Posted by:
gungholierthanthou
(
)
Date: January 31, 2014 02:11PM
Here's an idea about the experience my2cents had.
People feel the "spirit" with a burning bosom all over the world everyday for reasons related to positive experiences. It's part of the human condition. Love, selflessness, stories with happy endings, music, beauty, the good in the universe--they all evoke that feeling and several like it. It is transcendent of religion or philosophy or thought. It can be induced with drugs--lots of people have the Timothy Leary experience, especially the first time they have an hallucigen like LSD or shrooms. My son talks about his hike up the mountain in Colorado on shrooms as the most moving, eye-opening experience of his life.
The LDS church, and lots of other religions and movements, have highjacked this wonderful human experience, defined in their own self-serving way, and sold you their definition.
Why it happened in your instance I can't say, but plugged into the bigger picture, it's understandable in theory.
I asked one of my psychology classes about the topic from our text which it called "altered states of consciousness." It did a fairly horrible job of trying to describe transcendent experiences. Of all those in my class, I was the only one who felt they'd had such an experience. If you've had it, I think you're lucky. If you have it often, you're really lucky. To have it highjacked by an institution is evil.
What percentage of people feel it? About a third, the text said. A good description is here
http://www.baylorisr.org/wp-content/uploads/levin_transcendent.pdf.
Recognize it? It doesn't belong to the church.