The class emphasizes the difference between teaching religion and teaching about religion. Students are introduced to the experiential dimension in Christianity and become acquainted with concepts such as hierophany, axis mundi, and the sacred and profane in human religious life. Students explore archaic religious systems, sort out the search for answers to profound life questions, and explore styles of religion. The Religious Experience Discusses the difficulties in determining religious experience and the challenges of language, interpretation, and culture in shading descriptions of extraordinary or parapsychological events and explores the relationship between religion and science. It features a series of interviews with religious seekers, putting a human face on this unique aspect of human experience.
Religious experience is explored through a study of Monastic life.
A Coptic Orthodox monk and a Hindu swami teach students about mysticism and meditation. Hinduism Explores the experiential dimension focusing on Hinduism. The class features interviews with Swami Prabuddhananda from the Vendanta Society of Northern California and Shankara Pundit of the Chicago Hare Krishna Center. Buddhism Demonstrates the relationship between the religious impulse, profound life questions, and the experiential dimension while explaining fundamental Buddhist concepts such as the Four Noble Truths, the Eight Fold Path, egolessness, karma, dharma, and reincarnation. Features a Zen Buddhist at the San Francisco Zen Center and the Tibetan Buddhists at the Dharmadatu Temple in Chicago.