We live in a time of awesome change!
In just three generations, human understanding of ourselves and the cosmos changed tremendously. So have our notions of God, religion and spirituality. We need a spirituality for the 21st century – a mixture of what will never change and what must change. Our purpose is to awaken what the human perspective is today about spiritual reality, and why it is important in human life.
The three generations I refer to span the years 1880 until the present:
My grandfather (1880 – 1970) He was born into a world that was basically unchanged for over 100 years. He was a farmer his whole life. There were only trains and horses, although he had a Ford after awhile. No electricity, no radios, and on his farm no indoor plumbing. He ploughed 60 acres with a team of horses until he retired as a farmer in 1960 at 80 years old. When he was in his 80s he flew to Washington DC to visit my family, and the year before he died, man walked on the moon. He practiced the Methodist religion his entire life and probably never heard the word “spirituality.”
My father (1908 -1989) He was born on the farm but left home in 1926 to work then go to university. He experienced flight, telephones, electricity, radio (after he left home), two world wars (he served as an army officer in the second one), women’s equality and civil rights (he worked as an investigator of hospital civil rights violations for the federal government). He didn’t practice any religion and also probably didn’t know anything about spirituality.
Me (1937 – present) I was born in a urban environment and have lived in cities my entire life. During my lifetime, I saw the rise of global computing and communications, rapid travel and multi national business, all of which is now called globalisation. The population of the world has more than tripled during my lifetime. The ‘have nots’ have begun to demand justice from the ‘haves.’ I worked at NASA for six years and was on the project that took the first images of the entire earth from 40,000 km away. The knowledge of the immense age and size of the cosmos, and the fundamental structure of quantum matter/energy/gravity became commonly known. What human consciousness is, how everything is evolving, and the design of DNA began to be understood by some people. The emphasis on religion declined in western nations, and some notions of spirituality began to take shape in some people.
The vast majority of people today have a 19th century understanding of God and religion, and little or no understanding of spirituality and the reality of the presence of God. This is probably not their fault. Religious knowledge and education could not keep up with the pace of change in human knowledge. In fact, until very recently most religions saw science as the enemy of religion.
It is important to understand that there are three fundamental ways for humans to understand reality . . .all of which can begin to understand God. The way of science can understand what can be measured in reality, whose theories can be shared and proven. The way of art can sense and describe deeper aspects of reality, and communicate these intuitions in sounds, images or words. The way of spirituality can also reveal deeper aspects of reality beyond art, and lead individuals to a sense of God’s presence. (Only revelation can attach meaning and truth to spirituality.)
We hope in the Taste and See website to expose you to all three ways of knowing reality, and point towards ways to integrate this knowledge with the Christian religion.