Religious Experiences Quotes

We don't yet have a body of scientific knowledge about evil to be called a facet of psychology. Therefore, religious reasoning for actions will always be at the discretion of the psychologist, thus making them the judge and jury over what is delusion and what is a spiritual experience that has to be sedated. ~ Shannon L. Alder

Along with the violent tonic-clonic seizure, it turned out I had also been experiencing complex partial seizures because of overstimulation in my temporal lobes, generally considered to be the most "ticklish" part of the brain. The temporal lobe houses the ancient structures of the hippocampus and the amygdala, the parts of the brain responsible for emotion and memory. The symptoms from this type of seizure can range from a "Christmas morning" feeling of euphoria to sexual arousal to religious experiences. ~ Susannah Cahalan

Religious experiences also occur only when emotions run high and only to those who were predisposed to believe. ~ Walter Sinnott-Armstrong

To sum it up, from this point of view, the two religions of mankind tend to be the peakers and the non-peakers, that is to say, those who have private, personal, transcendent, core-religious experiences easily and often and who accept them and make use of them, and, on the other hand, those who have never had them or who repress or suppress them and who, therefore, cannot make use of them for their personal therapy, personal growth, or personal fulfillment. ~ Abraham H. Maslow

There are, then, three sorts of religious experiences. The ancient rites, which are essentially propitiatory. The mysteries, which purge the soul and allow us to glimpse eternity. And philosophy, which attempts to define not only the material world but to suggest practical ways to the good life, as well as attempting to synthesize (as Iamblichos does so beautifully) all true religion in a single comprehensive system. ~ Gore Vidal

I find myself seeking out the commonalities of our different religious experiences with hopes of encouraging, through my writings, the most hopeful, loving and redemptive qualities in all of us. ~ Richard Paul Evans

Many will argue that there is nothing remotely spiritual in combat. Consider this. Mystical or religious experiences have four common components: constant awareness of one's own inevitable death, total focus on the present moment, the valuing of other people's lives above one's own, and being part of a larger religious community such as the Sangha, ummah, or church. All four of these exist in combat. The big difference is that the mystic sees heaven and the warrior sees hell. Whether combat is the dark side of the same version, or only something equivalent in intensity, I simply don't know. I do know that at the age of fifteen I had a mystical experience that scared the hell out of me and both it and combat put me into a different relationship with ordinary life and eternity.

Most of us, including me, would prefer to think of a sacred space as some light-filled wonderous place where we can feel good and find a way to shore up our psyches against death. We don't want to think that something as ugly and brutal as combat could be involved in any way with the spiritual. However, would any practicing Christian say that Calvary Hill was not a sacred space? ~ Karl Marlantes

There's a part of the human brain, the temporal lobe, that is associated with religious experiences as well as with epilepsy. ~ Ken MacLeod

The experiences which we have been studying during this hour (and a great many other kinds of religious experiences are like them) plainly show the universe to be a more many-sided affair than any sect, even the scientific sect, allows for. What, in the end, are all our verifications but experiences that agree with more or less isolated systems of ideas (conceptual systems) that our minds have framed? ~ William James

A religion made up solely of heightened religious experiences would not be a religion at all ... The major religious traditions address the mysteries (with or without entheogens), but they have other business to do: widen understanding, give meaning, provide solace, promote loving-kindness, and connect human being to human being. ~ Huston Smith

Having been exposed to a variety of religious experiences in the foster homes I lived in, being Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, or anything else means absolutely nothing to me. I have already formed an opinion that the so-called religious teachings that I've been exposed to simply make no sense. So, I've just ignored the Sunday-school message of fear and judgment and paid no attention to any of it. I see no need for all of this craziness in my life, and long ago decided not to participate in it because every time I was required to go to church I ended up feeling worse for the experience - and I want, more than anything, to feel good. ~ Wayne W. Dyer

