'mystics' and there relgious experiences./?/ not buying it.

[Desert Snake]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I'm not buying it.

 

[Twilight Hue]

You don't have to. Advertising sucks anyway.

 

[psychoslice]

Its not for sale, its something that you already have but also something that you may be ignorant about, its who you truly are, and this can be experienced of who you truly are, once you have experienced this, you will never be the same again.

 

[George-ananda]

I'm not buying it.

Why not? Some sound legit to me.

 

[oldbadger]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.
I'm not buying it.

.....so you have never experienced a miraculous event?
Just start at the beginning of this universe........ that's pretty miraculous.
How about Earth being at a perfect distance from Sun, or the collision which formed the moon, without which we would be in deep trouble.......... would not be at all, actually.
And now you can start looking for miracles happening every day, all the time, all around you.
Now read the NT again..............

Oh...... and it's a gift...... it ain't for sale!

 

[te_lanus]

.....so you have never experienced a miraculous event?
Just start at the beginning of this universe........ that's pretty miraculous.
How about Earth being at a perfect distance from Sun, or the collision which formed the moon, without which we would be in deep trouble.......... would not be at all, actually.
And now you can start looking for miracles happening every day, all the time, all around you.
Now read the NT again..............

Oh...... and it's a gift...... it ain't for sale!

Most of those facts is based on science. And anyway we know how created the universe: EA( or better known as Enki) one of the Babylonian Gods. And "miracles" happen to everybody no matter who you believe in, or even if you believe at all.

 

[Valjean]

If you've never been there your skepticism is perfectly understandable.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

How about Earth being at a perfect distance from Sun, or the collision which formed the moon, without which we would be in deep trouble.......... would not be at all, actually.

There are billions of planets in the Goldilocks zone ( at a suitable distance from the sun for life to develop ) so I'm not sure what your point is here, or how it relates to the OP.

PS have you voted yet?!

 

[Breathe]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I'm not buying it.

Nobody cares.

 

[Mycroft]

While disciple may be going about it in a brutish way, I'm inclined to believe him.

Now these people have experienced something, that much is true. And they are sincere about what they believe they have experienced being 'spiritual' or 'mystical'.

But this does not make it so. And the Mystic (or indeed anyone of a similar vein) is quite unable to evidence otherwise.

What I mean by this is that there are myriad psychological, neurological and biological phenomena that can occur under certain conditions. Particularly if you have a history of drug use, though this is not necessarily the case with all mystics. It stands, however, that unless a mystics is well versed in all of the phenomena I mentioned, they're not able to eliminate any of them to be able to accurately assign it a spiritual or mystical label.

All a mystic can objectively say is that they had an experience which they can't explain, and that they believe it is spiritual in origin.

Anything else is BS (Bad Science).

 

[Vouthon]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I'm not buying it.

That's fair enough, the Catholic mystics wouldn't expect you to 'buy it' anyway:

"...Our loving Master [Eckhart] taught you and told you about these matters and you did not understand him. He spoke from the point of view of eternity, and you understood him from the point of view of time..."

- Johannes Tauler (c.1300-1361), Catholic mystic & Dominican priest

"...You and I do not meet on one branch or in one place. You make your way along one path and I along another...No one can explain this to another just with words. One knows it by experiencing it..."

- Blessed Henry Suso (c. 1296-1366), German Catholic mystic & Dominican priest

"...Until you reach this point, and the self is annihilated,
Everything you think is true is really false.
You do not yet have in you pure charity
While you can think of 'yourself'
And the 'victory' you are 'striving' for.

Oh, the futility of seeking to convey
With images and feelings
That which surpasses all measure!
The futility of seeking
To make infinite powers ours!..."

- Blessed Jacopone da Todi (1230 - 1306), Catholic mystic & Franciscan poet​

Unless you've experienced it for yourself, I can well understand why you'd regard it as nonsense. I think we're all doubting Thomases deep down.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I've had meditative experiences, and I don't doubt that people have "mystic" experiences. What I do doubt is all the assumptions that people make about them, the complex belief structures they place around an interesting experience.

 

[Jumi]

@disciple Depends on what you mean by mystical or spiritual experience. There are many things out there to be experienced. You don't need to attribute them to gods. I can see how someone would if it was based on their cultural and religious context to use the language they've been taught.

 

[Levite]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I'm not buying it.

Why would it matter if you did, or didn't?

 

[NewGuyOnTheBlock]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I'm not buying it.

All religious mood-altering/perception-altering experiences are manifestations of the mind which are psychologically and scientifically predictable and repeatable, when the conditions are correct. None of them are evidence of anything except the frailty and gullibility of the human mind. The mind has an amazing way of manifesting what it desires.

 

[Nakosis]

I haven't read one convincing anecdote of a religious experience by /seems either catholic, or some form of that, similar, meditative 'oneness', or whatever.//.

I'm not buying it.

Those who have experienced them would like to understand what is going on.

I don't know why you'd expect to be convinced by someone else's experience. I've never experienced ghosts or alien abductions, so none of the claims seem particularly convincing. If however I had seen a ghost, I'd probably be real interested in explaining it.

I do agree however that we try to create a picture from a puzzle with most of the pieces missing. While we continue to look for more pieces, some have convinced themselves of knowing the final truth.

Me, I'll talk sometimes as if concepts I create are true but that mostly because I am looking for reasons to question them. Hopefully others will point out the gaps in my thinking.

 

[Theweirdtophat]

You have to experience it to understand it. I've had experiences but I can't prove it. It doesn't mean it didn't happen. Do what they do, and you'll find the proof.

 

[Mycroft]

You have to experience it to understand it. I've had experiences but I can't prove it. It doesn't mean it didn't happen.

Nor does it mean they did.

 

[GoodbyeDave]

Such experiences have been extensively documented throughout the centuries and all over the world. To dismiss the experiences of literally millions of people because you haven't had anything similar is surely a little rash.

The challenges to religious experience are reductionist or content-based.

The reductionist claim is that those who report religious experiences are in some way abnormal or pathological. This doesn't stand up to close inspection:
1. pathological experiences are typically disturbing and life-disrupting; religious experiences are neither.
2. a psychological study of people reporting religious experiences conducted in the USA showed that were were no more suggestible than normal.
3. many who have had religious experiences have shown great common sense and practical abilities, like Teresa of Avila or Blaise Pascal.

The content-based claim is that the experiences cannot be true because their interpretations may be incompatible. But interpretations are just that. If someone thinks they saw a puma in the woods and it turns out to be an dog, that doesn't mean they didn't see an animal in the woods. If you have a hierophany, to use the technical term, you may decide it was of a specific divinity on the basis of your expectations; whether that identification is true has no bearing on the reality of the hierophany.

If anyone is interested in studying this, the classic sources are
William James. Varieties of religious experience.
Alister Hardy. The spiritual nature of man: a study of contemporary religious experience.
and, for analysis,
Caroline Franks Davis. The evidential force of religious experience.

 

[Theweirdtophat]

Nor does it mean they did.

I for one know that it did happen, whether you believe it or not. Your opinion won't change that. What can't be proven can at least be experienced, and this is one of those experiences.