A Spirituality for Health and Healing

What Is Spirituality?

Spirituality is the innate drive to transcend our state of separateness and re-experience a state of unity in Divine love. It is a universal and essential part of human nature. And yet, paradoxically, there is no single, universally agreed-upon definition of spirituality. Spiritual experiences are difficult to put into words, and the language used across cultures and religions varies widely. So too do the spiritual paths people walk and the destinations they seek.

Despite this diversity, one enduring principle appears in nearly every major world religion and culture: the Golden Rule. Though almost universally known, the principle of the Golden Rule is widely misunderstood. Clarifying its deeper meaning provides a useful basis for defining a spirituality centered on health and healing, rather than one on salvation.

A New Light on the Golden Rule

The Golden Rule is commonly phrased as: “Treat others the way you’d like to be treated.” On the surface, it promotes fairness, empathy, and cooperation. It’s often regarded as a basic moral guideline for peaceful coexistence.

But mystics throughout history have pointed to deeper meaning in the Golden Rule: that we are called to treat one another with care not simply because it’s fair—but because we are all one and the same.

Just as raindrops, snowflakes, sleet, and hail are all temporary expressions of the same H₂O—originating from, and eventually returning to, a common sea—so too are we temporary expressions of a common essence. On the material plane, we experience separateness and differences, but on a spiritual plane, we retain our connections to our shared sacred origin.

Spirituality as a Path for Health and Healing

From this perspective, spirituality is the human drive to transcend our material separateness in order to re-experience our spiritual unity with one another and the Divine source of love from which we originated. When we reconnect with this source, it awakens our empathy, compassion, and deeper sense of connection with others.

What does this have to do with health and healing? Everything.

Healing means restoring what is broken, removing what harms us, and soothing what suffers. For the body, we have surgeries, medications, and physical therapies. But those tools cannot heal the non-physical dimensions of our being—our minds, hearts, spirits, or souls. These dimensions require a different kind of remedy: spiritual healing rooted in love and connection.

The Limits of Salvation Spiritualities

Many spiritual traditions—particularly religious ones—are primarily oriented toward salvation. They offer a path to being saved, accepted, rewarded, or reunited with the Divine by adhering to specific beliefs, rules, or commandments. Salvation spiritualities promise reward for faithfulness and punishment for failure. They describe a Divine being who evaluates our lives, judging our worthiness for salvation or condemnation.

While salvation traditions may offer deep comfort to many, they can also create unintended harm. Their most concerning element is that of judgmentalism—the belief that Divine love must be deserved. Even for the most pious and caring, this belief can generate fear, guilt, shame, and dread. While these emotions are normal and even useful in moderation, they can become toxic when they dominate our relationship with the Divine, with others, or with ourselves.

Tragically, many people turn away from spirituality altogether when they experience the consequences of its conditional judgments. Unhealthy spiritualities result in greater separation—from ourselves, others, or the Divine—rather than greater unity.

The Healing Power of Unconditional Love

A spirituality for health and healing is both simple and profound in its difference. It rests on the conviction that the Divine is unconditionally loving and universally available. Its path includes no framework of judgment, reward, or punishment. The blessings of Divine love are not conditioned upon our obeying the Golden Rule.  The unconditional love from the Divine inspires us to follow the Golden Rule.  

Justice, consequences, and accountability are important—but they belong in the human realm, not the Divine’s. By separating Divine love from human systems of reward and punishment, we make it possible to turn to the Divine not with fear—but with wholehearted trust.

When we trust that there is nothing to fear from the Divine, we feel safe enough to expose our deepest wounds and invite the healing powers of Divine love into them.  Healing love is not something to be earned—only something to be freely received.

A Spirituality That Heals

A spirituality for health and healing promotes wholeness not through belief or obedience, but by restoring loving connection—by helping us become whole again. It helps us release toxic guilt, shame, fear, and loathing. It inspires empathy, compassion, forgiveness, mercy, atonement, and gratitude. And it invites us to see ourselves and others not as broken or separate—but as equally loved members of a common whole.

Distinguishing a spirituality for health and healing from a spirituality for salvation is not about declaring one “right” and the other “wrong.” Each has its place and value. Salvation spiritualities bring comfort and purpose to countless believers. But for those whose greatest need is not salvation, but healing, a spirituality that is free from the trappings of judgment and justice may be a better choice.