Grace

I was reading today in a well known tabloid newspaper that according to a new poll 53% of people in the UK do not identify with any religion at all. Which calls into question the significance of "Grace". Most religion revolves around God, and Grace is more often than not seen as God being merciful towards us. Thus religion involves God, which involves grace - and if so many no longer subscribe to any religion at all then the whole package becomes redundant. "Amazing Grace" has floundered.

But Grace remains for me a beautiful word that suggests so much. It can suggest that the reality that we live in is ultimately benign, significant and meaningful. Even in a totally non-theistic context, the reality of grace is that all is given - not "attained" - and that we are OK just as we are. Treating ourselves as some sort of object that must needs be polished and perfected and made suitable for others to admire is a non-starter. Self-acceptance, as I see it, is at the heart of grace -  and far from this being a justification for a passive attitude it can in fact prove to be the catalyst for genuine transformation. As is acceptance of others just as they are.

The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them. (Thomas Merton)

Getting back to the lack of religion, those who view this as some sort of unwelcome development - often the Clergy - then often insist that something is "missing" in our modern lives, even that the average human being is haunted by a sense of "incompleteness", even "emptiness". Personally I am happy enough as I am. Others will have to answer for themselves.

A feeling of emptiness?

Maybe in the old days religion was a means to an end; it granted the benefit of "salvation", which presupposes a particular world view. For many that world view, for good or ill, has gone. An "afterlife" makes little sense and for most seems unbelievable. Yet rather than any lack, this can be seen as an opportunity. Many so called "spiritual" people in the past have always insisted that "virtue is its own reward" ( though often looking forward to receiving one ) Now that death is thought to be the end, then what price virtue? Love, compassion, a helping hand. Such things can truly be purely for the sake of the other and not to satisfy a requirement of "faith". 

Our lives can become a means of expressing gratitude for all that we have received, not a means of ego advancement or of gaining any other benefit. This can be bolstered by a faith that we live in a Cosmos, not a chaos, that there is significance in Reality, yet a faith that does not issue in creeds or explicit beliefs but rather allows us to become free to live a full and meaningful existence in this life.