Religious experiences - chemical activity in the brain?

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It’s my last year of high school, and I’m taking at the moment a Socialisation and Human Behaviour class, and we are just ending our unit on the brain and its functions.

We have been watching some videos lately, and I found some of it quite disturbing.

Could religious experiences be rather a chemical activity produced in the brain, a higher consciousness created as a by-product in the mind? There has been parallel experiences to individuals who receive seisures, but at the same time become profoundly and profusely spiritual in their quotidian lives.

Van Goh is another example (I forgot how to spell his name) who received epilepsy and people note that his ‘impaired vision’ created some of the most impressive art in the modern day. It is also noted that his religiosity was so scandalous that he even claimed once that he was the Holy Spirit…

I will talk to my teacher about it because I know he is Catholic and yet he teaches this course, and how he can compromise his faith in the light of science.
 
the human brain works through electro-chemical activity. Is that all that human intelligence, memory, emotions, thought, creativity and spirituality amount to? I think not. The explanation of how the brain works (science knows only a fraction of it) is not the explanation of the content and productivity of the brain. Your body can by analyzed into a collection of chemicals that on the open market would bring anywhere from 1.98 to 6 million dollars (I have heard both estimates recently on the radio). Does that mean that a handful of chemicals is all there is in a human being? you are forgetting the soul, which science cannot isolate, describe, explain or destroy.
 
Dear Silverwings,

Maybe it would help you to read the teachings of our Carmelite saints who wrote about religious experiences so we could distinguish the true from the false ones.

You will read that one is not able to keep the blessing of their experience any longer than the Lord desires, nor are we able to produce them at will through many types of personal mental effort. Conversely, we are not able to remove them until the Lord desires.

I’m remembering an experience St. Teresa shared that was almost capable of causing her death, and she began to fear when this was beginning - yet she had no known way of stopping it or reducing the magnitude.

These various interior gifts are granted by the Holy Spirit, and have nothing to do with brain activity. Keep in mind, though, that there are some pseudo experiences that persons might undergo due to excessive penances or fasting, and possibly even from the devil who delights in deception.

If this still bothers you, it may be good to read these works of both St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross to set your mind in peace.

I get so adamant at some of the nonsense that our universities present, for it can have a temporary (hopefully, not permanent) effect of diminishing one’s faith. No doubt there are a myriad of experiences that the mind can produce, but not authentic religious experience.

Carole
 
I always wondered about this too. Is our brains so crazy that it causes these experiences?

But God gave us a brain, therefore, He can do anything He wants to it whether it be an experience, etc.

I think this science is so b.s. (excuse me there) because there is NO way someone can figure out how the brain works. And if someone THINKS they know, they come up with this theory or that theory that can cause some people like you said, only temporarily, to lose their faith - which is from the devil who would love to have us loose our faith.

BUT faith is a gift and faith is stronger than science in many cases.
 
Our brains, according to science, work chemically and electrically. Many of our respones to physical stimulation alter the brain chemistry. Like fear, love, hate, etc. Even thinking causes changes in the brain. That’s how God put us together. So, no doubt spiritual feelings also alter our brain chemistry, or else how would we know we are having them? So, God when he decides to visit us alters our brain chemistry to make us aware of him. But you can’t alter your brain chemistry by adding outside chemicals to “bring God” to you. --nicolo
 
Hi Carole, Yes, I love St. John of the Cross. To me his teaching is the clearest and most precise for all who seek recollection. No wonder he is Doctor of the Church!–nicolo
 
Maybe it’s the religious experience that causes the chemical activity rather than the other way around.
 
Eileen T:
Maybe it’s the religious experience that causes the chemical activity rather than the other way around.
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Yes-That’s what I think. That’s one of the reasons I feel science and faith are not in oppositionm but rather two sides of the same coin.–nicolo
 
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silverwings_88:
It’s my last year of high school, and I’m taking at the moment a Socialisation and Human Behaviour class, and we are just ending our unit on the brain and its functions.

We have been watching some videos lately, and I found some of it quite disturbing.

Could religious experiences be rather a chemical activity produced in the brain, a higher consciousness created as a by-product in the mind? There has been parallel experiences to individuals who receive seisures, but at the same time become profoundly and profusely spiritual in their quotidian lives.