The fact that people have religious experiences is interesting from the psychological point of view, but it does not in any way imply that there is such a thing as religious knowledge ... Unless he can formulate this 'knowledge' in propositions that are empirically verifiable, we may be sure that he is deceiving himself. ~ A.J. Ayer

Men may believe what they cannot prove. They may not be put to the proof of their religious doctrines or beliefs. Religious experiences which are as real as life to some may be incomprehensible to others. ~ William O. Douglas

Religious beliefs are sometimes based not on testimony by others but on religious experiences of the believer. ~ Walter Sinnott-Armstrong

How irrelevant the belief in God can be to religious experience - so irrelevant that the emotional structure of religious experiences can be transplanted to completely godless contexts with little of the impact lost - and when he had also, almost as an afterthought, included as an appendix thirty-six arguments for the existence of God, with rebuttals, his claim being that the most thorough demolition of these arguments would make little difference to the felt qualities of religious experience, ~ Rebecca Goldstein

Religious experiences are real and common, whether or not God exists, and these experiences often make people whole and at peace. ~ Jonathan Haidt

Growing up where I did, you met a lot of colorful characters whose business was on the other side of the law, or more likely you didn't know what they were up to, and you never would. So playing those kinds of characters now, I can draw on that. The rest of it, you can practice or learn from books. But mostly, I draw from my experiences. That's all I have, you know. ~ Jason Statham

The truth is, in order to heal we need to tell our stories and have them witnessed ... The story itself becomes a vessel that holds us up, that sustains, that allows us to order our jumbled experiences into meaning.
As I told my stories of fear, awakening, struggle, and transformation and had them received, heard, and validated by other women, I found healing.
I also needed to hear other women's stories in order to see and embrace my own. Sometimes another woman's story becomes a mirror that shows me a self I haven't seen before. When I listen to her tell it, her experience quickens and clarifies my own. Her questions rouse mine. Her conflicts illumine my conflicts. Her resolutions call forth my hope. Her strengths summon my strengths. All of this can happen even when our stories and our lives are very different. ~ Sue Monk Kidd

If Christianity were true religious persecution would become a pious and charitable duty: if God designs to punish men for their opinions it would be an act of mercy to mankind to extinguish such opinions. By burning the bodies of those who diffuse them many souls would be saved that would otherwise be lost, and so there would be an economy of torment in the long run. It is therefore not surprising that enthusiasts should be intolerant. ~ William Winwood Reade

After weeks on the road, listening to a language you don't understand, using a currency whose value you don't comprehend, walking down streets you've never walked down before, you discover that your old "I," along with everything you ever learned, is absolutely no use at all in the face of those new challenges, and you begin to realize that buried deep in your unconscious mind there is someone much more interesting and adventurous and more open to the world and to new experiences. ~ Paulo Coelho

You need to position yourself to your referral sources and your current clients as providing exceptional value and experiences in everything you do ~ Timothy M. Houston

The best place to have some food set aside is within our homes, together with a little money in savings. The best welfare program is our own welfare program. Five or six cans of wheat in the home are better than a bushel in the welfare granary ... We can begin with a one week's food supply and gradually build it to a month, and then to three months. I am speaking now of food to cover basic needs. ~ Gordon B. Hinckley

Don't be troubled if you don't feel the love of God in yourself, but thing about the Lord, that He is merciful, and guard yourself from sins, and the grace of God will teach you. ~ Silouan The Athonite

The worldling will not face his colossal inner blah. He multiplies experiences in an unending and desperate attempt to numb his spirit. It hurts so much not to have attained the very reason for his existence, an immersion in God, that he uses things as a narcotic. The worldling pursues prestige or comfort or wealth or sexual encounters not because they basically satisfy him (if they did, once would be enough) but because they dull his inner aching. Always and eventually he is faced with his personal failure. But the sight if it is so revolting and painful, he dives once again into the aspirin sea of frantic pursuits. ~ Thomas Dubay

