Do Atheists Find Meaning in their Mystical Experiences? Dr Alice Herron; Prof. Adrian Coyle; Dr Emma Williamson Do Atheists Find Meaning in their Mystical Experiences?

When atheists report experiences of a spontaneous, transformative, enlightening or of a mystical type (MTEs), given that they do not believe in supernatural agency: how do they interpret them? what meaning do they give to them? what effect (if any) do they have on atheists’ sense of identity?

In your own words please describe your experience In your own words please describe your experience. Give as much information as you find necessary to convey what the experience was like. Please additionally give some idea of what you understood the experience to mean at the time. Please describe any long-term impact you believe the experience has had on your life.

Atypical Event/Situation Phenomenological Features New connections become salient and experienced as unity Experience seen as meaningful Feels s/he has realised new truths S/he perceives the world in a new way Making sense of experience after event Atheist identity and meaning of experience reconciled

Name Identity change Meaning change Timeframe for change Frank Atheist - Atheist Solution to philosophical problem instant Brenda Atheist→ Catholic Belief in God Instant Ian Source of meditation techniques Oscar Sense of presence → delusion Minutes Patsy Atheist → Spiritual Out of body → experience of soul Weeks Valerie Atheist → Religious? Feeling of ‘Belief in God’ Months Oona Atheist → Christian → Atheist God’s love → result of priming when vulnerable years Wendy Christian → Atheist Presence of God → unity of the universe Years Edward Atheist → Christian Drug experience → meaningful vision from God Daniel Several experiences → on-going search for meaning

Harmonising the perceived meaning of the experience with identity Changing identity to accommodate meaning Reinterpreting meaning to preserve identity Reconstructing both meaning and identity

Changing Identity to Accommodate Meaning “…..I would say that even though I am a pretty militant atheist and I despise everything about religion, if another experience came upon me I would love it because if felt so good. It sounds awful. …. to be honest, if I could feel like that again I don’t care about my principles, I would be quite happy to be religious if it meant that I could feel like that.” (Valerie)

Reinterpreting Meaning to Accommodate Identity “… But I think there had been a growing feeling, … the feeling that I was becoming, or realizing, that I was an atheist, that I started putting this different interpretation on the experience and started to feel that it wasn’t to do with God, it was to do with being part of the universe…. … The interpretation I put on it now, that it is a sense of connectedness with the universe, yes it’s nice to know we are connected with the place we are living in….” (Wendy, interview)

Reconstructing both meaning and identity [Discussing his dream where God had spoken to him] “….Why would God tell an atheist not to believe in Him? […] Despite His words, I could no longer be a militant atheist when ‘evidence’ was staring me in the face. I slid into agnosticism and became less preachy on the subject of religion. At the same time, I could not really believe the person I had talked to was God. It seemed more likely the entire dream was my brain playing tricks on me based on how I subconsciously perceive a God to be like [...] (Ken, written account)

The meaning making model. From Park, 2010

Atypical Event/Situation Phenomenological Features New connections become salient and experienced as unity Experience seen as meaningful Feels s/he has realised new truths S/he perceives the world in a new way Making sense of experience after event Atheist identity and meaning of experience reconciled

Proposed Grounded Theory MTEs can be conceptualized as an intuitive leap of meaning occurring when there is incongruence between an atypical situation and the person’s global meaning framework. The intuitive leap is a meaning making effort in which the person’s global meaning framework is reconstructed to accommodate the new situation. It takes the form of an MTE where phenomenological turbulence intuitively and spontaneously draws on emotions and cognitions associated with a sense of of meaning in life. After the experience the new framework is assessed and accepted, modified or rejected through a process of assimilation and accommodation. The person looks for coherence between the new meaning framework and their identity. Again, through a process of assimilation or accommodation the person may modify or reject their atheism, or reject or reinterpret the MTE