How does a secular or atheist person get a religious and / or spiritual experience?

Christian churches provide a service to give people a religious and spiritual experience, for which it's expected for you to tithe by putting some money into the collection plate.

How does a secular or atheist person get a religious and / or spiritual experience?

 

I would avoid services that expect tithing money. The good ones will ask instead for volunteer time and labor. And it is in this volunteering you are more likely to find your spiritual experience.

 

I have been to both Protestant and Catholic services where it seemed the religious or spiritual experience is in name only. I did go to an Evangelical service one time, to hear a famous preacher speak and things got weird, speaking in tongues, being saved and passing out. One woman standing in the aisle began to shake and people around her said she has the spirit in her, but to me it looked like she was having an orgasm. It was a spiritual experience for many.

As an atheist I have had spiritual experiences. The most intense with the help of hallucinogens. Less intense but awesome looking up at the night sky, the Grande Canyon, standing in a blizzard, sitting in a garden....feeling a part of a larger thing and being one with it (sounds cliche huh).

 

Since those are feelings, any experience could create a feeling. Personally I've found inspiration during things like roadracing, BJJ, fostering dogs...

 

Meditation, being out in nature, strong social bonds

 

I had something of a spiritual experience free of charge beginning about a year or so ago when I began to listen to a near death experiencer who had been a Pentecostal previous to his 1992 NDE. He has dozens of free lectures on youtube. He prays during most of his lectures and it seems like he has a gift to drive discarnate entities away from his listeners.

You may find this one rather interesting due to the connection to Genesis 6...



"Exposing the Nephilim" - Kevin Zadai

 

I've had a number of them. I was raised in a liberal (not politically) church by two atheists. It kept me open to participating in whatever I am invited to, as long as it's not a sermon.

I've been to some very interesting places over the years and studied a fair amount of spiritual philosophy.

Self actualization work can be very spiritual. No need for a deity.

 

Yes. This. And also really good sex.

 

I am not one of those. I am a Gnostic Christian, but do have a suggestion.

Fasting and meditation is advised by almost all sages and esoteric seekers.

That is what helped me push my own apotheosis.

Going within yourself is where the answers are. We call it Gnosis.



No brain killing supernatural garbage to believe in.

Seek what Jung and Froud called our Father Complex.

Regards
DL

 

Have you ever considered going directly to God by sincerely
from the heart praying the sinner's prayer? It goes something
like this , , ,

"Lord Jesus, I know that I am a sinner, and I ask for Your
forgiveness. I believe You died for my sins and rose from
he dead. I turn from my sins and invite You to come into
my heart and life. I want to trust and follow You as my
Lord and Savior."
__from the Billy Graham Crusades

JAG

``

 

Hallucinogenics seem to work for some.

 

So they have spiritual experiences with God and you get them by smoking crack...

Got it..

 

Been there a few times...

 

Many of the World’s religions have used and still use Hallucinogens to commune with the supernatural.

Not sure crack works the same way.

 

Absolutely a good read is "DMT the spirit molecule"

DMT: The Spirit Molecule - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org › wiki › DMT:_The_Spirit_Molecule
DMT: The Spirit Molecule is a 2010 documentary film based on a book of the same name by Dr. Rick Strassman.

 

another example, peyote cacti.

Drugs are not the only way but they are an easy, hard way.

 

Music does it for me.

 

I suggest you read Michael Pollan's book "How to Change Your Mind".

 

Forgiveness is up to the victim, not some third party that cannot be hurt.

Forgiveness is mine and yours to give, not some imaginary genocidal prick of a god.

Regards
DL

 

Sayeth the Lord Jesus , , ,
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that
whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,
but to save the world through him.

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not
believe stands condemned already because they have not believed
in the name of God’s one and only Son."
___The Lord Jesus in John 3:16-18

Paul says , , ,
"For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ
died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that
he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures."
___The Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:3-4


Best.

JAG

``

 

Or San Pedro cactus. It grows faster/isn't endangered due to over-harvesting like Peyote is, and can be legally purchased in most of the US.

 

Definitely not. It isn't a psychedelic. I seem to remember a paper written about some seminary students who were given psilocybin mushrooms and reported the "most spiritual" experiences of their lives. Crack is a different animal.

 

I tried that once as both bear mescaline, but I could not stomach to eat a ft of columnar cactus, believe me I was motivated too! I used to hunt and consume pscilocybe cubensis all the time in my 20's but I'll likely never eat them again. Been decades. *edit, over A decade

Problem with peyote is improper and over harvesting, should cut the button at ground level so the root can produce again. Never been west so I've never seen one in the flesh.

 

Next time don't eat the whole thing. The mescaline is in the green skin, and the white pulpy part in the middle is what causes most (though not all) of the nausea, while not containing much mescaline itself. You can shave off the green parts, boil them for a nice long time, and try that instead, if you are curious. Still gross, from what I'm told, but a much better experience.

I haven't tried much of this myself, just relying on what others have told me. I have a dissociative disorder, so I'm a little cautious about what I consume.

 

One spiritual experience I had, long ago I was walking a very long and flat, country road near dusk, the nearest house was miles away, nothing but orange groves and cattle pasture. I was walking the shoulder as I had stashed my bike some distance back, barbed wire pasture on both sides, I was walking along to spy some mushrooms.

A car passed me by, it slows and stops about a hundred yards ahead and begins to back up. I thought to myself, WTH? My mind was churning, I said to myself, "well, if they want to shoot me for kicks and giggles, I'm screwed" there was no cover, I was a sitting duck. I said to myself, "so be it, what shall be shall be" and I was at peace with whatever would happen next. Turns out it was just a good samaritan checking to see if I needed a ride.

I had a very similar experience in a dream, I dreamed I was stranded at sea, just bobbing along. First was disbelief, denial, then anger and rage and self pity....then acceptance of my situation. I came to peace with it and slowly submerged. Then I woke up, it was a very vivid dream.

I enjoy every day of life but when death comes, I shall embrace it.