Tens of thousands, perhaps millions, have come into some kind of religious experience by accepting Christ and they have not been saved. ~ A.W. Tozer

He knows that as long as a man keeps his faith in God and in himself nothing can permanently defeat him. ~ Wilferd Peterson

Who are we, who is each one of us, if not a combinatoria of experiences, information, books we have read, things imagined? ~ Italo Calvino

What was once easy became confused and hard, which brings us back to the mystic question, who is God? ~ Rakim

I would have been an archaeologist or something, maybe a historian. There are a lot of things I would have liked to have done differently, but everything that happened to me made me the person I am today. No matter how negative it seemed at the time or whatever hardship it seemed to have been at that time, Im just the sum of all those amazing experiences. ~ Chaka Khan

I love you, rotten,
Delicious rottenness.
... wonderful are the hellish experiences,
Orphic, delicate
Dionysos of the Underworld. ~ D.H. Lawrence

My religious training told me that in times of personal uncertainty one should seek God's direction through personal prayer and study of the Christian scriptures. ~ Preston Manning

Our Ancestors came to Australia, foraged for food in a rain forest where AM grew, ate the AM, and suffered the effects of muscimol hallucinations in a cave and drew paintings of a religious nature and these paintings were confirmed at 50,000 years ago, at the exact inception of religion. This was done by a species that never had religion before that. Since the species would therefore have no religious content until they ate the hallucinogens, it follows that these AM were the start of religion. ~ Leviak B. Kelly

Relying, as I do, upon the Almighty Power, and encouraged as I am by these resolutions which you have just read, with the support which I receive from Christian men, I shall not hesitate to use all the means at my control to secure the termination of this rebellion, and will hope for success. ~ Abraham Lincoln

The prophecy Revelations tells three stories
1) God's plan to use mankind to transform a darker spirit and soul into light
2) To use the Law of Creation and its processes to facilitate this plan
3) To guide the collective spirit and consciousness of mankind from dark to light and then then God. As we grow the spirit of business systems that were created over the past several thousand of years will evolve too. ~ Phoenix

No poetry lives which reflects only the cheerful emotions. Our sweetest songs are those which tell of saddest thought. We can bring harmony out of melancholy; we cannot banish melancholy from the world. And the religious utterances, which are the highest form of poetry, are bound by the same law. There is a deep sadness in the world. ~ Leslie Stephen

The religious worry about life after death at the expense of life before death. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

It is, I am afraid, true that frequently various religious groups endeavor to exert pressures and control over different legislative and educational fields. It is the job of all of us to be alert for such infringement of our prerogatives and prevent any such attempts from being successful. Like all our freedoms, this freedom from religious-group pressure must be constantly defended. What seemed to me most deplorable ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

Don't tell me how educated you are, tell me how much you have travelled. ~ Anonymous

... Without memory how will you ever find your way back to where you came from? ~ Michael Ende

Give yourself permission to honor and follow the God-given desires of your heart. ~ Alaina Odessa

I think that God will provide opportunities and people and experiences, and everything we need to date and ultimately to find the one. ~ Henry Cloud

The connection between religious faith and mental disorder is, from the viewpoint of the tolerant and the "multicultural," both very obvious and highly unmentionable. ~ Christopher Hitchens

I am an atheist, I have no religious beliefs. And obviously I don't believe in spirituality of some kind. ~ Javed Akhtar

The world of sports knows no religious, racial or political differences. Athletes, from whatever land they come, speak the same language. The lessons of competition are lessons for life. ~ Robert Kennedy

George Washington participated as a vestryman in his local congregation, but that didn't really imply any particular kind of religious belief. This was necessary in order to participate in the society. ~ Matthew Stewart

The fatted calf, the best Scotch, the hoedown could all have been his too, any time he asked for them except that he never thought to ask for them because he was too busy trying cheerlessly and religiously to earn them. ~ Frederick Buechner

Being in a different band always brings great musical experiences to be able to draw on. ~ Graham Nash

