In this world of post-Enlightenment rationalism, how do we talk about spirituality? Well any good rationalist would go to the dictionary first. So here are the definitions of "spiritual" from the Oxford American Dictionary:
1. of, relating to, or affecting the human spirit or soul as opposed to material or physical things.
2. not concerned with material values or pursuits
3. of or relating to religion or religious belief
4, the dictionary also defines “one’s spiritual home” as a place in which one feels a profound sense of belonging
#1 and #2: Something Other Than Material values and pursuits
With these definitions, we see spirituality does not just mean religion, but a broader sense of finding meaning in life. Where do we find meaning? Because of the scarcity and velocity imposed on everyone by the debt-based monetary system, most of us are forced to find meaning in our job, i.e. our effort to collect bank credit. So we are stuck finding meaning in "material values and pursuits," precisely the opposite of spirituality. This reveals the oppressiveness of the monetary system. The tyranny of debt-based money drives everything. It is only concerned with the material world because the only thing that matters to it is extracting more and more income from people over time so that it can keep growing. Spiritual activity gets in the way of that. It does not generate increasing income so it is devalued by the system. Having been devalued for 100 years, spirituality is now virtually nonexistent. It has been hijacked by the monetary system.
As an example, we see this as we raise children. The primary focus of their lives is going to school, to get good test scores, to get into the right colleges, to give them access to the job that generates the most income (material pursuits), so they can have kids and run them through the same cycle. Jobs are the raisson d'etre of life now, which is by definition a non-spiritual life. This makes for a non-spiritual society.
#3: Religion
One definition of spirituality does include religion, and it has largely been co-opted by the monetary system. Not only has it been devalued along with spirituality as described above, but it has been harnessed by the state and monetary powers to fuel our financial empire system. This is common throughout history as emperors, dictators, kings, prime ministers and presidents have used religion to justify their imperial goals. However, it also happens in more insidious, subtle ways. For example, western religions and churches today dare not speak against usury, which when abused has been a fundamental method of maintaining the slavery/servitude condition throughout history. But today, usury has become so pervasive that it drives the very foundation of everything in our system since all money comes from debt. So religion, and therefore spirituality to a large degree, has been subjugated to the monetary system.
Moreover, churches have been divided into left vs. right political camps. Protestant denominations have in fact split into separate denominations because of politics. So church congregations are distracted from a core issue like systemically abusive usury, and they are now politically harnessed in a way that fuels the empire rather than staying independent of it. It also means that the empire has used the typical divide and conquer strategy to debilitate opposition and further suck our desire for spirituality into the destructive political civil war that dominates our system.
#4: Profound Sense of Belonging
This last definition of spirituality speaks to the existential truth many feel today—no sense of belonging. Our spirituality has been stolen from us, our families have suffered from the money velocity machine, our communities have been destroyed by the vortex of debt-based money, our counties and states have been made irrelevant. Most of us now find belonging only in our corporate jobs or in our political affiliation with one of the two empire parties run from Washington DC. In other words, our society has little sense of belonging anymore. This is dangerous. An orphaned society will not tend toward peace, love, and relationship. It will tend toward the opposite. This does not bode well for the future. Enlightenment and awakening to our need for belonging is necessary to avoid the coming endarkenment that will result if we don't.