God in the Waves
Posted: Fri Feb 22, 2019 2:43 pm
I'm reading Mike McHargue's book Finding God in the Waves.
Here's a summary and a few observations:
McHargue was a highly engaged Evangelical Southern Baptist who had the misfortune of loving science almost as much as he loved his church experience. The unexpected consequence was that he reached a tipping point in which science won and he had a cataclysmic faith crisis that left him in the atheist camp for a couple of years. But he didn't like being an atheist, he had loved his church experience and having God as a close friend. Long story short, he had a powerful spiritual experience one night on a beach that made him feel God's love again and gave him permission to pursue an understanding of God and scripture that was significantly different from his previous indoctrination.
McHargue's re-conversion still left him with the science problem. He ended up believing in a very different kind of God, more like Einstein's and Spinoza's God, except that he talks to this God like an old friend. He feels like he has a brain with one Christian hemisphere and one atheist hemisphere. He acknowledges that God might be an evolutionary/cultural construct but he believes it's one that makes people happier, so he advocates going with it even if you don't believe, to the degree that he urges you to pretend you believe in God, praying or meditating with that intent so that a "God object" can take form in your neural networks. I think what Mike is missing here is that other people in his position may not be able to, or have any desire to manufacture a God in their brain. He compares it to the Velveteen Rabbit coming to life because of the love of a child. I'm not sure that's a healthy reality for everyone.
As wacky as all of this sounds (plenty of eye rolling on my part) McHargue is pretty open about the problems with religion and he presents some good science in a very approachable way, both for and against religious claims. For instance, research on prayer has shown that praying for sick people has absolutely no effect on their recovery, UNLESS they know that a lot of people are praying for them, in which case the effect is actually detrimental to their recovery because it adds additional stress and performance anxiety.
I would recommend this book for two reasons. First, anyone who has experienced a faith crisis will really connect with a lot of things McHargue says, particularly regarding relationships with fellow fundamentalists. Second, he does a really good job of explaining the brain science behind faith, spiritual experiences, the measurable neurological differences in the brains of people who believe in a loving God vs. a vengeful God, and the concrete benefits of prayer/meditation (he says there's no difference).
Have you read this book or are you familiar with Mike's story? I'd like to hear your thoughts.
Here's a summary and a few observations:
McHargue was a highly engaged Evangelical Southern Baptist who had the misfortune of loving science almost as much as he loved his church experience. The unexpected consequence was that he reached a tipping point in which science won and he had a cataclysmic faith crisis that left him in the atheist camp for a couple of years. But he didn't like being an atheist, he had loved his church experience and having God as a close friend. Long story short, he had a powerful spiritual experience one night on a beach that made him feel God's love again and gave him permission to pursue an understanding of God and scripture that was significantly different from his previous indoctrination.
McHargue's re-conversion still left him with the science problem. He ended up believing in a very different kind of God, more like Einstein's and Spinoza's God, except that he talks to this God like an old friend. He feels like he has a brain with one Christian hemisphere and one atheist hemisphere. He acknowledges that God might be an evolutionary/cultural construct but he believes it's one that makes people happier, so he advocates going with it even if you don't believe, to the degree that he urges you to pretend you believe in God, praying or meditating with that intent so that a "God object" can take form in your neural networks. I think what Mike is missing here is that other people in his position may not be able to, or have any desire to manufacture a God in their brain. He compares it to the Velveteen Rabbit coming to life because of the love of a child. I'm not sure that's a healthy reality for everyone.
As wacky as all of this sounds (plenty of eye rolling on my part) McHargue is pretty open about the problems with religion and he presents some good science in a very approachable way, both for and against religious claims. For instance, research on prayer has shown that praying for sick people has absolutely no effect on their recovery, UNLESS they know that a lot of people are praying for them, in which case the effect is actually detrimental to their recovery because it adds additional stress and performance anxiety.
I would recommend this book for two reasons. First, anyone who has experienced a faith crisis will really connect with a lot of things McHargue says, particularly regarding relationships with fellow fundamentalists. Second, he does a really good job of explaining the brain science behind faith, spiritual experiences, the measurable neurological differences in the brains of people who believe in a loving God vs. a vengeful God, and the concrete benefits of prayer/meditation (he says there's no difference).
Have you read this book or are you familiar with Mike's story? I'd like to hear your thoughts.
