There is no specific area of the brain that mediates Christian mystical experiences, researchers say, following a study of 15 Canadian nuns.
A University of Montreal team found Christian mystical experiences are mediated by several brain regions.
Researchers asked 15 nuns to recount mystical experiences while studying them on MRI scanners, the journal, Neuroscience Letters reported.
Did they think a nun's brain has a blinking prayer spot? Blink blink, I'm praying. Can't you see the green light in my brain?
Fr Stephen Wang, a Catholic priest teaching at Allen Hall Seminary in London, has some words to those researchers:
"These brain studies can give us fascinating insights into how the human body and mind and spirit inter-connect, but they should not make us think that prayer and religious experience are just an activity in the brain.
"True Christian mysticism is an encounter with the living God. We meet him in the depths of our souls.
"It is an experience that goes far beyond the normal boundaries of human psychology and consciousness."
Exactly how I see it. I wonder what's next for the curious scientists!!! Do we have a soul?
2 comments:
That all depends on whom you ask! lol. Of course we do. Otherwise, why would God tell us HE could separate the Spirit from the soul?
Rosemary,
You may never know. they may tell us the soul doesn't exist :-(
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