Some days it already feels like the end times. Yesterday, the biggest city in China, ShanghaiChina's leading financial centre. Ironically, its citizens have been reduced to bartering for food., went back into lockdown. War in Ukraine joins ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and central AfricaCivil war has been raging in the Central African Republic since 2012.. Famine threatens the developing world as wheat supply chainsMuch of the Middle East and North Africa import wheat from Ukraine and Russia. While there is currently plenty of wheat on the global market, there are fears that switching supply chains could cause serious shortages in the coming months. break down. And now, devastating floods in Australia remind us that the climate crisis is already well underway.

All of this together might seem like an unprecedented challenge. But humanity has been here before. For centuries, we have withstood natural disasters, bloodshed and social collapse.

And each time we emerge on the other side, something curious happens: people turn to spiritual wisdom to understand how they got there.

When the Black DeathA bacterial infection that killed as much as 60% of the population of Europe and 33% of the Middle Eastern population. struck Europe, many people believed it was a judgement from God. Some people, called flagellants, thought they could earn divine mercy by publicly beating themselves with whips and sticks.

Man-made disasters have also sparked spiritual movements. Almost every family in Britain lost members to World War One, and in the 1920s many turned to occult practices to help them grieve. More and more people attended seances, hoping to have one last chance to communicate with their fallen relatives.

And sometimes spirituality has emerged as a response to oppression. In the 1890s, many Native American peoples began to perform the Ghost Dance, a ceremony that would allow the spirits of the dead to return to the world and end the expansion of the USAIn the first half of the 19th Century the USA expanded further and further west. As it did so it removed Native Americans from the territories it was claiming. In some places, like California, it committed genocide against the local populations. into their lands.

When we experience death up close, either by narrowly avoiding it or seeing loved ones die, it forces us to think about our own lives. We might turn to spiritualism as a way of reassuring ourselves that there is life after death, staying in contact with those we have lost - or simply giving what we do a sense of purpose.

That is why some think our current trials might spark a flourishing new era of spirituality. Just like our ancestors, they suggest, we will turn to the divine and mystical to make sense of our troubles.

Although we tend to think we live in a secular age, 84% of the world still identifies with a religious group. And that proportion is growing.

Spiritualism is booming outside the traditional religions as well. More and more young people now believe in astrology - the idea that our personalities, moods and behaviours are affected by the movement of celestial bodies.

But others are sceptical. They think in our age of technology and scientific rationalism, there is simply no room for real spirituality anymore. People can no longer believe in something greater than themselves.

Still others argue science might take the place of spirituality. Popular scientists like Richard DawkinsA British scientist who is associated with New Atheism, a position that is critical of religious belief. and Steven Pinker present scientific arguments to us as a matter of objective fact. Some see them as the High Priests of a new religion of rationalism that tells its disciples all their problems can be solved with science.

Yes: People have always turned to spiritual wisdom in times of hardship and uncertainty. We can already see it happening with the growth of religions and ideas like astrology.

No: In the past, religion was the natural framework for people to reach for when they had to make sense of death and suffering. Today religion is less important in our lives. We are more likely to seek solace in technology.

Or... Technology could be its own form of spiritualism. There is a reason we refer to "tech gurus". We already treat those who invent cutting-edge technology like modern prophets.