Think of healthy religion in terms of ‘relatedness’

There are at least a handful of things unique and peculiar to the homo sapien animal.

We laugh and cry. Most people are convinced higher mammals experience emotions or feelings, but we're the only ones who express significant emotion with a spontaneous, biological response involving tear ducts, lungs and the rhythmic movement of the diaphragm. In fact, if you think about it, the physiology of laughing and crying is virtually identical. One feels lousy. The other feels good. Both create endorphins and a sense of greater calm.

We require and are compelled to create symbols and art. I get that you can teach gorillas and chimpanzees to use American Sign Language. But only human beings feel the need to paint on cave walls and canvasses and church ceilings. Only human beings sculpt and exchange wedding rings. No chimpanzee, after consummating a courtship, ever said, "Was it good for you?"

We talk. That is, we use language. Other animals communicate, yes, but they don't talk. There is a difference. This is actually a subset of the above discussion of symbols, since it is the nature of language to be symbolic.

All animals exist, but it seems that human beings know they exist. Perhaps dolphins and humpbacks and my Aussie shepherd, Kelly, have some sentient understanding that they exist, but it is not the same as a human understanding. See, the primary way we know we exist is because we also know that someday we'll cease to exist. That is, we know we're going to die. And this bothers us. Really bothers us. Consciously or unconsciously.

It's called existential anxiety. No other life form appears to manifest it. Wildebeests can exhibit anxiety, distress, even something like fear when wild dogs come to eat them alive. But this is instinctual -- not philosophical. African elephants at, say, age 53 show no evidence of brooding, "Gee, where did the time go? I promised myself I'd see Kenya before I die."

No other animals perseverate whether they have made a good and proper use of their time on Earth.

And lastly is the universal human need to transcend. Human beings can't stop reaching beyond their own physical environment, their finite forms, their experience, even their own consciousness.

I'm not joking: Mind-altering substances show up early in human history. Beer shows up in the Middle East around the fourth or fifth millennium B.C., and many archaeologists believe earlier than that in Africa. Wine is older still. It took homo erectus no time at all to find herbs, mushrooms, seed pods, grasses and leaves able to help him escape the everyday humdrum of mastodons and cave bears and intrusive cave in-laws.

Other cultures altered consciousness not with pharmaceutical assistance but with rigorous disciplines of mind and body. Smoke lodges. Sweat lodges. Meditation. Chanting, rhythm and music. Vibration. Activities pushing the human body to its physical limits and beyond. Ritual tattooing and mutilation. Crop offerings. Material offerings. Animal sacrifice. In some ancient cultures, human sacrifice.

Death, existential anxiety, the need for symbols and transcendence -- somewhere along the way these things merged to invite the emergence of spirituality and religion. Only human beings do this.

I pushed myself, years ago, to attempt a nonsectarian definition of spirituality. My goal was a definition broad enough to be universal (I couldn't, for example, say "spirituality means being a Christian"), and concrete enough to be meaningful (I refused insipid ideas like "spirituality is whatever it means to you.")

So, for better or worse . . .

"Spirituality is the intentional disciplines we undertake to realize, respond and bear witness to essential relatedness."

Hmm. Seems I could not coin a meaningful definition without presupposing an article of faith. In the case of the above definition, I'm presupposing that people and things and events in this life are essentially related. I can't prove that. It's a part of my spiritual worldview leaking into my definition. A bad high school debate team would spot that in a minute.

(Can't apologize, however, because I do think things are essentially related.)

For me, healthy spirituality intercepts and overlaps my vision for competent mental health care: authenticity and human wholeness. I enjoy remembering that the Greek root hiding in the Christian idea of salvation is sadzo. From this root we derive words such as saved, salvation, holy, whole, authentic, health and healing.

Healthy religion isn't about dodging the wrath of the gods, or about currying their favor. Healthy religion is about being properly related -- to self, to neighbor, to community, to environment, to cosmos and to the mystery (known to some folks as God).

Right relationships yield human wholeness. It is the human matter that matters most.

Steven Kalas is a behavioral health consultant and counselor at Clear View Counseling and Wellness Center in Las Vegas. His column appears on Thursdays and Sundays. Questions or comments may be sent to skalas@reviewjournal.com..