While a growing number of Arizonans shun organized religion, God is still on our radar screen.
Eight out of every 10 Arizonans believe in God, according to a poll released Friday by the Phoenix-based Behavior Research Center.
The finding may appear to contrast with other studies that show Arizonans are less likely to belong to a religious body than people in most states. A 2000 census of American religious adherence released last year, for example, listed Arizona among the 10 lowest states in the nation for its level of religious affiliation.
Interviews with Tucsonans show that their belief in God doesn't always translate in going to church. Tucsonans increasingly see a difference between being "religious" - adhering to organized religion - and being "spiritual" - mixing and matching pieces of traditional theology with personal belief or less-orthodox religions or philosophies.
The "spiritual but not religious" can range from apocalyptic anti-government militia groups, to people who follow a faith but do not participate in organized religion, to those who follow an Earth-centered spirituality such as traditional American Indian worship.
And the exact nature of their God, based on interviews with believers, is elusive at best.
"I view God as the faith that mankind can and will do better. She doesn't punish or reward," said David Collingham, 59, a retiree who grew up Protestant but no longer identifies as part of a faith. "I am still spiritual. I've read a lot of Joseph Campbell, about the power of myth, and Carl Sagan. I used to be agnostic, but not anymore."
Collingham stressed that he believes in God, but his God is female: "We men have screwed too many things up."
Collingham seems to represent a major trend in American religion. The greatest increase in absolute as well as in percentage terms in the American Religious Identification Survey of 2001 was among adults like Collingham who do not have any religious identification: Their number more than doubled from 14.3 million in 1990 to 29.4 million in 2001.
And their proportion has grown from just 8 percent of the total in 1990 to more than 14 percent in 2001, with higher levels in the Pacific Northwest and other Western states. The New York-based magazine Spirituality & Health recently estimated that 20 percent of Americans are "spiritual but not religious."
Dan McDonald, a 44-year-old research specialist at the University of Arizona, is such a person. A former Catholic, he now calls himself humanitarian, yet he is undoubtedly spiritual.
"I believe in myself and have faith in the goodness of humankind. . . . I do not believe in a supreme being, if that is how one defines God," McDonald said. "My faith does not involve a god at all, although I believe that the collective goodness in humankind is a power greater than myself."
Just 2 percent of those who took the Behavior Research Center's Rocky Mountain Poll about God said they do not believe in God at all. And while the "spiritual but not religious" group is growing, surveys still indicate that most Americans, like G. Bryan Barlow, 39, a Tucson business owner, continue to affiliate with a religion.
"A person can have only a minimal amount of spirituality without brothers or sisters in Christ to help them be accountable for their spiritual growth, or acknowledging that Jesus Christ is Lord," said Barlow, a parishioner at Pantano Christian Church, 10355 E. 29th St.
Similarly, Jeanne Holt, 38, a home-schooling mom and parishioner at Palo Verde Church of Christ, 651 S. Kolb Road, said worshipping with a body of believers not only keeps her focused on God but helps to remind her "how precious his love and forgiveness is."
The Rocky Mountain Poll, which found minimal differences in the ages of the believers in God, was based on 602 telephone interviews conducted between Nov. 6 and Nov. 20 in Maricopa County.
Identifying with religion
UA graduate student Patrick Leach said he believes in the existence of a divine creator but finds "no solace" in being part of organized religion. As a gay man, Leach said he felt ostracized from the Roman Catholic Church in which he was raised. And he no longer believes in the Holy Trinity, nor is he convinced that Jesus Christ was divine.
"I am coming to believe that he may have been a divinely inspired prophet, a great and pious man with important messages, as were many before and after him, but I no longer believe he was the son of God," Leach said. "If he had been, I believe peoples of all faiths or lack of faiths would not treat each other as badly as they did even immediately after his Crucifixion, and for the subsequent 2,000 years."
The American Religious Identification Study, conducted by researchers at the City University of New York, noted a considerable gap between "identification" with a religion and "membership" or "belonging" to an institutional embodiment of that religion. That difference between religious identification and belonging could well contain the seeds of a cultural shift, the survey said.
Three Points resident Karen Allison, for example, calls herself Catholic. Yet she doesn't go to church and she also strongly identifies with pantheists, who find a divine presence in nature.
"I believe in God and I like the Catholic Church's services, but I really can't go to church until they change their moral laws that are unfavorable to divorced people and homosexuals and others," said Allison, 51. "God is something I don't know, it's an It with a capital 'I.' I do find that nature is sort of a natural church."
Elizabeth Peeler, a local businesswoman raised in an evangelical Christian family, is now Buddhist. While Peeler finds her own faith is strengthened by being with other Buddhists, she believes spirituality is up to the individual.
"I believe in God - as a force and a power, not as a he or she or humanized entity," Peeler said.
Finding the spirit
Pollsters say the Arizona survey has about a 95 percent accuracy rate. But surveys, polls and studies do not always measure the nuances of faith.
Beverley Tidwell, 46, a parishioner at Sunrise Chapel, 8421 E. Wrightstown Road, has had mixed feelings about religion since her 11-year-old son died of a brain tumor in 2000 after an eight-year battle with cancer.
"In some ways this brought me closer to my spiritual roots. In other ways this has challenged aspects of my relationship with God," said Tidwell, whose family once created their own church at home.
Sunrise Chapel, which Tidwell began attending after her son died, is based on the spiritual experiences and studies of Swedish scientist and philosopher Emanuel Swedenborg, and centers its worship on the historical life and the risen and glorified reality of Jesus.
"As I go through the grief process for my son, I am just so angry at God that this whole experience occurred," said Tidwell, a former nurse and now homemaker for her four other children. "Sometimes I wonder to God, 'Do you exist in the truly loving, parental position I believe God is in? What kind of parent allows that to happen?' "
Tidwell doesn't believe she'll get those answers in this life.
The Rev. Warner Davidson, a retired United Methodist minister and former director of chaplain services at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., says he is deeply spiritual but not very religious.
"That is strange coming from an ordained minister," said Davidson, who is 72 and now lives in Tucson. "But I believe one's understanding and experience of God is dynamic, not static. The church and organized religion are vehicles for expressing one's spirituality."