Spirituality and the Supernatural

Spirituality:  The quality of being concerned with the human spirit or soul as opposed to material or physical things.  Experiencing the deepest values and meanings by which people live.

Supernatural:  Attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature.

The writing of this essay was a purely personal endeavor.  The first thing I realized as I began this inquiry was that I knew relatively little of spirituality and almost nothing of the supernatural.  And furthermore, I was soon sure that I had no hope of changing this situation with the amount of study that I planned to dedicate to this effort.  The most that I could hope for was to clarify in my own mind the relationship of spirituality and the supernatural and in the process understand my own spirituality better.  I set out to answer the following questions realizing that my answers would only be my unique perspective.

• How do we experience spirituality and the supernatural: through reason, emotion or both?

• What is the role of science in determining what is supernatural or spiritual?

• Is God necessarily supernatural?

• Does spirituality require a belief in God?

• Is there something supernatural about spirituality?

• What is the source of my own spirituality?  

How do we experience spirituality and the supernatural?

I once thought that I was a person of reason.  I believed that rational decisions pretty much ruled my life.  But later in my life when I looked at the major decisions I had made, I was shocked to realize that all of them without exception were based on emotion!  Yes, most were within some bounds of rational behavior, but the actual decision and the specific results of that decision were pure emotion.  For example, I went to college where my best friend did for pretty much that reason alone.  I married for love.  Every car I bought was because of a very strong gut reaction to that car.  Child rearing decisions were emotional based on love or fear or some other emotion.  Knowing this, I have to believe that spirituality for me must be an emotional experience. Yes, spirituality must be within some bounds of reason, but the experience is emotional.  And because I tend to imagine that other human beings are basically like me, my expectation is that spirituality must be an emotional experience with others as well.  So I believe we can say that spirituality is at least a human emotional experience, but is it more than that? Is there an outside influence that evokes this spirituality?  Perhaps a supernatural outside force?

The supernatural on its face would seem to be something not associated with natural human emotion or reason.  By definition, the supernatural transcends the natural world in which we humans are surely embedded.  If the supernatural lies outside our understanding of the natural world, how do we know it actually exists and how does it interact with the natural world?  If the supernatural is outside the natural world, how would we experience it?  The simple answer to the experience question is that we must experience the supernatural the same way we experience everything else…..with our senses and our mind.  But our senses and our minds are evolved to sense and recognize what is natural not what is supernatural, which means that we must experience the supernatural only as it can act through natural means that we can sense.  In other words, somewhat paradoxically, the supernatural must present itself in some natural way for us to have any chance of sensing its presence.  However, we are still left with the issue of how we would recognize this supernatural experience, which we are sensing only through our limited natural means.  What we sense is surely not the reality sensed by a supernatural being that operates outside our natural world, so our experience would be very limited from the perspective of the supernatural being. Even though experienced through our native senses and mind, our experience of the supernatural could be very unusual. And to the extent that this experience was very unusual it certainly would evoke very strong emotions.  So, even though there are great limitations on what supernatural experiences we might have they certainly would be very emotional and perhaps out of the bounds of reason.  

I would be remiss at this point if I didn’t note the role that imagination plays in all our experiences.  I believe that our entire reality not to mention our fantasies are driven by the ability of our brains to imagine.  (see “Understanding Imagination, Belief & Faith”)  So, whatever our experiences, they are really imagined by our mind both with and without inputs from our senses.  This means that it is essentially true that both  spirituality experiences and supernatural experiences would be a product of our imagination, whether they are influenced by outside forces or not.  

So, summing up, we experience spirituality and the supernatural through our imagination, our emotions, and other natural phenomena apparent to our senses.  Spirituality is a natural experience; the supernatural is something beyond the natural world that interfaces with us through natural phenomena.

What is the role of science in determining what is supernatural or spiritual?

Science is the study of the physical and natural world through observation and hypothesis testing.  Hypotheses that cannot be tested are not valid subjects of scientific inquiry.  Science accepts hypotheses that are supported by inductive reasoning based on the preponderance of evidence up to the time where that hypothesis is discovered to be false by a counter example.  Many argue that science makes real progress only when such falsifications occur.  So at any point in time it is important to realize that science is fallible, even if it is the best way to obtain knowledge of the physical and natural world.  

Almost immediately we might be tempted to say that science has nothing to say about either spirituality or the supernatural since neither are a subject of its practice.  But if you feel that way you might be missing an important fact.  As science expands what it is able to study, it excludes what can be considered supernatural or even spiritual.  As scientific knowledge has expanded, what had seemed to be supernatural has been pulled into the scientific tent.  As science looks deeper into the mind and consciousness it reduces certain mental constructs and perhaps even emotions to biological functions.  Is spirituality related in some way to these mental constructs and biological functions?  Certainly to some extent.  Perhaps some day science may find the source of spirituality hidden in our minds.  Or science may at most be able to say what functions are not spiritual.  Will science ever be able to build an artificial mind that is spiritual by giving it the proper human like mental constructs and functionality?  I don’t think we know the answer to that question today, but we can expect to at least find out how to build lots of artificial minds that are not spiritual.

