Religious Experience Essay

The six interviewed students each cited academics as their principle focus at Williams during the semester; however, no student referenced GPA (or any form of formalized assessment) when asked about successful and/or frustrating classroom experiences. Jonathan Hall, a prospective chemistry and classics double-major from New York, described an experience from his high-school biology class:

We were learning about the way electricity functions in the body. When potassium ions come [into the nerve] and you get to a point where it overflows, the membrane opens up, sodium rushes in, and electricity shoots down the axon. It was by far the most interesting thing I had ever learned. I don’t know why. (Interview 4, 9:35)

Four years later, Jonathan still

As I employed Frazer to explore Jonathan’s narrative of natural order and the nervous system, I will now use James for the same purpose. In The Varieties of Religious Experience, James writes: “Religious feeling is an absolute addition to the Subject’s range of life. It gives him a new sphere of power. When the outward battle is lost, it redeems and vivifies an interior world which otherwise would be an empty waste” (James 1902, 44). Ignoring the gender bias, James’ conception of religion as “a new sphere of power” captures Chrisleine’s desire to use education for the public good. In other words, Chrisleine’s sacred and spiritual consciousness in academic life is her belief in the potential power of her education. Given intense levels of stress, spiritual activities serve an anchoring buoys and “added dimensions of emotion” to strengthen the interior world (James, 44). For Chrisleine, learning political philosophies and writing the history Black Africans represent such spiritual activities. Rachel Levin, a prospective psychology major from Ohio, described similar motivation: “I really want to help people. People have always come to me for advice, so I feel psychology is how I can make a difference” (Interview 1, 8:30). Like Chrisleine, Rachel strengthens her interior world with “a new sphere of power” in psychology and defines her sacred consciousness of