Experiments in the Religious Experience of Struggle

Experiments in Personal Religion: Study IV
Religious Experience through the Struggle of Life
H. N. Wieman

1. The Practical Problem of Struggle

The preceding part of this study has demonstrated the importance of struggle. The greater goods of life have rarely been attained save in those circumstances where men have been forced to struggle. The greatest goods and the ever higher levels of good can be attained only when men continue to struggle after they are no longer forced to it by danger and deprivation.

Here we have the great practical problem which is becoming ever more urgent and vital as our civilization makes life more easeful and luxurious. The problem is twofold: (1) How can men be induced to struggle for ever greater goods when necessity no longer compels them; (2) how can they keep on when discouraged, weary, or depressed with sense of failure. The first of these two parts of the problem is not so widely recognized as the second, but we believe it is much more serious. The old sad story of civilizations reaching a certain height of excellence and then sinking back into decadence; the old story of fathers struggling up from low levels of life only to see their sons become flabby and weak, if not vicious and dissipated; of individuals achieving a noble success, but at the age of forty or fifty beginning to decay morally, mentally, physicallythis old story will continue as long as we fail to keep up the great struggle of life after the scourge of necessity no longer whips us into the fight. This applies especially to the most highly endowed. These gifted men can often get what they want without one-tenth the effort others expend. So they live their lives without making that great contribution to human welfare which they could make if they exerted themselves, and all human life is impoverished thereby.

Here, then, is the twofold vital problem involved in struggle: How can we keep it up when comfortable or when discouraged?

Let us first state how it cannot be accomplished. It cannot be accomplished merely by making up our minds to do it. Resolution is not enough. Resolution may produce spurts of effort, bult it can never keep us striving with that persistency and dauntless drive which is the only road to the highest goods. The futility of all such moral volition arises out of the fact that persistent and potent struggle depends upon the release of personal energy; and personal energy can be released only when the individual is rightly stimulated. Only those situations that arouse intense desire or fear or anger or other such deep-seated emotion can release within us that amount of energy which is required for great struggle. In scientific terms, it is a problem of organic chemistry. Energy is locked up in the organism. It must be unlocked before struggle, long-continued and powerful, is possible. No matter how conscientious, no matter how highminded, idealistic, and spiritual a man may be, if the needed energy is not unlocked within him by the required stimulation, he simply does not have it in a form available for struggle.

Here is where science steps forward to show the futility of morality, culture, and education without religion when it comes to this problem of struggle. The utmost moral good will in the world cannot keep one struggling if he does not have the energy. Psychology and history of religion and the testimony of deeply religious people indicate that religion can release energy in great quantity. It is very certain that morality without religion cannot do this. One of the chief reasons why people so commonly put their trust in morality, culture, and education rather than religion is because they fail to see this basic truth about human nature. Food-getting, sex, fear, anger will release energy. But when we are at ease or when we are discouraged, how shall we get it? That is the great problem. Religion is the answer.

The purpose of the personal experiment in religion to be described later will be to discover that way of practicing religion which will release energy for struggle. But before we present that experiment we must look a little more closely into the sources of personal energy in order to make plain that personal experiment in religion is the only possible way to find how to get energy for struggle when we are at ease or discouraged.

2. The Sources of Personal Energy

The amount of personal energy available for struggle depends upon two conditions, one physiological, the other psychological. The physiological condition is stimulation of visceral processes, pre-eminently the endocrine glands. The psychological condition is freedom from mental conflict, in other words, peace. Let us briefly examine each of these in order.

When the endocrine glands are stimulated and the visceral adjustments are made through which maximum energy is released, the whole process produces a mental state called emotion. Fear, anger, and the emotional phases of desire, aspiration, hope, joy, exultation, excitement generally, are examples. But the important thing, be it remembered, is not the conscious state called emotion; the important thing is the visceral readjustments, glandular processes, and consequent release of energy. The conscious state, the emotion, simply serves to inform us that the energy is now released and made available for struggle. When this energy is drained off immediately and completely in some struggle that is going on, one does not experience the emotion to any marked degree, even though energy is being released in great quantities.

