Spiritual Freedom

I do feel we are connecting on a spiritual level here. If you want to go deeper, read my Autobiography post;

https://www.hipforums.com/forum/topic/482053-autobiography-of-my-spiritual-life/

 

I did see that this morning and read the beginning--I then got busy---I will go back and finish it today or this evening.

 

I had a lot of trouble with religion, and explored many beliefs when I was much younger. I found, what I felt, were a lot of truths, and that the major difference between belief systems was cultural. But I soon realized that my real problem was the institution--religion is after all a man-made construct.

Spirituality, what ever you want to make that out to be, is not traditionally an institutional construct. It is your own relationship with the universe and spirit. Every religion has a spiritual core, but the institution is built around that turning it into a religion. But there is probably more varied forms of spirituality than there are religions.

In my own path, I became very agnostic at one point, and tried to ignore the path I had been on. However an experience in the Philippines pushed me back towards it. I have found my own home within indigenous spirituality---a path that is very powerful and filled with amazing wonder...

But spirituality doesn't have to have a home per se'. In the end, it is you, and the universe.

 

Totally agree. I've recently come across the term for all of this ''eclecticism,'' which essentially means that a person can find a number of belief systems to be helpful to his/her life. I think that, anyways.

Belief/spirituality and religion aren't the same things to me, I find that religion is where everyone struggles the most, especially the ''religious.'' Religion is constricting, and doesn't allow for enough individuality, imo.

 

I am a very eclectic person. If you were to visit my house you would find a very eclectic collection of art and artifacts--my art collection is primarily Oriental though I do have some European pieces (I'm hoping to add more). One of the artists I have collected is known for his eclecticism---Karl Bang (which is his anglicized name) was the official artist of Mao Tse Tung (so whatever paintings you see of Mao, were done by him). After Mao died he was allowed to leave China, and then only painted women---or more correctly a mixture of models that he would combine into the perfect woman, and would combine several different cultures and cultural motifs into each piece. Then there are the antiques, antiquities, and artifacts---everything from a little statue of the Goddess Astoreth from 2,500 BC to a 3 foot tall Chinese jade incense burner. There are all kinds of indigenous artifacts from around the world. I have a large and fairly eclectic collection of music---granted, it is primarily rock and blues music--but there is still quite a bit of music from Middle Eastern music to Chinese and Japanese music, to Scottish, French, and Russian---and I have a fair amount of electronic music, classical, and so forth. Instruments too---an Aeta nose flute, Indian sitar, a snake charmer's flute, several electric guitars, a bass guitar, several flutes, a Korg MS 2000 analog synthesizer, a didjeridoo, and even a balalaika sent to me as a surprise gift by someone here on HipForums.

Spiritually I am fairly eclectic as well. Even in some ways I didn't intend to be---I have a set of Ancestor paintings that are about 150 years old. Ancestor paintings are paintings of the First Chinese Emperor and Empress, and were kept at temples for the majority of Chinese who were too poor to have paintings of their own ancestors--since the Emperor and Empress were the great ancestors of all the Chinese, these paintings would serve as surrogate representations of their own ancestors to leave offerings and incense and so forth to. The night before I went to pick these paintings up I had a dream of where I would hang them, and then place a small round table between them to burn incense and leave food for. It was a very lucid dream, and I had the feeling that I had had the same dream in the past---so that's what we did. (Though it isn't too alien from my own beliefs if you consider that ancestor worship and folk Taoism grew directly out of the ancient indigenous spiritualities of their Ural-Altaic ancestors, and the first emperor himself performed amazing things, such as diverting streams and other superhuman feats, by turning into a bear while his wife beat on a hand drum---a very shamanic story connected to the ancient bear cult that stretched clear across Eurasia, even to Japan, and then into the Americas. There is a certain level of universality that you have among indigenous spiritualities around the world, that you don't have among other religions.)

There are numerous Native Americans who go to church, but also walk the Red Road (follow the traditional indigenous spirituality).

