Wouldn't It Be Grand to Believe We Are Doing God's Work, Love's Work, in the World?

First published on April 9, 2021

One of the most notable aspects of my interview with Jeffrey Wotherspoon, released last week on the Coach's Journey Podcast, was the centrality in Jeffrey's life of his religion: how his life has gone in an incredibly different (and far better) direction to where it would have gone had he not met a particular group of people at university and engaged with Christianity in a new way.

Introducing the episode, I found myself trying to talk about the impact of being in a deep conversation with someone of such obvious and strong faith. I've seen it with my religious friends before; they often have such a deep trust in life which those of us (including me) who find themselves apparently God-less, simply don't have. And in an age where overthinking life and under-trusting ourselves (or indeed anything) is epidemic among many of us, this is particularly notable.

And, when a member of The Coach's Journey Community was reflecting on the episode, he pulled out that aspect of the conversation too, and I found myself writing about how religion... well it just isn't really spoken about in certain parts of our society these days.

Of course this isn't the first time I've reflected on things like this. As a coach, deepening into presence further and further, thinking about my coaching less and less, it's hard not to ask, sometimes, Where did that question come from? Who is really speaking in this moment? Is it really 'me'? As a writer, tapping into a 'through me' practice, it's hard not to feel like something is writing this, but it isn't 'me'.

The situation, of course, is changing. As Rebel Wisdom co-founder David Fuller reflected recently, part of the fascinating impact of Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson as he exploded into global consciousness in 2018 was to shift the conversation away from the ideas of the New Atheists. As Fuller pointed out, in many circles thinking on how to treat the lessons of the major religions changed incredibly swiftly. From something like, 'It's foolish to consider the lessons of the major religions in the way you think about the world', to 'It's foolish not to consider the lessons of the major religions in how you think about the world.'

And, of course, religion matters. Religions matter. Our societies were built on those belief systems, for better or worse. And we seem, at least according to the work of psychologists like Jonathan Haidt, to be built for religion. We are, as Haidt said, 90% chimp, 10% bee. And that 10% is the collective, working for something bigger. For almost the whole of human history, that collective has been centred around one religion or other, one God (or set of Gods) or another.

For a secular, modern society, what happens to that group-ish part of us, that for so long as embraced religion as a way of being part of something bigger? Well, it doesn't go away, that's for sure. You only have to look across society to see what we might call religiosity showing up in all kinds of places. In the UK, we see people behaving with religious fervour in relation to football teams, political parties, the environment, the NHS, free market capitalism and more. To check it, you just have to ask yourself if there are 'blasphemous' things that can't be said without being ostracised from a certain group? Are there 'heretical' views which would see you completely rejected?

The problem with removing religion from our societies is... what replaces it? Should our economic or healthcare system have the a religious zeal about it? What impact does that have on our dialogues about those things, on our ability to solve problems together?

And what about for individuals? Without a framework of beliefs to rely on, a tried and tested one evolved over centuries, who are we? What is the point? Why do we do what we do? And how do we stay sane when things get hard?

I'm not a religious man, and my early experiences of religion didn't seem filled with the kind of trust or love or faith that charactarises Jeffrey in our conversation. Yet I find myself drawn more and more to those who are. I envy their faith, their belief, even if I don't share it, even if it doesn't permeate my being in the way it sometimes feels it does there.

Wouldn't it be grand, after all, to have faith that God is Love, and that we are doing God's work, Love's work, in the world?