Van Goh is another example (I forgot how to spell his name) who received epilepsy and people note that his ‘impaired vision’ created some of the most impressive art in the modern day. It is also noted that his religiosity was so scandalous that he even claimed once that he was the Holy Spirit…

I will talk to my teacher about it because I know he is Catholic and yet he teaches this course, and how he can compromise his faith in the light of science.
Click to expand...
Actually, if you think about it in this light: If God creates everything, and if (as we Catholics believe) nothing happens in God’s universe by mistake or without His undivided attention, and I would cease to exist if God took His attention off of me, then the chemical activity I experience in my brain during a spiritual experience is all a part of God’s plan and He is doing it all.
 
Silverwings,

One thing that you should realize is that science has been primarily been taken over by modernism. The way that science is approached today is that:

1- The existence of God or even things spiritual cannot be measured or tested and for that reason cannot be studied by science.

2- With no supernatural ideas or concepts allowed anything studied by science must involve only what can be POTENTIALLY observed or measured. But even things that can’t be measured with our current technology is OK to include in science because it will theoretically be possible to measure it in future.

3- Curiosity forces some scientists to study such things as where does religion come from. But since they are forbidden from considering the spiritual all they can do is come up with theories that would explain religion without anything spiritual.

Also note that these theories are encouraged and promoted by those that want to discredit religion.

Do not buy into this as I once did. One thing I have learned over the years is that much of what we hear that “scientists say” about human behavior, the brain etc is bologna!

Good scientists understand the limitations and don’t try to advance these kinds of ideas as more than hypothesis.

Please let us know how your teacher responds
 
But also remember…if God is the author of all Truth then there can be no conflict between science and Holy Scripture. If there appears to be so then either the science is faulty or our understanding of Holy Scripture is faulty.At least that’s how St. Augustine saw it.
 
Grr, I’m running on minutes here and my browser went wonky and deleted my post…

Anyways, succinctly, my teacher said that in the video, although they acknowledged that some experiences may be genuine, they also denied the fact that there is more to explain than merely conveniently fitting all spiritual experiences into a little box, however convincing they are.

He said that it was okay to disagree with the people, which is a ‘my bad’ on my part, but to think that perhaps God could create these mental experiences into other states for the very reason to change ourselves in a spiritual manner can be quite understandable if seen in a spiritually positive light.

Oh, and he thinks that evolutionism is a bunch of hoowacky with unexplained questions, and thinks that some parts of creationism should be taught in school. 😉
 
Dear friend

I was watching a programme on television last night about hinduism. In that programme the basis one of the people interviewed had for believing hinduism was the true religion was that people had seen visions of their gods.

With Christianity people saw with their own eyes Christ Jesus, He lived on earth, walked the earth, fulfilled prophecy, carried out His ministry, suffered as was foretold, died and rose again from the dead and people still see Him with their eyes or experience Him ‘spiritually’.

How do we explain other ‘spiritual experiences’ of God outside of Christianity? I’m just throwing up guesses here and it is not necessarily what I think…Perhaps this is part of God’s will, perhaps it is simply human yearning for the Divine and this has manifested itself in the human mind as an experience, but is not a Divine experience. I’m interested to know what others think here.

God Bless you and much love and peace to you

Teresa
 
This was the other issue that caused me to not accept the faith when I was young. It seemed to me that I was Catholic only because my parents were. I could just as easily have been any of the other world religions purely by chance. It was not until I studied the faith and it’s history and used logic and reason that I understood how and why our faith holds the proof of it’s truth.

Has anyone ever heard of a pre-enlightenment culture that was atheistic? I don’t know, but get the impression that they are few and far between if any.

Some might claim that his is because a ruling class uses the religion to maintain or increase control. However, I tend to think that people are not so stupid.

I think that the explanation has to be that human nature includes a strong need for the spiritual. As Christians we know this is because we were created to be in union with God.

As Catholics we know that a hindu is not condemned because of being hindu. We understand that the hindu who has not been fully presented with the Christian truth will not be judged as us, for whom more has been given. So it is not unfair of God to permit these other beliefs.

So if it is human nature to hunger for the spiritual and God loves all of humanity would he not provide a glimpse of his presence to everyone? It cannot be held against a hindu if he interprets it in his tradition.

Hoping others have thoughts on this.
Peace,
Jim
 
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