Joseph Campbell asked, "How can one person get God into the heart of another person?" How can any person get God into their own heart? Praying? Reading the Bible? Reciting a catechism? Chanting The Hail Mary and The Our Father back to back? Campbell's question is like asking, "How can one person enlighten another person?" "Illumine another person?" "Bring realization to life?" How can we make ourselves, or anyone, fall in love? Decide before we go to bed what we will dream tonight? Experiences with the Numen, with numinous reality, come of their own accord out of nowhere, when the time is right. We can encourage the experience by immersing ourselves in encounters with art, music and nature, but that guarantees nothing, merely provides the experience of the ineffable a fertile environment in which to work. The Mystery breaks in upon us in its own time, in its own way, and cannot be hurried, or compelled, into being. Which is not to say that it cannot be conjured up with drumming or loud organ music and hours of bad preaching. But a person so "converted" will have nothing original to say about the experience, and will repeat what has been drilled into them, word for word, phrase for phrase, with lots of "hallelujah's" and "praise the lord's" thrown in for good measure. The validity of a religious experience is in the life of the one so moved. "Wisdom is known by her children," and, sometimes, by her grandchildren.
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Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy 