Written on a T-shirt I saw today was the statement: “Organized Religion: The World’s Largest Pyramid Scheme.”

Giving the statement further thought, I arrived at the conclusion that not only is organized religion a pyramid scheme….it’s an oxymoron too!

Putting aside the solidly religious, there is a not so silent majority of people that see themselves as not being religious having abandoned their birth religion and now identify as being spiritual.

Many of these people are still in “search mode” and are not ready to totally abandon being a super (believer of the supernatural) and embrace atheism as that is sometimes seen as the last stop of the “search train.”

Ian is one of these people, a Christian who says he is highly spiritual but not at all religious.

Unfortunately for churches, there are a lot of Ians out there.

A recent benchmark survey finds that 55 percent of young people ages 12 to 25 say they are more spiritual now than two years ago. But nearly one-third of the young people said they don’t trust organized religion.

"If that’s the way they really feel, it means that we have some serious questions that we need to ask ourselves," said Terry Dittmer, the director of youth ministry for the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod.

The survey, believed to be the first of its kind, was conducted by the Minneapolis-based Search Institute. Peter Benson and Gene Roehlkepartain, co-directors of the institute’s Center for Spiritual Development in Childhood and Adolescence, said it may take years of number-crunching to figure out all of the implications.

"This work is still in the emergent stage," Roehlkepartain said. He said the institute hopes to use the data as a baseline for follow-up surveys every two years. "This is our coming-out party."

The survey included 6,853 subjects. The first question was, "What does it mean to be spiritual?" Nine choices ran from "believing in God" to "being true to one’s inner self." Respondents could also say that there is no spiritual dimension, or that "I don’t know."

Of the young people surveyed, 93 percent believe there is a spiritual aspect to life. But the disconnect between spirituality and religion was clear in the comments from Ian and other young people in the survey.

Gaurav said he is "practically religious" in that he follows his Hindu faith’s traditions, but he’s not "spiritually religious." Amneh has rejected many of her religion’s traditions as sexist but said she still adheres to the teachings of Islam.

Benson said he wasn’t surprised that many young people drew a line between spirituality and religion.

"Spirituality is bigger than religion," he said. "One of the things we have to focus on now is disentangling spiritual development from religious development."

If the youth don’t feel spiritual in church, where do they?

"Spending time in nature" topped the list of responses. "Listening to or playing music" was No. 2, and "helping other people or the community" was third. "Attending religious services" was ninth on the list of the top 12 most-frequent answers. Many other young people are turning to meditation.

The Center for Spiritual Development stopped short of offering specific advice for how churches can reach more young people, but it did conclude its report with the suggestion that the place to start is with conversations. The report recommends asking young people open-ended questions, such as "What does being spiritual mean to you?" and "What is most important in your life?"

"We’re not paying enough attention to what our kids are saying," Roehlkepartain said. "We need to listen more and talk less."

Definition of “Organized Religion”

According to the Urban Dictionary

1. A bad idea.
2. An over simplification of a complicated idea to rationalize away the unknown so that the general public can sleep at night believing that by attending religious services they are on the way to salvation.
3. Subtle attempts at brainwashing for a…. "good" cause.
4. The lack of desiring real answers about life and thusly settling for what is popularly accepted.

1. Organized religion is about as smart as eating bleach.
2. Organized religion is like having "Advanced Calculus For Dummies."
3. I’m no conspiracy theorist, but any group trying to convince me to giving money to them along with believing crackers are God will get me into heaven, isn’t all too far from brainwashing, regardless of motives.
4. I’m lazy so I am a fervent believer in organized religion.