Among all mental diseases that have been systematically inoculated into the human cranium, the religious pest is the most abominable. ~ Johann Most

The dissemination of pseudoscience, including such things as the fascination with near-death experiences and the growing belief by Americans
34 percent of them
in reincarnation are dangerous. They help to break down the standards of reason. ~ Wendy Kaminer

Men do not fear a powerful hostile army as the powers of hell fear the name and protection of Mary. ~ Bonaventure

In the tradition of Julian of Norwich and St. Teresa of Avila and all the other mystics, we can learn to render ourselves vulnerable to the "favors of God" - those indescribable experiences that mock our dualisms and so saturate our imagination with abundance that they transcend our ability to convey joy and wonder. In the tradition of St. John of the Cross, we can learn to survive and derive benefits from the soul's dark night. ~ Brian D. McLaren

Religion which requires persecution to sustain, it is of the devil's propagation. ~ Hosea Ballou

The mechanism by which spirituality becomes passionate is metaphor. An ineffable God requires metaphor not only to be imagined but to be approached, exhorted, evaded, confronted, struggled with, and loved. Through metaphor, the vividness, intensity, and meaningfulness of ordinary experiences becomes the basis of a passionate spirituality. An ineffable God becomes vital through metaphor: The Supreme Being. The Prime Mover. The Creator. The Almighty. The Father. The King of Kings. Shepherd. Potter. Lawgiver. Judge. Mother. Lover. Breath.
The vehicle by which we are moved in passionate spirituality is metaphor. The mechanism of such metaphor is bodily. It is a neural mechanism that recruits our abilities to perceive, to move, to feel, and to envision in the service not only of theoretical and philosophical thought, but of spiritual experience. ~ George Lakoff

Both revelation and delusion are attempts at the solution of problems. Artists and scientists realize that no solution is ever final, but that each new creative step points the way to the next artistic or scientific problem. In contrast, those who embrace religious revelations and delusional systems tend to see them as unshakeable and permanent ... Religious faith is an answer to the problem of life ... The majority of mankind want or need some all-embracing belief system which purports to provide an answer to life's mysteries, and are not necessarily dismayed by the discovery that their belief system, which they proclaim as "the truth," is incompatible with the beliefs of other people. One man's faith is another man's delusion ... Whether a belief is considered to be a delusion or not depends partly upon the intensity with which it is defended, and partly upon the numbers of people subscribing to it.* ANTHONY STORR, FEET OF CLAY ~ Jon Krakauer

Stella nodded. She was so glad Janet had found a new doctor after all that suffering. One thing that had astounded her was how the women - smart, educated, strong women - never wanted to bother their caregivers. They silently suffered, trying to be low-maintenance patients despite their horrifying experiences. ~ Deanna Roy

Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him (i.e. Jesus) by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being. ~ Thomas Jefferson

My mantra, like most, was that if it didn't kill you, it only made you stronger. Later on in life, after being beat down by the experiences following you'll read about, I've changed the mantra to, if it doesn't kill you now, it will later. ~ Jennifer Topper

It was a great experience for a kid, because it was a bunch of kids playing on pirate ships and water slides, so looking back on it, it was the fondest experience of my childhood. ~ Corey Feldman

Christianity is the only true and perfect religion ... ~ Benjamin Rush

The depression we find ourselves in here, and which is causing havoc in America, is allowing people to give weight to that which divides them, rather than to the shared experiences and elements of connection they see mirrored in their fellow man. ~ Jacqueline Winspear

The stars are distant and unobtrusive, but bright and enduring as our fairest and most memorable experiences. ~ Henry David Thoreau

Religion is not 'doctrinal knowledge,' but wisdom born of personal experience. ~ Martin Luther

Religious freedom in an open society has the best prospects of flourishing to the extent that it expresses itself as freedom of religious inquiry. ~ Sidney Hook

No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or nonattendance. ~ Hugo Black