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People often say they are spiritual, but what do they mean when they say it? I’m sure the definition varies from person to person (and even within a person; we’re so full of contradictions). Leigh Schmidt has written an essay describing some of the general attributes Americans give to spirituality. The essay says the main attributes are:

• a yearning for mystical experience or epiphanic awareness
• a valuing of silence, solitude, and sustained meditation
• a yearning for mystical experience or epiphanic awarenessa valuing of silence, solitude, and sustained meditation
• a belief in the immanence of the divine in nature and attunement to that presence
• a cosmopolitan appreciation of religious variety, along with a search for unity in diversity
• an ethical earnestness in pursuit of justice-producing, progressive reforms
• an emphasis on self-cultivation, artistic creativity, and adventuresome seeking

Personally, I’d say I tend to approach the world with:

• a yearning for wondrous experiences and truer awareness of the world about me
• a valuing of silence and solitude, and my curiosity
• a yearning to delve the complexity and simplicity of nature and attunement to that
• an appreciation of other’s beliefs, along with an appreciation of how similar and dissimilar such beliefs are
• a desire to not cause harm, and to help
• an emphasis on self-cultivation, artistic creativity, and adventuresome seeking

So, am I spiritual?

The NY Times has a fascinating story about the friction between the Iraqi insurgency and Al-Qaeda:

In October, the two insurgents said in interviews, a group of local fighters from the Islamic Army gathered for an open-air meeting on a street corner in Taji, a city north of Baghdad.

Across from the Iraqis stood the men from Al Qaeda, mostly Arabs from outside Iraq. Some of them wore suicide belts. The men from the Islamic Army accused the Qaeda fighters of murdering their comrades.

“Al Qaeda killed two people from our group,” said an Islamic Army fighter who uses the nom de guerre Abu Lil and who claimed that he attended the meeting. “They repeatedly kill our people.”

The encounter ended angrily. A few days later, the insurgents said, Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and the Islamic Army fought a bloody battle on the outskirts of town.

The battle, which the insurgents said was fought on Oct. 23, was one of several clashes between Al Qaeda and local Iraqi guerrilla groups that have broken out in recent months across the Sunni Triangle.

For more click here.