Peeking Behind the Ideological Curtain

Hosted by Center for the Study of Religion and Psychology at Boston University's Danielsen Institute

Wesley J. Wildman, a School of Theology associate professor of theology and ethics, discusses the social function of religious and spiritual experiences in Peeking Behind the Ideological Curtain, the fifth lecture in a six-part series titled Religious Experiences: From the Mundane to the Anomalous. He moves beyond the realm of the individual — covered in his previous lectures on the neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy of religious and spiritual experiences — to analyze the power of such experiences in stabilizing both the human brain and the larger social order.

Wildman puts his argument in an evolutionary context. From the time of hunter-gatherer societies through to the era of empire states, humans have developed increasingly complex social arrangements — and these arrangements require more and more energy to maintain. Yet, Wildman argues, our brains have not significantly changed to keep up with our intricate social needs. Religious and spiritual experiences, he says, give us a supernatural framework that helps us to accept the nature of the society we inhabit. As a result, these experiences play a crucial role both in maintaining a social equilibrium and in helping us cope with transitions from one social order to another.

Wildman acknowledges that religion can be a powerful form of social control by the leaders of a group — “priests and politicians” — but adds that it is an equally important force in motivating some people to revolutionize their societies. On the whole, however, he believes that the most long-lasting religions are supernatural; without requiring much energy, they “cosmologize the fundamental operating principles of a social group” by “writing them in the sky,” giving us a much-needed sense of security that often cannot be found in society alone.

Part of a research project at the Danielsen Institute’s Center for the Study of Religion and Psychology, the lecture series is funded by a Templeton Foundation grant from the Metanexus Institute, which administers the Templeton Research Lectures.

March 17, 2008, 7:30 p.m.
Photonics Center

Video length is: 01:32:34.

About the speaker:
Wesley J. Wildman is an associate professor of theology and ethics at the Boston University School of Theology, where he directs the doctoral programs in Christian theology, in comparative theology, and in science, philosophy, and religion. Wildman has a bachelor’s in mathematics from Flinders University and a graduate degree in divinity from the University of Sydney, both in Australia. He earned a doctorate in philosophical and systematic theology and philosophy of religion from the Graduate Theological Union, in Berkeley, California. He has published more than 60 articles and the book Fidelity with Plausibility: Modest Christologies in the Twentieth Century. Wildman is the coeditor of the Encyclopedia of Science and Religion, as well as a collection of debates on contemporary issues in religion and science. He has studied the nature and problems of religious experience for over a decade through his involvement with the Divine Action Project at Boston University, sponsored by the Vatican Observatory and the Center for Theology and Natural Sciences, in Berkeley, and the Crosscultural Comparative Religious Ideas Project at BU. An ordained minister in the Uniting Church in Australia, Wildman has served churches in Sydney, Australia, and Piedmont, California.

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