith without recourse to beliefs. One cannot believe in the existence of anything that cannot be in some rational way provided without contradictions. However, I have perfect faith in that which we will not name. (see Watts)
5. We celebrate by community in action. Celebration without rituals/sacraments.
6. We seek the dialogue/encounter with the “divine” instead of the sacramental prayer. Petitional prayer as I-It. Encounter is with the whole of life and requires the whole of being: mind and body.
7. We seek blessedness without or instead of religious-bound concepts such as sacredness/holiness,
8. We seek community as a way of life with the whole of being and that is not the same as conventional priesthood/institutions/temples.