Spirituality to change the world
Humans have not really changed. Our culture and systems have been made up of the same essential things since humans first appeared as a species - relationships, community, learning, work, entertainment, food, chores, raising children, hardships and the occasional adventure.
Except now we are facing an existential crisis. After a huge period in humanity’s evolution, we’ve made everything faster and more efficient, even profitable. But meaning, peace, and joy often feel out of reach. There is no substance. We are grasping and wanting and consuming but there is nothing there. We are not finding the meaning, peace, or joy we were promised.
The poet John O'Donohue wrote in Anam Ċara “We need to remain in rhythm with our inner voice and longing. Yet this voice is no longer audible in the modern world. We are not even aware of our loss, consequently, the pain of our spiritual exile is more intense in being largely unintelligible.”
In humanity’s spiritual exile, we have developed an addiction, and it is slowly killing the species.
St. Thomas Aquinas was a little more blunt; “Man cannot live without joy; therefore when he is deprived of true spiritual joys it is necessary that he become addicted to carnal pleasures.”
Do we want to be the ones who, as Professor Bryan Cox asks, eliminate the only source of meaning for 40 billion light years? Loathe am I to be in the generation that sees the beginning of the end for our species.
Researchers at the University of Maine suggest humanity is in the middle of an evolutionary change, where culture is shaping us more than genetics. One of the authors (Timothy M. Waring, associate professor of economics and sustainability) says “Human evolution seems to be changing gears. On reviewing the evidence, we find that culture solves problems much more rapidly than genetic evolution."
Our existential crisis isn’t a single-issue problem we can fix with one solution. It is a multi-dimensional change. It requires a deep cultural shift—a new way of being human. Cultural evolution is all good and well, but how? It doesn’t feel like ‘cultural evolution’ is going all that well for us right now.
All change hinges on the quality of the future vision, and the extent to which people buy-in to that vision. Humanity and world-changes require extraordinary vision, if we want to affect how we engage with the future. So, what kind of culture do we want to build next? What do we want the next evolution of humanity to look like?
Spirituality has always given us that vision by pointing us to universal truths.
Perennial wisdom (or perennial philosophy) says that all religious, spiritual, and philosophical traditions tell us the same universal truths about existence, humanity, and the divine. These universal truths are what make up our spirituality, regardless of our personal spiritual beliefs. These universal truths inform human culture and how we structure our systems.
Across traditions, there’s a shared universal truth of Oneness: that everything is interconnected. Science and math are compatible with this understanding. Italian physicist Carlo Rovelli said “The idea that the world is made by objects, it’s wrong, according to contemporary physics. The world is made by relations. The world is a network of relation.” Writer Virginia Woolf, and some who work on ‘the hard problem of consciousness’, refer to the Oneness as mind “Our minds are all threaded together…Any live mind today is of the very same stuff as Plato’s and Euripides. It is only a continuation and development of the same thing. It is this common mind that binds the whole world together; and all the world is mind.”
If we see ourselves as part of one whole, we can reshape our culture and systems with that truth at the core. If we can start from this first universal truth, we are well on our way to an extraordinary vision for humanity.
When we have spirituality as a foundation for culture (and therefore our systems) humans and the planet thrive. We build stronger communities. We care for each other, and that improves our well-being by reducing stress, and increasing happiness and social connectedness. We support equitable access to our abundant resources – we understand that each part needs resources in its turn. We care about communities, so capital tends to flow locally. Ownership of enterprises is closer to those who are workers, suppliers, customers, or other members of the community where the enterprises are located. The spiritual dimensions of existence (meaning, purpose, Love, connection, joy) are valued more than capital.
The future might look like ancient wisdom made new. It might look like every human living with ‘the peace that passes all understanding’, regardless of their possessions. It might look like protecting meaning over money. Schools and universities might teach an integrated view of economics, jurisprudence, and philosophy. The quality of our questions would improve – ‘What is the role of capital in driving positive change? What feels nice, what do we intuit? What is the kindest, wisest option? When we are creating in any setting – what of the spiritual, the imaginative, intellectual, or aesthetic experience?
But spirituality can’t stay abstract—it must be lived. Spiritual practice, in service of a better world, is also political action. It’s how we create systems that support human flourishing and a higher level of consciousness. Spirituality in action is how we create the changes we wish to see.
I want to be in service of creating a more meaningful and beautiful world for people. I want my work to help embed spirituality not only in our everyday lives, but also in our systems and culture. I believe spirituality is the bridge we need for humanity to step into its next evolution.
“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” Socrates