Rather, the people who are the most happy the most often are those who are pursuing a sense of meaning in their lives, and the author unpacks that experience as having four main pillars. The first of these is a sense of belonging, and I’ll come back to that in a moment, in the light of some other research I want to tell you about. The second pillar is purpose; the third is transcendence, and the fourth is story-telling, or what I would call narrative coherence. Each one of these four pillars is at the heart of what any competent church is meant to do; these are the functions that religious community ought to be providing for its members, regardless of what theology it represents. This is why church is good for you, because it is helpful to have a committed purpose, a practice of transcendence, a framing narrative, and a sense of belonging in community.

A sermon (text here) by Rev. Kendyl Gibbons, All Souls Kansas City