I have heard throughout my life at different times people say, in essence, “I believe in God, but not organized religion.” “I’m spiritual, but not religious.” Or some variant thereof.
There is a natural inclination of people to seek for a higher purpose in life, to seek for some meaning in this life beyond accumulating assets, or experiences. There also seems to be an almost universal inclination of people to seek communication with, or sense communication from, a higher power. From these inclinations religion is born.
There is also a natural inclination in most of us to want to share our experiences with others, to work with others towards a common goal. We also seem to have an inclination to be social animals, to gather ourselves together. From these inclinations organized religion is born.
For the ancients, religion served a very practical purpose in helping to make sense of this world. Almost certainly, not every ancient structure believed by archeologists and historians to have been built for a religious purpose was actually so built. Equally as certainly, many ancient structures were so built. Of the great manmade structures in history, many of them were undoubtedly built for an expressly religious purpose. Such structures do not come into being without purposeful, organized effort.
So much of the literature, and other art, that comes down to us from the ancients was of a overtly religious nature as well. In the United States we may be most familiar with the Old and New Testaments, but the Sutras of the Buddhists, the Veda of the Hindus, the Muslim Koran, and countless other ancient texts, both existent and no more, point to the importance of the ancients’ religious inclinations. Religious texts do not get handed down from generation to generation throughout the centuries without purposeful, organized effort.
Even today, places to meet to share spiritual experiences are not built and maintained without purposeful, organized effort. Neither is knowledge, whether of a religious nature or otherwise, transferred from one generation to the next by happenstance. Texts are written and shared with the purpose of preserving knowledge and experiences. For these reasons, organized effort, and organized religion, serve a very valuable purpose.
But there are other natural inclinations that serve to corrupt our religious experiences, and organized religion. There exists the natural inclination of people in all walks of life to attempt to convert what should be seen and treated as community property into personal property. There is the inclination to put one’s own needs, or the needs of one’s family and group, above the needs of “others.” This inclination toward covetousness is how organized religion often becomes its own worst enemy, attracting the faithless as well as the faithful. Our natural inclination to seek our own first is how the religious inclination is often coopted for selfish reasons.
As an all too common example, seen throughout millennia, a collective community effort is expended to build an impressive edifice as a testament to the community’s faith in a power beyond we mere mortals, and then the keys to the doors find their way into the hands of people who see themselves not as stewards obligated to the community of believers, but as gatekeepers of their own personal privilege. The mentality of a sentry at an exclusive country club more than of a faithful shepherd of Our Heavenly Father’s flock takes over.
I certainly don’t have a definitive answer of how the corruption of organized religion can be totally avoided. Seeking one’s own first is of course a pitfall millennia old. Greater prayerfulness, awareness, mindfulness, would seem to be a step in the right direction. The courage to step forward to work for the greater good is another. But perhaps the words of the Savior give us the best clue how to avoid this pitfall:
“Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you; but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant, even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life as a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:25-28.