Religion: Tool, Table, or Trap?
Religion was interesting to me when I was a kid… but it also felt irrational, hypocritical, and...if I’m being honest....kind of like a club I didn’t have the right membership card for. Part of that was personal. My family struggled in a lot of ways for a lot of reasons. What I remember most isn’t that the church did something “bad.” It’s that they didn’t really do anything at all. Nobody showed up with help. Nobody asked what we needed. In our sparse interactions with the church, it was always the same and went something like, “Hey there...nice to meet you… now what can you do for us?” Which is a weird message to me, and seemed an interesting (meaning self-serving) way to “love your neighbor.” The other part was culture. The church world I grew up around had its own language, its own cliques, its own little ladder of who belonged and who didn’t. And as a poor, chubby, nerdy kid, I didn’t need another place where I felt unseen or not good enough for the club. I had public school for that, thank you very much.
Probably the biggest thing revolved around questions, and I had a lot of them. And I mean a lot. The kind of questions that weren’t trying to be edgy, at least not on purpose. They were me trying to make sense of not just religion, but life! When I was around 12, I remember talking to a clergy person in the Christian tradition (the only tradition we had around when I was growing up), and asking question after question. Their answers were short and were more like “just do this”than “that’s a good question... let’s talk about that.” Something in me snapped into clarity after that day: If the biggest questions in life can’t be asked here… then what are we doing? That was the moment I became an atheist, not out of rebellion, but out of disappointment. I wasn’t trying to reject meaning. I was trying to find honesty...and despite my efforts, I wasn’t finding it. (Eventually, I did find religious people who welcomed my questions and cared for me deeply, and it dramatically impacted me, but that’s a long story and one for another day.)
Before we go any further, I want to talk about the word religion itself, because the origin story is very interesting, and actually not as clean-cut as one would think! The word comes from the Latin ‘religio’, but ancient writers didn’t even agree on its roots. Cicero traced it to ‘relegere’, meaning something like “to go over again” or “to reread carefully”. (So, religion as attention, careful practice, a kind of reverent re-checking).  Later Christian writers like Lactantius (and then Augustine) preferred ‘religare’—“to bind,” “to fasten,” “to tie together.” I’ve connected with this one deeply and have always loved it, because it’s basically saying: religion is meant to reconnect what’s been separated...God and humans, humans and humans, humans and their own hearts. In that vein, I’ve even heard folks define it as “re-ligament,” and that metaphor really works. After all, ligaments connect; they hold things together, they help bodies move without falling apart. If spirituality is the inner life, then religion...at its best...can be the connective tissue that helps people stay together, heal together, and move together. And at its worst? Religion becomes a binding that constricts instead of connecting. A knot instead of a ligament. A trap dressed up like a tradition.
Which brings me to this question: is religion in your life functioning as a tool, a table, or a trap? (or Sometimes it’s all three in the same week?) Before you answer, allow me to elaborate.
At its best, religion gives people tools...language for what we can’t quite name, rituals that carry us when we’re tired, stories that keep re-centering us, and practices that shape us slowly over time. Some traditions teach you how to pray when you don’t have words, grieve when you don’t have energy, and hope when your nervous system is stuck in fight-or-flight. Even outside religion, there are tools worth honoring. Atheist and secular traditions often insist: don’t check your brain at the door. Show me the evidence. Test what you claim. Ask the questions. There’s a deep gift in that, because anything, especially religion, that can’t handle curiosity isn’t “strong” at all, it’s rather brittle!