I don't see a problem with spiritual eclecticism when it is done in sincerity and within boundaries. But I would caution you a bit on the New Age eclecticism, which has a habit of taking things out of their cultural context and can even be dangerous. Granted, it is probably not such a big deal to take religious motifs and ceremonies from various religions and combine them, In fact there is a certain amount of sharing already----counting beads on a mala, is not too far off from Buddhist prayer beads, or a rosary, or Muslim prayer beads. But on the other hand---there is a specific cultural and religious difference between each of these, and so it would obviously take meaning away from the ceremony and would be most inauthentic to use Buddhist Juzu beads to pray the rosarie or for Muslim prayers.

But it is a much bigger deal when you are dealing with indigenous spirituality. Take the sweat lodge for example---there are some very difficult things one must go through before they can run a sweat lodge, including 4 years of piercing at a sundance. There are a number of white people around who do not respect that, and think they can do it for whatever reason. Those are the sweat lodges where people die, such as the incident in Arizona a number of years ago when several people died in a sweat lodge run by a motivational speaker. I would certainly learn a bit about sweat lodges before going to one---especially one run by a non-native before trusting someone----and never pay to attend one, bring a gift of tobacco.

If you apply the Christian concept of covenant to Native spirituality, you could state that indigenous people have an adult relationship with God---like in the Garden of Eden. Ceremony, prayers, actions, are not taken lightly in indigenous ways---you do not make a promise with spirit and then break it, because their could be real consequences to that. Christianity and Judaism on the other hand, has a tradition where several covenants have been broken with God, and therefore they have more of a child like relationship with god---they're somewhat protected from the consequences. One can pray and promise one thing, and do another----you could be shooting yourself in the foot if you are doing things that could harm you, but it probably has no effect on your balance to the universe.

In fact this is something I am going through with my parents right now. My dad had cancer and it had moved into his bones, so I suggested that he consider ceremony. I explained to both of my parents about it, and I had the help of the grand daughter of Black Elk to also explain to them. I made it very clear that if they do go into ceremony that they will have to follow it with a Thank You ceremony after their prayers are answered. They are Christian but they agreed. The ceremony was very amazing to them and my dad was healed. But then he went and visited my fundamentalist sister who insisted it was of the devil. Still, after returning I felt that they had resolved those issues and came to terms with the fact that they did not agree with her. But they should have done the thank you ceremony over this past year---and instead they have put it off, and now have expressed that they do not wish to do that. (There is a lot of work in preparing for it---they will need to tie well over 400 tobacco ties, prepare spirit food, and so forth, It would be good to give gifts as well to the people (And they did bring back some branches of cedar from Oregon to give, but...) This is not good what they are doing.

My mom rationalizes that God is love, and they didn't know what they were getting involved in, and she thinks that they have the church and they can pray, etc. etc.

I believe in love too, but there is a balance in the universe. I have seen medicine men suffer because they did ceremony for someone who did not come back for a thank you ceremony after the prayers were answered. They had to make amends for it themselves at a sundance. I have heard stories of people that did not keep their promise to do a thank you ceremony.

My parents saw powerful things in that ceremony that they would never see in a church, and the prayers were answered. It is a very hard ceremony to perform for the medicine man, who doesn't get paid for it. Even if they don't think it will have consequences, or bring bad luck, or whatever, at the very least---it is disrespectful. No one knew who they were, yet many people in the Indian community showed up to pray for them.

.......Anyway--the real point is that you should keep a cultural/spiritual context to whatever you are incorporating----unless you have a clear message of how and what you should do with it from spirit. But, for example, if you wanted to suddenly incorporate a chanunpa (sacred pipe) in your ceremony because you thought it would be cool---at least take the time to learn about it first--not from books or whatever---but the people that pray with it everyday----the chanunpa is a very powerful tool, and you don't want to be creating bad karma for yourself by disrespecting it.

This may not apply directly to you Deidre---but there are all kinds of people that read these threads.