What Do You See in the Glass Ball?

A Look in the Mirror
Robert Owens Scott

Finding our way in this new spiritual landscape

Each year when Christmas and Easter, Hanukkah and Passover give spirituality a public focus, the media report on new opinion polls that confirm what last year's polls told us: Americans believe in God (overwhelmingly), belong to houses of worship (by a substantial majority), and go to services regularly (almost half of us). We appear to be so consistent that comparable statistics have shown up since the 1930s. What's new in the last decade is that pollsters added spiritual growth (four out of five of us say we want it). And that probably won't change much either.

But what these polls have largely missed is that our spiritual journeys are now taking us down paths that were not available to previous generations. Not only are we exposed to a wider variety of religious practices, but the word spirituality has stepped out on its own. It now signifies a multitude of indispensable indefinables that give our lives meaning.

So we decided to create our own poll to peek under the hood of this new American spirituality. We commissioned Blum & Weprin Associates -- heavyweights used by NBC News and The New York Times -- to field a national opinion poll of adult Americans (ages 18+). Our staff designed the questions with input from a wide circle of our contributors and advisors. (Our special thanks to Bowling Green State University psychologist Kenneth I. Pargament, Ph.D., who framed our key questions on spirituality and religion in his study "Religion and Spirituality: Unfuzzying the Fuzzy," Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 1997, 36(4): 549-564.)

We also realize that no amount of data will ever be able to capture the wonderfully complex movement of the Spirit. That's why this special section (through page 39) reaches far beyond the numbers, into the lives of people famous and obscure. As we see ourselves in their choices, their stumbling, and their breakthroughs, we find permission to dream, to expand our worldview, to consider anew the avenues open to us for spiritual growth -- whether we're discovering new practices or recommitting to old ones with fresh passion.

Snapshots from Our National Poll

Spirituality and/or Religion

Remember the first time you heard somebody say, "I'm spiritual, but I'm not religious"? One big question we hoped to address was whether this rise in spirituality means that religion is on its way out. Or, to put it bluntly, is the spiritual renaissance the triumph of the New Age movement, as some traditionalists fear? The answer is a resounding "no" to conflict, "yes" to compatibility:
• 59% of Americans describe themselves as both religious and spiritual
• 65% have positive associations with the word "religion" (15% find it negative)
• 74% find the word "spirituality" positive (6% disagree)
• 20% -- or one in five Americans -- see themselves as solely spiritual, and among this group, 47% view religion negatively
• 8% say they are only religious

Most of us see the two concepts working in sync:
• 23% view spirituality as the broader concept that embraces religion
• 7% say religion is broader
• 19% consider the two identical
• 13% see them as entirely different

Both concepts are important to us:
• 80% of those who define themselves as spiritual say that their spirituality influences every aspect of their lives
• 42% told us that religion plays a central role in their lives (for another 36% it plays some role)
• For nearly all of them this role is the same as, or greater than, it used to be

God: Distant or Loving?

Like many polls, ours found that nearly all Americans say they believe in God. No news there, but we went a step further, trying to understand what people mean by "God." What we found surprised even us:

• 71% described God as "loving" when given a list of characteristics and asked to pick the one that best describes God
• 14% (a far-distant second) chose "creating"
• 5% find God primarily "remote"
• 2% chose "judging" and the same percentage went for "controlling"
• 84% of Americans view God as being "everywhere and in everything" rather than "someone somewhere"

Whether these findings point to pantheism or mysticism is a question we'll take up in a future issue. For now we can certainly say that the stern old guy with a beard appears to be exiting, stage left.

What's a Spiritual Act?

Since we believe that spirituality is part of everyday life, we gave people a list of activities and asked which, if any, they find spiritual:

• 91% of us see praying as a spiritual activity
• 81% see attending worship services as spiritual
• 80% believe that parenting is spiritual -- and even those who say they are not spiritual believe that parenting is
• 67% consider a walk in the forest a divine experience
• 52% of adults affirm that making love is a spiritual activity, although men are more likely to have transcendent sex (57% yes/38% no) than women, who are divided about 50/50 on the question. Contrary to what some might expect, people who are religious are more likely than the nonreligious to say that making love is spiritual
• But, though cleanliness may be next to godliness, only 29% of Americans find anything spiritual about cleaning