Religious Experience and Brain Scanning

Principles Of Neurotheology
By Dr. Andrew Newberg

In the movie, Religulous, Dr. Andrew Newberg was interviewed on his work in Neurotheology.  He studies show how religious experiences and practices impact the brain by doing brain scans of various religious people.  Gone are the days that we have to guess about what happens in a person when we can see it first hand through a brain scan.  This field of study is called neurotheology detailed in a book called "Principles of Neurotheology".

While people are in a very deep spiritual or religious state, these researchers do brain scans.   Some of the people they have studied include a Buddhist meditating, Sikhs chanting, and nuns praying.  They compare these brain scans to that of the person at a state of rest and observe the difference.   This research has given them a big opportunity to really see what happens within the mind and body when someone is taking part in a religious or spiritual practice.