Despite Paul’s longstanding ill health resulting from the multiple attacks on him, this article draws together the wisdom Paul has shared with the Lighthouse team through previous calls and teachings. We are bringing this message together on Paul’s behalf as he rests, recovers, and strengthens in our Lord.
“For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” — 2 Timothy 1:7
So many human beings are so undeveloped and spiritually immature that Paul S. Waugh coined a term for it: spiritual anorexia — the dire condition of a humanity starved of spiritual intelligence, and largely unaware that it is starving at all.
7) 24th June 2021 — Paul S. Waugh expresses the consequences of spiritual anorexia:
“The most common is spiritual anorexia: ruggedly individual, lacking the spiritual connection with living and life, lacking the spiritual connection with our earth, flora and fauna, in space time and beyond space time, lacking the interdependent reality of how they really and truly need to live in order to be whole and fulfilled. Most people are emotional, mental, spiritual anorexics, they become dependent, they become old infants, they become institutionalised, and infantilised because they are anorexic. You will not find an anorexic person capable of looking after themselves.”
A starved person cannot stand. A starved person cannot think clearly, cannot discern, cannot resist. And a starved people can be managed.
This condition is no accident, and the consequences are devastating. What has come through our research at Lighthouse is an awareness that these trends are not random drift but the outworking of a wider systemic effort to edge spirituality — and Christianity above all — out of culture, education, public life and the formation of human beings themselves.
The evidence of that starvation is measurable:
- Spiritual and religious decline — the University of Oxford documents a common three-stage sequence in religious decline repeating across the globe.
- The sexualisation of children — Humanium draws together the research on the intrusion of media sexualisation in childhood.
- The corrosion of materialism — MIT’s Tim Kasser sets out The High Price of Materialism and what the pursuit of things costs a human life.
- Existential emptiness in the young — Leonard Kulisch’s global study finds that declining societal religious norms are linked to rising youth anxiety across 70 countries.
Strip a generation of transcendence, and you do not get liberation. You get anxiety, dependency and infantilisation — precisely the harvest the data records.
The reason is straightforward: the top-tier Establishment sees Christianity and Christians as a threat, because we are. Secular authority cannot exert totalitarian control over people who are anchored in the Truth of God’s Word, who follow Christ, who are infused by the Holy Spirit, and who answer to God as the ultimate authority. Such people cannot be bought, frightened or managed. Rome understood this and set out to crush the early Church. Rome fell. Two thousand years later, Christ’s Church remains.
It was precisely when we at Lighthouse Global came to see the reality of Christ that the vitriolic attacks began — online, through the mainstream media, and through government agencies.
That is no coincidence.
| Paul S. Waugh is a Christian researcher, mentor, and founder of Lighthouse Global. For over 21 years, he has dedicated his life to understanding the root causes of human limitation and developing practical, biblical solutions for realising God-given potential. |
Related articles:
The Fundamental Question That Exposes the Establishment’s War on Our God-Given Human Potential
Self-Awareness: The First God-Given Human Endowment the Establishment Wants to Suppress
Conscience: The God-Given Human Endowment the Establishment Seeks to Suppress
Overcoming the Barriers to Success – Paul S. Waugh
This is so revealing and damning:
“A starved person cannot stand. A starved person cannot think clearly, cannot discern, cannot resist. And a starved people can be managed.”
This is slavery by induced spiritual disability. This is actually horrifying, what has been done to human beings. As Paul has shared before, the dark, toxic roots in the kingdom of darkness can be seen everywhere.
I vividly remember when and where I was when Paul first coined the term ‘spiritual anorexia’ on one of our Lighthouse research calls.
That was around a decade ago now and was a major catalyst for me to start looking at the reality of Christ and the Christian faith. I shared some of this here.
Before that, many of us were looking at spirituality through new age, meditation and authors like Eckhart Tolle. With the benefit of hindsight I look back and see how empty that was compared to seeking to build an eternal and infinite relationship with our Heavenly Father…
The more people and society walk away from God in their heads and their hearts, the more depraved, debauched and diabolical human thought and behaviour becomes and the worse people treat one another. That’s because we can’t truly love in and of ourselves without God, because He is love. He is the source of it and that’s part of what Christ is asking us to trust in! Thank you for a powerful post. God bless all who trust in and seek to love and obey Christ 🙏
Such a powerful distinction. “Spiritual anorexia” really captures what happens when we become disconnected from God and spiritually underdeveloped. We need Christ and God’s truth to nourish us, strengthen our discernment and enable us to develop the potential He has gifted us.
Thank you.
Philippians 4:19
“And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.”
This is an excellent article and the resources provided which show that starvation is measurable, are critical but also damning. This critical distinction of spiritual anorexia, is so spot on, there is nothing more horrific than to be starved of spiritual intelligence and this is why the verse above felt appropriate.
This is so accurate and deeply disturbing in equal measure. But above all it is true. We are so spiritually starved that we don’t recognise that malnourishment anymore. It is my prayer that our eyes will be opened to recognise our failures and turn ever more towards Jesus.
Spiritual anorexia, is important term, it was revealing seeing that lack I have. The connections between spiritual decline, materialism, anxiety, dependency and the loss of connection with God are particularly revealing, while the supporting research helps demonstrate that these are not simply abstract ideas. I also found the central point about spiritual nourishment, discernment and our ability to stand firm in truth especially important and something seriously I’ll be looking about. I especially want to be closer to God and this will help me do so.
The term ‘Spiritual Anorexia’ has a real depth, and from my own experience, I know how much it is linked to my state of health and my ability to enjoy life. Not developing an understanding of God and not building a relationship with Him feels more and more like walking on one leg. It’s crucial to understand who the main source of our spirit and energy is; otherwise, we just live a life running on batteries.
When we are anorexic physically we have little ability to defend ourselves, so it is with spiritual anorexia. I have felt ‘something is missing’ in life and when proudly atheist, always had the doubt ‘what if i’m wrong?’
That’s because there is a need for God and for belief that is within every person. Ignore that need and you will always live less than half a full life.
Thank you for coining what it is that we, humanity, have been suffering for years, Spiritual Anorexia. Anorexia is starving ourselves of food, depriving our bodies of the nourishment that it needs to survive. For our spirits to be healthy, we need God and His word. I have not had anyone in my life to help me understand this and to highlight this to me until I was in my 50’s, and this is only by God’s grace.
Thank you for sharing this article with us; it is so critical that we understand this…God bless
This is such a powerful article that gets to the root of why there is such a degradation of society. We place such importance on the very things that destroy us and have our priorities so wrong. Understanding God let alone building a relationship with him was something that was not discussed once even in Religious Education!!