Men vary greatly with respect to the amount of personal energy at their disposal. Some are so constituted organically that they constantly have more energy than others. This organic constitution cannot, so far as we know, be changed by training or stimulation. But given this organic constitution, a man may be subjected to such stimulation as to release far more energy than he otherwise would. Religious stimulation can do this, perhaps, more powerfully than any other. It cannot change the organic constitution, but it can stimulate that constitution so that it will yield all the energy of which it is capable.

Let us turn now to the second source of energy, the psychological. It is not so much a source as a determining condition. It is mental harmony; it is dynamic peace. It is that plastic organization of responses such that each impulse supports the others and none frustrates the others. If there is conflict in our minds between two or more opposed desires, one or both of which may be subconscious, our energies will be consumed in this conflict and hence rendered unavailable for struggle with things outside ourselves. If all our energy is consumed in struggle between our own impulses we have none left for struggle with environmental difficulties. Hence our wishes and desires must be harmonious with one another if we are to have sufficient energy for the greater struggles. This inner conflict appears in consciousnes~, in the form of worry, fret, anxiety, melancholy, excitement, and, in extreme forms, delusion and insanity. One may suffer from this mental conflict and not know what is wrong with him. The conflict may be subconscious in part or whole.

We can now see the nature of the problem which we have to solve by personal experiment. We must find some way (i) to stimulate those glandular and other processes through which energy is released, and (2) bring peace of mind by removing those mental conflicts which waste and divert our vital energies.

3. Personal Experiment in Religion for Release of Energy

Let us call to mind that the aspect of the universe called God is a pervasive aspect constantly and intimately operative in our lives and in the world round about us. In so far as we yield ourselves to it, indescribable possibilities for good hover over us and loom before us. But in so far as we yield ourselves to the destructive aspects of the universe great evils hang over us and open before us. At regular seasons of worship let us cultivate this sense of divine presence, with the attendant possibilities for good and evil.

But I we must not stop with this sense of divine presence and vivid apprehension of the attendant possibilities. Each of us must recognize, and through regular seasons of meditation clarify, the definite part which he is fitted to play in bringing the divine aspect of the universe into dominance, with all the consequent good , and in reducing the evil aspects with their consequent disasters. Each of us, by reason of unique individuality and circumstance, has a definite part in this vast process. This part should be formulated by us as clearly as possible. It should be put into words and repeated in seasons of meditative worship, changing the wording as our vocation grows clearer with the passage of time. Thus a life purpose will grow upon us. Within this life-purpose specific objectives should be verbally defined in so far as we are able. This should be continued at regular seasons of worship until we Attain a sense of destiny and become possessed of a passion. With some this sense of destiny and drive of passion will be much stronger than with others. But I believe everyone can achieve a driving purpose in life by practicing regularly and for a sufficient length of time the method described. A certain season set apart each Sabbath day might be used in this way. Occasional vacations could be spent in like manner. We can imagine no better way of spending a vacation than in such meditation and worship.

What we have described must be carefully distinguished from mere resolution or moral determination. The method before us consists in exposing one's self to the stimulus of certain facts until they have worked in us the physiological and psychological readjustments through which personal energy is released. It is not resolution; it is remaking of the personality through exposure to the stimulation of supremely significant facts. The consequent state of body and mind can become a permanent disposition by regular re-exposure. This exposure is a kind of worship.

There are other problems involved in struggle besides finding the required energy. There is the problem of directing the energy to worthy ends. One may struggle to do trivial or evil things. There is the problem of efficiency. One may expend his energy in waste motion. There is the problem of keeping gracious, sympathetic, and appreciative toward persons and undertakings outside one's own work. He who struggles is often harsh and even cruel in his zeal. We have not discussed these three problems, but we believe they are automatically solved in the practice of religion which we have proposed. The same experiment in religion which releases energy will guard against these dangers also.

The practice we have described should give rise to a growing passion. It is the passion that results from finding one's destiny and surrendering to the clutch of it. Passion means maximum release of energy. Historical records indicate that no matter how frail in body one may be, such passion and sense of destiny releases energy. One may turn to flame and burn up, but as long as he lasts he has the energy needed for struggle which cannot be choked by ease nor quenched by discouragement.