Robin Baugus

September 20, 2010

Final Paper

The Catalyst of Religion

The concept of Religious Ecstasy has certainly woven its way into society and continues to
leave its mark on our consistently evolving culture - and rightly so. These experiences constantly shape
and reshape the beliefs of man, allowing the human race to maintain its desire for religious structure
and purpose in an ever changing world. It is therefore reasonable to believe that, without religious
ecstasy, religion would cease to function in human life as it became an obsolete notion.
All the cultures of the world evolve and change through technological advances, influences
from surrounding societies, and changing mindsets which can, and do, periodically cause a religion to
become outmoded. Religions which emphasize the insignificance of the human race are confronted by
scientific inquiry, which has allowed for a greater understanding of the natural world and its processes previously thought to be mystical and of divine inspiration. The most notable example of this conflict
can be seen with Christianity whose opposition to scientific progress stems from the ability of science
to invalidate the truth of the Holy Bible1.
Prior to these revolutionary technological advances, religious practices still formed around
societal needs. Indigenous tribes combined these two demands (the needs of the community and the
need for religious structure) in the role of the Shaman. The culture of these societies was based upon
their precarious situation: survival was a difficult process as several things had to be balanced (the
consuming of food, the act of hunting, the need to regulate resources, etc). Shamans, therefore, were
designated by the community as being responsible for the adherence of these taboos. They were
thereby enabled, through spiritual possession and ecstatic rituals, to religiously question individuals or
1 Think Newton discovering gravity and the many court cases surrounding the teaching of evolution over creationism

the community as a whole when survival was at stake. By claiming the use and assistance of religious
ecstasy, the Shaman's verdict and questioning was not generally contradicted and was widely held as
true and just, so long as their actions were believed to be beneficial to the community. If a Shaman's
practices were seen as contrary to the tribe's motivations, a new Shaman was then instituted. Indeed, to
even become a Shaman, one had to display credibility in the form of affliction valiantly endured and,
in the end, transformed into spiritual grace. (Lewis, p.60) Thus, we understand that Shamans were
continuously chosen because they had been subject to an experience of religious ecstasy the community
had deemed suitable enough for their spiritual, societal, and cultural needs.2
History has shown us that as empires reach out to conquer and dominate those societies along
its borders and beyond, the culture of the dominating empire is often imposed upon the dominated.
This may even lead to a melding of the two cultures, much as the Roman empire would absorb the
particularly attractive or efficacious [deities] (Ehrenreich, p.50) of its conquered nations into its own
pantheon of Gods3. Certainly a religion which cannot adapt to these outside influences successfully
will lead many of its followers to question its validity.
Finally, as societies change with time, the mindset of its citizens also change. Whereas it may
have been acceptable for individuals of African American decent to be enslaved, it is now deemed
illegal, wrong, and a violation of rights. Whereas women were formerly confined to the home, without
voting or land holding rights, they are now seen largely as equals allowed to hold positions in the
military, own land, climb corporate ladders, and make their own choices. The changing ideas of a
society may, perhaps, form the greatest threat against established religion. Religions which cannot
accommodate the founding ideas and morals of a people will not earn adherents and followers, nor be
able to hold onto its current congregational base. Those faiths founded upon patriarchal beliefs must
2 Later in Lewis's study, he applies this idea to other religious structures when he states possession is now the idiom in
which those who contend for leadership in the central religious life of the community press their claims for recognition
as the chosen agents of the gods. (p.119)
3We see this with the Egyptian goddess Isis, in particular, who gained an ecstatic cult following upon her integration to the
Roman pantheon (Ehrenreich, p.50, 60)

then accommodate the growing status of women allowing them to hold clerical positions, key roles in
the church, and encourage their growth in general society. The alien must be accepted, rights be
granted which were previously withheld. In the more modern world, we witness the emergence of Gay
rights. While exploring her saga into the heart of the Evangelical church, Welch mentions the affect of
widespread support for Gay relationships upon the movement when an anti-gay activist (Rick Warren)
was asked by Obama to give the invocation at his inauguration. While Warren's website contained a
statement effectively discouraging gay people from even thinking about membership, Welch points
out that the exposure to the moderating influence on the left led to the removal of the anti-gay
language in only days. (Welch, p.109) Warren's removal of this controversial material protected him
and his church from the scrutiny and detrimental opinions the general public may form against him. In
short, the established religion must (and in Warren's case, did) change to fit the needs of the established
culture.4
Religious ecstasy is the path by which these changes may take place. Religions cannot exist or
change without the use of ecstatic experiences as it is through these experiences that they gain validity.
Many religions are indeed established around the ecstatic experience of their founder: the ecstasy of St.
Paul and Jesus, the essential possession of Muhammad as he encountered the angel Gabriel on the
mountain, Abraham being called by God to establish a sacred covenant and leave his homeland for one
thereby promised to him and his descendants. As religions attract followers, many may even encourage
the ecstatic experience of adherents as proof of the religion's truth, what Gina Welch refers to as
Feeling X which she states as being the thing that seized people when they spoke in tongues or
raised their hands in the air during church or decided to come forward to accept Jesus Christ as their
Lord and Savior. (Welch, p.71) In her experience, Jerry Falwell's Evangelical church relied upon the
individual's similar experience of religious ecstasy as proof of Jesus and the Holy Spirit, which could
4 This is further asserted in Lewis's study of shamanism and spirit possession when he states that [religious
phenomena]...rise, change, and decline in response to variations in the external circumstances which play upon them.
(p.86)

