4 Chapter 4: Ritual and Rites of Passage
In 1999 I was in Rome, Italy, for an excavation at the Villa of Livia in Prima Porta. One day, some Swedes and I were walking around Rome and decided to go to the Vatican. We simply walked into Saint Peter’s Square and suddenly I was swept up in a huge roar of a crowd. Thousands of people were crammed into the square, people had signs, and piñata-like things on sticks. Their glowing faces were looking up at a balcony.
“What’s happening?” I asked the Swedes, who looked bored.
“Oh, it’s the Pope,” they shrugged.
“WHAT?!?” I immediately worked my way to the center of the square, surrounded by sweaty ecstatic people.
“IT’S THE POPE!!” I shouted.
The Pope vanished and another huge wave of sound enveloped me and reverberated throughout the square. Only later did I question what happened at the moment and my reaction to seeing Pope John Paul was so moving. I mean, my parents forced me to go to the Catholic school on Saturday and I hated it so much that one day I just decided to get on my bike and ride as far and fast as I could. I kept this up for weeks until my brother snitched on me. Why then was I so caught up in this moment? Looking back, I think it was something called “collective effervescence”–a moment of spiritual ecstasy when a group is in perfect synchrony and solidarity. It is a feeling of oneness with other people that is irresistible to people. Well, except for the Swedes.
Spiritual Beings
A central irony of being human is that our spiritual nature is as notable as our ability to solve physical problems—we live in and excel in both realms. Humans invest huge amounts of time, energy, and money in planning and participating in religious activities, often preparing for weddings, funerals, and coming-of-age ceremonies years in advance. Monuments like Angkor Wat in Cambodia, Karnak in Egypt, the Parthenon in Greece, Tikal in Guatemala, and Stonehenge in England, to name a few, illustrate the lengths to which humans will go for the sake of spiritual beliefs. Plans are currently underway in India to build Viraat Ramayan Mandir, a religious complex even larger than Angkor Wat, the world’s largest. While chimpanzees display at waterfalls and throw rocks at particular trees, spirituality, religion, and sacred values take center stage in human societies. For many, spiritual or religious beliefs are at the core of a person’s life and identity.
There are dozens of major religions and around 4,000–5,000 in total. By some estimates, there are as many as 10,000 religions today, counting numerous sects or sub-religions (Dietrich 2015). Our devotion and industry toward matters of religion and ritual are so strong, that psychologist Jonathan Haidt suggests Homo spiritualis (spiritual human) is a better description of our species than Homo sapiens (thinking or wise man).
Supernatural and Religion
We can define supernatural as powers or phenomena that are not subject to the laws of nature. What qualifies as supernatural