Is Religion All in Your Head?

Last updated on: December 27, 2014 at 12:35 pm by Fr. Dwight Longenecker

Is Religion All in Your Head? 2014-12-27T12:35:40-05:00 Fr. Dwight Longenecker

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

I remember how they wired up the visionaries at Medjugorje while they were experiencing their apparitions. The scientists wanted to study what was going on in their brains as they “saw” the Blessed Virgin.

Religious experiences of the mystical kind occur throughout human experience and in most every kind of religion. But what is happening when visionaries see the Blessed Virgin, Hindu holy men go into a trance or charismatics speak in tongues?

Are they experiencing something real or is it just their imagination?

Neuroscientist Andrew Newberg studies how the brain responds to religion.

In this fascinating article his work is explained and explored by atheist Julia Llewellyn Smith. An atheist submitted to some experiments with Newberg to see if a religious-type experience could be artificially activated in his brain. It didn’t work.

Llewellyn Smith explains:

Newberg is director of research at the Jefferson Myrna Brind Centre of Integrative Medicine, in Philadelphia, and co-author of, among other books, The Metaphysical Mind: Probing the Biology of Philosophical Thought. He is a leading neurotheologist, pioneering a new and highly controversial science that investigates whether – as many sceptics have long suspected – God didn’t create us, but we created God.

During brain scans of those involved in various types of meditation and prayer, Newberg noticed increased activity in the limbic system, which regulates emotion. He also noted decreased activity in the parietal lobe, the part of the brain responsible for orienting oneself in space and time.

“When this happens, you lose your sense of self,” he says. “You have a notion of a great interconnectedness of things. It could be a sense where the self dissolves into nothingness, or dissolves into God or the universe.”

Newberg has discovered that the human brain has what might be called “a capacity for prayer” and this is universal. We are able to get outside ourselves and experience what we feel is contact with a high power.

Such “mystical”, self-blurring experiences are central to almost all religions – from the unio mystica experienced by Carmelite nuns during prayer, when they claim their soul has mingled with the godhead, to Buddhists striving for unity with the universe through focusing on sacred objects. But if Newberg and his colleagues are correct, such experiences are not proof of being touched by a supreme being, but mere blips in brain chemistry.

“It seems that the brain is built in such a way that allows us as human beings to have transcendent experiences extremely easily, furthering our belief in a greater power,” Newberg says. This would explain why some type of religion exists in every culture, arguably making spirituality one of the defining characteristics of our species.

What interests me about this research is that the findings can be taken either as evidence for the existence of God or the opposite.

The doubter says that the “God experiences” are simply a matter of a snap, crackle pope in the brain. They assume that the brain is no more than a computer made of meat and that these experiences are no more significant than the other electro chemical impulses of the brain.

The believer, on the other hand, claps his hand and says, “You see! This is proof that we were created to be in touch with God. This capacity exists within all of us to search for and find the Almighty Father!”

One of the problems with some scientific experiments is that they begin with an atheistic, reductionist premise. Everything is reduced to materialism and nothing is greater than the materialistic scientific facts.

I am reminded of a very common diagnosis of mental illness. We are told that the mental illness is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain and that medication will fix it. But of course, it could be that the chemical imbalance was itself caused by something else of a spiritual, emotional or relational nature. The chemical imbalance may therefore be a symptom, not the cause.

Likewise, the brain activity which is charted by the neuroscientist may be the result of one’s contact with the numinous rather than the cause. Real contact with the Divine may produce the brain activity observed by the scientist, but because he does not believe in God he thinks that brain activity is what causes what is perceived as a religious experience.

To put it simply, it is just as logical to suppose that the person had a real religious experience and the brain waves are the evidence of this as it is to suppose that the brain waves caused the experience.

Let’s use another analogy. Read More

Previous Post

June 19, 2014

If You Summon Satan...

Next Post

June 21, 2014 What's The Use of Dialogue?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Anglican Matters Apologetics Architecture Blobble Study Book Reviews Brideshead Caitlin O'Rourke Catholic Art Catholic Culture Church Politics Chust for Nice Contemporary Culture Duane Mandible Ed Blanch Film Reviews Fr Harvey Nicolaitan Frank Viola Mantilla the Hon More Christianity Mrs Brady Catholic Old Lady Mystery of the Magi Norman Anderson Queen Hillary Saints and Supernatural Spirituality The Inklings The Vicar Theology Todd Unctuous Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz