Logic tells me God doesn't exist but my heart says otherwise.

[bennyboy]

In the general, yes, but I'll be more specific. I was putting forward the notion that a "religious experience" as interpreted by you or I, as recorded or communicated by another in the present or from the past -may not- mean anything remotely close to what we have assigned it, to anyone but ourselves.

In specific cases, that's true, but I think if we are to look at accounts of experiences OTHER people have described through history as being religious, we can probably make a reasonable collection.

There's also the chance that if we can learn enough about past religious rituals, we can use psychology and neurochemistry to deduce what experiences they had-- for example, we can know the effects on our experience of 40 days of fasting, we can study what extended isolation and prayer do to the brain, etc. We can also learn what "holy" plants and mushrooms do (peyote comes to mind).

-Now imagine that this is a religious experience. Hard to do? Not if you're a Maori circa 1750.

I can't comment on what the Maori might have felt. However, I want to be careful to distinguish between two kinds of religious experience: a) a powerful experience of a mystical nature which may subsequently be wrapped up in mythology or theological ideas; b) the experience of performing the rites and rituals of a religious institution. Some would argue that attending mass is a religious experience, because mass is a religious rite. But I'm talking about the qualitative experiences common to many no matter what their denomination.

More specifically. Isn't it possible that you took your "fundamental truths" and found ways to paint them over the experience or narratives of others? "All is one" is not exactly "all is interconnected" to begin with.

By "all is one," I mean that the universe is all one system, and we are each but one part of it. This is in opposition to "I am me, and the world 'out there' revolves around me." There's no great reason for one part of the universe to be considered important, and any others not. You might disagree with this philosophical idea, but my point is that it doesn't involve inventing Sky Daddy, or making mythological constructions, or trying to control anyone, or any of that.

Please remember my original point (even though maybe too strongly worded) wasn't this positive assertion about the nature of reality. It was that a religious experience can alter one's world view in a powerful way-- but does not necessarily have to be at odds with what we know about reality. So instead of just thinking the idea "We are all connected, and mutually co-dependent" a religious experience might allow one to have a strong emotional connection to the idea which makes it come vividly to life, so to speak.