then be followed by a full conversion to Evangelical Christianity a requirement for complete

membership at the Church.
While some established religions may act similarly (encouraging religious ecstasy as a means of
establishing validity), others may feel the need to extinguish ecstatic experiences in its followers to
maintain its predominance. They recognize, then, that religious ecstasy is tricky: while it may indeed
encourage the authenticity of the religion, it may also be used by those who experience ecstasy as a
way of separating from the religion and its established principles through the formation of a separate
movement5. It also allows, as Ehrenreich points out, for individuals to believe they could approach the
deity on their own terms, which is detrimental to religions which are determined to maintain [their]
monopoly over human access to the divine. (Ehenreich, p.84)6 Established religious orders are then
faced with a predicament in which their founding beliefs are based upon an experience of religious
ecstasy which cannot, then, be recreated in its followers lest the religion's influence be undermined
rather than confirmed.
Yet, by failing to allow for changes in their structure, these religions can become obsolete.
They may be deemed archaic, old-fashioned, or outdated and eventually discarded when their dogma
no longer conforms with the current culture. At this point, religious ecstasy allows individuals to
facilitate the emergence of a new religion, or a new form of an old religion, which has been adapted to,
and is functional in, the current cultural setting. Denominations and sects of major religions often arise
through an individual whose views ran counter to those of the established religion in question and were
confirmed by a personal ecstatic experience.7 Ehrenreich illustrates this in her chapter-long comparison
5 Lewis mentions the history of Christianity which affords innumerable examples of separatist sects [which employ
possession as a supreme religious experience] struggling to achieve an independent existence but held in check through
their persecution as heresies (p.115-116)
6 Lewis, again, elaborates on this point by stating that Inspiration then becomes an institutionalized property of the
religious establishment which, as the divinely appointed church, incarnates god: the inspired truth is then mediated to the
masses through rituals performed by its duly accredited officers. In these circumstances individual possession
experiences are discouraged and where necessary, discredited. (p. 118)
7 One might begin to see this as a cyclical pattern in which ecstatic experiences establish the basis of a religion, which,
when outdated, is replaced by a new form of the same religion more adapted to the current times established by the
ecstatic experiences of another individual

of Dionysius and Jesus as she explains that Dionysian rituals, including ecstatic experiences, become
outmoded as time progressed and the civilization changed, at which point the emergence of Jesus,
whose validity was established through his own ecstatic experience and religious ideas, replaced lost
Dionysian elements without conflicting with the modern culture.8 Even today we can see the
expansion of Christianity as it has splintered into various sects (what one could reasonably conceive as
different versions of Christianity) to accommodate for the various needs of different groups of
people.
In an interesting case study, we can look at the emergence of Aimee Semple McPherson and her
Christian church in the 1920s, as presented in Matthew Avery Sutton's biography. McPherson, who
found that the toils of a traditional wife and mother did not suit her, sparked an Evangelical movement
after experiencing what she believed to be the Holy Spirit urging her to go and preach the word.
While McPherson felt she was called upon by God to battle the liberal trends enveloping Christianity
(Sutton, p.11) and to restore American churches to what she believed was their original and 'pure'
form (Sutton, p.13), she did so through modern means with the use of radio, television, and theatrics
as opposed to the strict use of speech-like sermons.
McPherson attracted her congregants by presenting herself as an individual who was aligned
with the modern culture9 (through the use of current technology and nontraditional preaching methods,
as well as her constant displays of patriotism) but also spiritually in tune with her faith (having had
several ecstatic experiences, including: speaking in tongues, contact with the Holy Spirit, and the
seeming ability to heal). The popularity of her church, the Angelus Temple, continues today in part
because of the ideas she preached, but also because its message does not conflict with, but rather
embraces and continuously adapts to, the current technological culture and use of popular mediums:
lights, large viewing screens, even Twitter and Podcasts.
8 Lewis mentions that ancient cults Often...turn out to be the mainline religions of earlier ages which have been eclipsed
by new faiths. (p.86)
9 It may be interesting to note that the current website for Angelus Temple even includes, in their brief description of
Sister Aimee, the acknowledgment that her Pentecostal approaches were modern and notably ahead of her time.

