Religion: What is it FOR?

For most of my life, I assumed human beings were basically bad. Including me. Maybe especially me. My working theory was pretty simple: people are selfish, messy, and just one bad day away from proving it, so the best we can hope for is a decent set of rules, some consequences, and enough social pressure to keep the wheels from coming off. Not exactly inspirational, but it felt honest.

Then, quite surprisingly, Christianity handed me something not just rearranged the furniture in my head, but gave me a whole new set of furniture: the idea that human beings are made in the image of God. In other words, at our truest and healthiest, we look like Jesus...love, patience, kindness, courage, mercy, truth, all of it. That didn’t make me naïve about human behavior. People still do terrible things. I still do things that don’t look much like Jesus. But it shifted the frame from “you’re bad, so you better follow the rules” to “this thing you’re doing isn’t actually who you are.” That is a very different way to live. It made goodness feel less like pretending and more like remembering...which is a BIG difference. And maybe that’s one of the best things religion can do: remind us who we are at our best, and keep calling us back when we forget.

That’s part of what religion is for. Not the whole thing. But part of it. At its healthiest, religion helps people orient their lives around what matters most. It gives us stories, rituals, language, songs, seasons, symbols, practices, and communities that pull us back toward what is true, good, and life-giving. It doesn’t just answer questions; ideally, it forms people. It teaches us how to grieve, how to celebrate, how to repair, how to hope, and how to stay human when life gets sharp.

You can see that in all kinds of traditions. In Christianity, it shows up in confession, communion, baptism, prayer, Scripture, and the ongoing call to love God and neighbor. In Judaism, religion has this beautiful way of making memory communal...telling and retelling the story, wrestling with the text, arguing your way toward faithfulness, and refusing to let holiness drift away from ordinary life. In Islam, there’s a steady, embodied rhythm to devotion...prayer, fasting, generosity, submission...not as mindless rule-following, but as re-centering your life around God and the good. Buddhism, while it functions differently than these traditions, still offers a path of practices, community, and wisdom that help people navigate suffering without becoming consumed by it. The Baha’i tradition reminds us that unity is not a side quest; it’s central. Even secular and atheist frameworks can function religiously in this sense, as they offer meaning, ethics, ritual, community, and a way of testing what is true without checking your brain at the door.

Now, to be clear, these traditions are not all the same. They make different claims, tell different stories, and hold different convictions about God, truth, reality, and the shape of human flourishing. And that matters...a lot.  But they often agree on what a healed person tends to look like: someone more truthful, more compassionate, more just, more humble, more awake to the dignity of others. And That matters...a lot more.  

That’s why I’m less interested these days in asking, “Is religion good or bad?” as a category. That question feels too flat. Too lazy, honestly. A better question is: what is this religion producing in actual people? Is it making them more honest? More loving? More merciful? More brave? More grounded? More capable of belonging without controlling? Or is it making them brittle, fearful, performative, cruel, superior, or numb?  Because religion can absolutely help. And religion can absolutely harm. We’ve talked about the harm. But I don’t want to hand the mic only to the worst expressions of religion, because that gives them too much power. At its best, religion doesn’t shrink people. It steadies them. It gives them a path to walk when life gets confusing. It offers language when grief scrambles the brain. It creates tables where people can practice mercy before they’re good at it. It keeps asking us to become more fully human.

That matters to me, because I still believe people need more than random inspiration and a few decent podcasts. We need forms. We need rhythms. We need stories bigger than our own. We need communities that can hold us accountable without crushing us, and traditions that can shape us without erasing us. In other words, religion...when it’s healthy...is not mainly about keeping bad people in line. It’s about helping human beings become who they really are. For me, that’s still one of the most beautiful things Christianity ever gave me. But honestly, it’s also one of the things I’ve come to love in other traditions too, even while staying in my Jesus lane. Different stories, different practices, different names for the Holy...but that same deep invitation to become more human, more loving, more awake.

Now, I know there are plenty of folks out there who have either been harmed by religion or never gave it a second look because of how often it has been expressed in unhealthy, controlling, or just plain absurd ways. Fair enough, honestly. So if you’re willing, here’s a gentle little practice for the week...not to convince yourself of anything, but simply to pay attention.

Take a few quiet minutes and ask yourself, “At my best, what kind of person am I becoming?” Then, right alongside that, ask, “What in my religious background...or even in my assumptions about religion...has helped me become more human, and what has made that harder?” Write both down if you can. Hold them together without rushing to tidy them up. And then, if someone comes to mind who has helped you become a little more honest, kind, brave, or grounded, reach out and tell them. Just a simple text or call: “Hey, you’ve helped me become more myself in a good way. Thank you.”

If you feel comfortable enough, send us your answers at heythere@justloveneworleans.org. One of the reasons Just Love - Greater New Orleans exists is to keep exploring...and embodying...what a healthy expression of spiritual and religious community can actually look like. Sometimes healing starts there...not with a grand spiritual breakthrough, but with honest reflection, a little repair, and remembering that none of us are meant to "become fully human" without humans.

For me, the goal isn’t to be “for” or “against” religion as a concept. The goal is a spirituality with skin that helps real people breathe again…and love their neighbors well. So until next time, may you remember who you are at your best, practice it badly but sincerely, and find companions who help you keep becoming.

Grace and peace, my follow humans,

Sam