On Religion

         The British writer D.H. Lawrence wrote these lines using traditional religious language, which he entitled “On Being Religious.”

         “The Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is within you. And it is Ghost, forever a Ghost, never a Way or a Word. Jesus is a Way and a Word. God is the God. But the Holy Ghost is forever Ghostly, unrealizable. And against this unsubstantial unreality, you may never sin, or woe betide you.  Only the Holy Ghost within you can scent the new tracks of the great God across the Cosmos of Creation.  The Holy Ghost is the dark Hound of Heaven  whose baying we ought to listen to, as he runs ahead into the unknown, tracking the mysterious everlasting departing of the Lord God, who is forever departing from us.  We’ve got to find our way to God.  From time to time MAN wakes up and realizes that the Lord Almighty has made a great removal, and passed over the known horizon. Then starts the frenzy, the howling, the despair. Much better listen to the dark hound of heaven and start off into the dark of the unknown, in search.”

     Lawrence uses traditional religious metaphorical language to describe the religious or spiritual experience of the human mind and soul. We can never understand or comprehend the reality of God by our intellect.   Many philosophers of science agree that ultimate reality (God) is forever beyond human understanding. But never-the-less, there is Something – a sensing of purpose or meaning - that haunts the attentive human mind and soul, calling us to attend and pursue.

         For attentive Christians haunted by this spiritual or Ghostly call, the Way, the path that we are called to follow, is the way of the man from Nazareth . Heeding this prompting and following Jesus Way is what our religion is intended to help us do. 

         So religion is instrumental, a tool, and like all tools is in need of constant maintenance and improvement. We should never mistake our religious ritual for the inner spiritual or Ghostly call or the living Way of Jesus our Lord..  If our religious practice does not enhance and help us “tune-up” our attention to the “Ghostly “ summons and sharpen our eye & mind  to discovering the Way,  there may be something amiss with us or our religion.