In one of my classes, we were assigned to read Émile Durkheim’s The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. In this book, Durkheim explains how religion could have emerged in society, with a broader goal to understand how it is part of the human experience. That goal sounds rather ambitious, as did the prospect of reading the book and writing a paper on it within a week.
One of the subjects we discussed in class was how Durkheim defined religion. One of the conclusions we drew was that religion involves two categories: the sacred, and the profane. The sacred encompasses the beliefs, rituals, and practices that we separate and protect from the mundane and the secular, which characterizes the profane. I don’t think Durkheim was using the modern definition when describing the profane; rather, he uses the word to distinguish that which is not sacred.
This isn’t a very helpful definition, but our professor pointed out to us that in many other instances, Durkheim took great care to define the terms that he was studying. Considering all of the potential ambiguities inherent in using language, this is no small feat. In the course of our discussion, our professor also noted that Durkheim was looking for characteristics shared by all forms of religion. Two of these characteristics happen to be the sacred and the profane.
This raises a difficult question. Perhaps, if one thought about it long enough, one could see how this principle of sacred and profane appears in many, if not all, of the world’s religions. But does this mean that anything that has the sacred and the profane is a religion? While there are certain activities that a large group people would consider to be sacred (I’m thinking especially of a certain sport and team), is that activity a form of religion? When I say this, I am not trying to deride the respect people have for activities like sports. Participating in and supporting these activities obviously carries great importance to some, and that reverence is nothing to be scoffed at. But even if these activities have elements of the sacred or are sacred, can they definitely be called a religion?
Durkheim wrote an entire book that led to this question, and he does not give us the answer. With that said, I have a hard time believing that nothing outside of religion is sacred. Sometimes I will walk into a space and be struck by awe, like the time I entered a shrine with a fan-vaulted ceiling on Yale University’s campus. On other occasions, I will feel uplifted by a group of people singing in harmony, with the echoes radiating across the room. Such experiences feel sacred to me, but I am hesitant to call them religious experiences. Nevertheless, I continue to be deeply moved by these moments of contact with the sacred. Whether that constitutes a religious experience or not, I am grateful for these encounters.
I invite you to reflect on what it is you would consider sacred in your life. Where do you encounter the sacred, and how do these encounters affect you? Wherever these experiences may occur, I invite you to open yourselves up to the profoundness of these encounters.