When religion is healthy, it becomes a table big enough for real people. Not a performance. Not a purity contest. A table. I’ve learned...mostly later in life...that different traditions carry this table-energy in genuinely beautiful ways. Judaism has a long tradition of wrestling with the text... questioning, dialoguing, arguing your way toward insight (and yes, there’s a whole tradition of commentary built on the assumption that good questions are part of faithful living). Buddhism starts with an honest acknowledgment of suffering and offers a path for meeting it without numbing. Islam’s devotion and“submission” isn’t mindless; it’s a daily re-centering around what matters most. The Baha’i tradition has a serious commitment to the unity of humanity and an expansive posture that makes room for people across backgrounds. To be clear, these traditions aren’t the same. They make different claims and tell different stories about God, reality, existence...and it’s okay to name that. But I keep noticing how often they agree on what a healed human looks like: someone who tells the truth, practices mercy, seeks justice, lives with humility, and makes room for the stranger. That’sthe perennial wisdom thread...the ‘thing’ that keeps resurfacing across faiths and philosophies. One way I say it is, if it’strue, it has to be true for everyone, everywhere, for all time. One of those bits of perennial wisdom is that when religion becomes a table, it feeds people...belonging, purpose, accountability, comfort, courage. It becomes a place where“love your neighbor” is not a slogan, but a lived and real existence.
Finally, there’s the version many of us know too well: religion as a trap, where belonging is conditional, where questions get punished. Where image management matters more than truth. Where cliques and exclusion masquerade as“community.” Where institutions ask for loyalty but don’t offer love. Where people in pain get platitudes instead of presence. That’s not “re-binding.” That’s constricting. That’s the ligament turning into a noose. (Apologies if that seems too harsh a metaphor, but also, it is an apt one for what many, including myself, have experienced.) This is the religion that creates moral injury. The religion that teaches people to bypass grief instead of experiencing and feeling it. The religion that makes you feel like you’re failing when you’re actually just human.
The big question is... how do we tell the difference? Here’s my simple test: Does it make you more human? Does it make you more loving? Does it help you tell the truth? If it does, it’s probably functioning as a tool or a table. If it makes you smaller, afraid, performative, or numb… that’s a trap. And you’re allowed to name it as such. In fact, you need to name it as such!
So...what do we do with this? Because it’s one thing to name “tool/table/trap” as an idea, and it’s another thing to look at your own story and admit, “Yep… that’s me.” Some of us grew up with religion as a toolbox...imperfect, but helpful. Some of us found a table...community that fed us, held us, and taught us how to love. And some of us got caught in a trap...shame, silence, fear, performance, control. Most of us… if we’re honest… have touched all three. So here’s a simple practice for you: not to judge yourself, but to get honest... and honesty is where healing usually starts.
Grab your phone notes app or a scrap of paper and make three quick lists:
Tool: What about religion has helped me love, heal, and stay grounded?
Table: Where have I experienced real belonging and shared practice?
Trap: Where has religion made me afraid, ashamed, or silenced?
Now circle one thing you want to keep...something worth carrying forward.
And circle one thing you want to release...something you’re done letting shape you.
That’s it. The purpose of this practise is to help you pay attention. And paying attention is a spiritual practice, whether you call it prayer, mindfulness, or “trying not to live on autopilot.” If you want to go a step further, you can find practical ways to actively do the thing you want to keep on a consistent basis. Same, but opposite, for releasing...really let it go. Fair warning, these are usually not something that you just stop doing, and they often take time to work their way out of your life. (One thing that will most definitely help you is to share this with someone...if you’re up for it, email us at hey@justloveneworleans.org, and we will not only hear you, we will help you find practical ways to release...and to carry forward...what you wrote down. Remember, religion connects us to one another, and it is always best practiced connected with other folks, many of whom are on a similar path as you.
Next time, we’ll get even more specific about what religion is...what it’s for, where it helps, where it harms, and why so many of us have complicated feelings about it. Because the goal isn’t to be “for” or “against” religion as a concept, it's to cultivate a spirituality with skin that helps real people breathe again... and love their neighbors well.
So…until next time, may you keep what helps you breathe, let go of what makes you shrink, and find a table where you can be fully human. And if your relationship with religion is complicated… congratulations... you’re in excellent company...and you’re definitely not alone.
Grace and peace,
Sam