For an older case study, we may focus on the development of firearms, as explored by
Ehrenreich. Technological advances in military warfare produced such weapons as muskets which
required several minutes to reload and fire demanding military diligence. Calvinism adamantly
embraced these changes to gain a stronger hold on society and further its agenda. The Calvinistic
movement found that the thirty-two motions soldiers were required to practice constantly eliminated
the time soldiers had previously spent reveling. By seizing this modern concept of continuous practice
and diligence, Calvinism was able to institute in its followers the notion of using their time wisely to
better themselves educationally and to contribute to society through work, rather than through ecstatic
dancing and ecstasy. In this way, Calvinism followed the mindset of the masses by encouraging and
elaborating upon the technological advances of the day. When later Ehrenreich acknowledges the role
this may (or may not) have played in the seemingly growing epidemic of melancholy and depression,
she mentions that many felt a cure was the release of one's self conscious through ecstatic experiences.
It is reasonable to believe these experiences could, potentially, alter the Calvinistic way of living as
people allowed these opportunities for ecstasy back into the modern culture (once again changing an
aspect of the popular mindset).
If, then, the ideas presented in this argument are true: that religious ecstasy is indeed necessary
for the continuation of individual religions and the religious experience as a whole because it serves a
catalyst by which individuals may facilitate the evolution of a religion to ensure its adaptation to the
constantly changing culture and mindset of the masses, then we must ask the question why. Surely,
civilizations in the modern world could potentially be capable of functioning without religious
structure. It must then be understood that human nature demands religious structure and thereby
employs religious ecstasy to ensure its availability.
In Ann Taves's approach to the study of religion and religious experiences, she claims that
individuals choose to attribute religion to experiences which may otherwise be explained. She
asserts that these experiences deemed religious are thereby the basis of religion itself, which has been

created as a result of rituals connected to special objects and taboo practices.

Surely, then, if what Taves says is true, the conscious designation of experiences as being
religious or not religious shows, at the very least, an openness to religion itself. If one knows they are
merely attributing religion to something, yet continues to do so, then they must clearly feel a need for
religion to function in their lives or they would otherwise attribute something else to their experience.
What is referred to at the beginning of this paper as a desire for religious structure and purpose is
therefore the motivating factor behind the utilization of ecstatic experiences. These experiences enable
the continuation of whatever an individual or society seek from a religion. This may include a moral
code, protection from a hostile environment, or, as Welch mentions in her memoir, group therapy in
the guise of sermon...community [one] could always count on to be happy to see [them]...friends...
structure...[and something] to look forward to.10 (Welch, p.303)
As a result, it can almost be seen as human nature to evoke the use of religious ecstasy when the
societal norms and cultural influences appear to contradict a religion's teachings, making it
incompatible with modern living. Not only is religious ecstasy the means by which the religious
experience is continued as a whole, it is also the means by which the human race clings to and protects
its own primal need for the existence of a higher guiding power.11

10 It is interesting to note that it is these aspects of the Evangelical church which Welch admits to missing the most after
once again returning to her analytical, atheist lifestyle and belief system. One could say this reasonably demonstrates the
inherent desire for religious structure and function, even in individuals who find they do not believe in a higher power.
11 Ehrenreich elaborates on the primal evolutionary role of religious ecstasy when she postulates the idea that the earliest
forms of dance and ecstasy were used to encourage humans to live in groups larger than small bands of closely related
individuals so as to better defend themselves against predators (p.23)

Bilbiography
1. Angelus Temple - Welcome to Angelus Temple. Angelus Temple, 2010. Web.
Accessed: 20 Sept. 2010. <http://www.angelustemple.org/>.

2. Ehrenreich, Barbara. Dancing in the Streets: a History of Collective Joy. New York:
Metropolitan, 2007. Print.
Pages: 23,50,58,59,60-64,84,122-123,150-153

3. Lewis, Ioan M. Ecstatic Religion a Study of Shamanism and Spirit Possession. 3rd ed. London
Routledge, 2005. Print.
Pages: 60,86,115-116,118,119

4. Sutton, Matthew Avery. Aimee Semple McPherson and the Resurrection of Christian America.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 2007. Print.
Pages: 9-11,16, photographs and their captions throughout book, 40

5. Taves, Ann. Religious Experience Reconsidered: a Building Block Approach to the Study of
Religion and Other Special Things. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2009. Print.

6. Welch, Gina. In the Land of Believers: an Outsider's Extraordinary Journey into the Heart of
the Evangelical Church. New York: Metropolitan, 2010. Print.
Pages: 71, 109, 303