Tunn11
Justified & Ancient
- Joined
- Nov 23, 2005
- Messages
- 2,238
- Location
- Under the highest tree top in Kent
I was thinking about the role faith plays in our acceptance or otherwise of various phenomena.
I have known two people with a strong Christian faith, a work colleague and the father of a friend. Both were very open about their faith but it was personal to them. They would happily talk about it and about religion but never tried AFAIK to influence any others. I am actually quite envious of those people as their faith helped them through difficult times.
I have met others who would claim, and perhaps do, have faith but which seems to me to be more akin to indoctrination. It is always along the lines of “Here is the truth, you should accept it and not question it.”
So, question one. These examples relate to religious belief but some Fortean incidents bear a similarity to religious experience and I wonder whether there is something in these experiences which somehow triggers this, for want of a better term “faith reaction” in people?
Question two. How much is faith a product of a need for a comforting belief? Religion is a huge comfort to many; a caring deity is a comfort, as is humanity being saved by aliens. Is it reassuring in some way to think that psi powers exist or that large bipedal apes wander the American North West.
Question three. Are we losing the personal experiences that prompt this reaction to the vicarious internet media experience? I’ve known people to have an awed, almost spiritual reaction to, observing Saturn through a small telescope or the transit of Venus. Compared to the images from Hubble Huygens, etc. available on line these observations are hardly spectacular but being personal had a far greater effect. Are these phenomena somehow meant to be experienced personally, not filmed and shared?
I have known two people with a strong Christian faith, a work colleague and the father of a friend. Both were very open about their faith but it was personal to them. They would happily talk about it and about religion but never tried AFAIK to influence any others. I am actually quite envious of those people as their faith helped them through difficult times.
I have met others who would claim, and perhaps do, have faith but which seems to me to be more akin to indoctrination. It is always along the lines of “Here is the truth, you should accept it and not question it.”
So, question one. These examples relate to religious belief but some Fortean incidents bear a similarity to religious experience and I wonder whether there is something in these experiences which somehow triggers this, for want of a better term “faith reaction” in people?
Question two. How much is faith a product of a need for a comforting belief? Religion is a huge comfort to many; a caring deity is a comfort, as is humanity being saved by aliens. Is it reassuring in some way to think that psi powers exist or that large bipedal apes wander the American North West.
Question three. Are we losing the personal experiences that prompt this reaction to the vicarious internet media experience? I’ve known people to have an awed, almost spiritual reaction to, observing Saturn through a small telescope or the transit of Venus. Compared to the images from Hubble Huygens, etc. available on line these observations are hardly spectacular but being personal had a far greater effect. Are these phenomena somehow meant to be experienced personally, not filmed and shared?