It appears to me that although science does not explicitly study the supernatural or spirituality, science has already characterized what is not supernatural and spiritual in the past and will continue to do that in the future.  And this characterization will likely have a strong impact on how we view the supernatural and spirituality in the future, so science cannot be ignored when characterizing the supernatural and spirituality.

Is God necessarily supernatural?

The answer to this question certainly depends on your definition of God.  Wikipedia has this to say about what God is. 

God has been conceived as either personal or impersonal. In theism, God is the creator and sustainer of the universe, while in deism, God is the creator, but not the sustainer, of the universe. In pantheism, God is the universe itself. In atheism, God is not believed to exist, while God is deemed unknown or unknowable within the context of agnosticism. God has also been conceived as the source of all moral obligation, and the "greatest conceivable existent"

My first reaction to the above is: how wonderful that we might be able to imagine so many different versions of God…. and many more if we imagine gods (with a lower case ‘g’).  My next thought is that if God is supernatural, we cannot know the supernatural nature of God because by definition God is beyond the natural world that we know and live in.  Of course, we can imagine a supernatural God but such an imagination would be unverifiable by any natural means. If we believe that we know God through some natural experiences (physical or spiritual), we do not know a supernatural God (or the supernatural side of God, if you wish).  So if we are honest with ourselves, a supernatural God is beyond our comprehension, and what we think we know of God through natural experiences is not a supernatural God, but a natural version of God that we can experience.   Interestingly, pantheism’s God (the universe itself) means that every part of the natural world is God, and God is not supernatural.  In fact, as part of this universe, we are God!

So, in answer to this question, God is not necessarily supernatural.  All that we really know of God is through natural means.  We can imagine that God is supernatural but we can never verify that through our natural experiences.

Does spirituality require a belief in God?

I want to just say “No” and be done with this question, but maybe we should put some thought into it first.  If we simply fall back to the definition above, spirituality is concerned with the human spirit or soul.  No God mentioned.  Of course, many would say that definition is wrong because it is the spirit of God that dwells within us that is the source of our spirituality (in Christianity, The Holy Spirit).  Or perhaps spirituality finds its source in this magnificent natural world that we live in, and in particular an appreciation for all that is outside of our self, be it natural or supernatural.  Or maybe spirituality is associated with the search for meaning in our human lives or our philosophy of life.  

If it is true as I have said above that spirituality is an emotional experience, we need to ask what emotions are associated with spirituality?  Somehow it seems that we should immediately rule out “bad” emotions like anger, fear, anxiety, prejudice, and so on.  They cannot be associated with spirituality.  Some “good” emotions come to mind that fit in with spirituality:  love, peace, joy, forgiveness, and so on.  You can argue that you can have these good emotions without God, but you can also argue that God is love, peace, joy and forgiveness (I tend to be in this camp.)

So, maybe a simple “no” in answer to this question does not do it justice.  Spirituality does not require a belief in God, but a belief in God is certainly one way to get there, maybe even the best way, depending on how you define your God.  

Is there something supernatural about spirituality?

In my mind there is no doubt about the answer to this question.  No, there is nothing supernatural about spirituality.  In fact, I think we can argue that spirituality is a purely natural phenomena.  The supernatural is inhuman, impersonal, unknown, and unknowable.  Spirituality is human, personal and can be experienced here and now in each of our lives.  

What is the source of my own spirituality? 

This is a hard question for me to answer fully because I do not believe that I have done more than scratch the surface of my own spirituality.  There is so much that I have not experienced.  So at best I can only give a preliminary answer.  Are there many people who can give a a full and complete answer?  Or is it true that we are all searching for our spirituality and will never complete that search in our lifetimes?  Here is my partial answer at this time. 

The ultimate source of my spirituality is my realization in any present moment that I am a trivial, small component of a much larger and wonderful universe.  (A spiritual person is a humble person.)  This realization can come from a glimpse of the natural world on scales that run from a tiny stream of ants in my garden to the vast cosmos revealed in a clear night sky.  It can also come from a loving interaction with my closest loved ones or a thought associated with someone I’ve never met when I see them passing near me as we both move through our lives.  These realizations give rise to a variety of strong positive emotions ranging from wonder to compassion.  When for a moment I am able to shed my Self and see the interbeing I share with the rest of the universe, my spirituality surges like blood in my arteries flooding my mind with peace, love and well being.  I identify my ability to have these wonderful positive emotions (love being the most prominent) with God, who dwells within me.  My God is not a supernatural God, but rather is the core of the most natural being we humans can imagine: ourselves.  

Consider this prayer of spirituality.

Let me be awake to the cosmos. 
Let me dwell in the moment. 
Let me be mindful of our magnificent natural world. 
Let me have love, acceptance and compassion for all living beings.
Let me banish my ignorance. 
Let me live in kindness.
Let spirituality be my path to joy and happiness.