Episode 193: On Conversion, or Arousing the Bodhi-Mind

Weird Studies

Phil Ford and J. F. Martel

Society & Culture, Arts, Philosophy

4.8 • 688 Ratings

🗓️ 9 July 2025

⏱️ 89 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How do you become religious? What is a conversion experience? Does it happen all at once or gradually? What's the point of religion, anyway? These are questions that JF (a Catholic) and Phil (a Zennist) have often been asked since starting Weird Studies, and in this episode they attempt some answers. Image: "Small Candle Flame" by Le Priyavrat, via Wikimedia Commons Sign up to attend Shannon Taggart's Lily Dale symposium, July 24-26 REFERENCES Ross Douthat, Believe Dogen, Shobogenzo New Atheism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Atheism Weird Studies, Episode 99 on “Wild, Wild Country” William James, Varieties of Religious Experience George Steiner, Real Presences Patrick Curry, Art and Enchantment Max Picard, The Flight from God Charles Taylor, A Secular Age James Carse, Finite and Infinite Games Richard Wagner, Ring Cycle Gilles Deleuze, The Logic of Sense Weird Studies, Episode 183 on “Siddhartha” Charles Sanders Peirce, American philosopher Leonard Cohen, “Hallelujah” Our Known Friend, Meditations on the Tarot Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Spectrevision Radio
0:02.0	Welcome to Weird Studies, an arts and philosophy podcast with hosts Phil Ford and J.F. Martel.
0:20.0	For more episodes, or to support the podcast,
0:23.3	go to weirdst. This is Phil.
0:53.7	This week, JF and I are discussing a pretty straightforward
0:57.0	topic, really. The question, how do you get religion? It's an increasingly common question.
1:04.0	A lot of thought pieces on the theme have appeared lately, and earlier this year we saw the publication
1:10.0	of Ross Dauphett's book Believe,
1:11.6	why everyone should be religious, which is a guide to becoming religious when you aren't
1:16.5	already and don't know where to begin. We sometimes get messages from listeners asking the same
1:22.5	question. They hear us banging on about faith, wonder, atonement, forgiveness, and other fruits of the
1:29.3	religious path.
1:31.1	They know we think that religion is an indispensable part of human existence, and they feel
1:35.9	like there's something they're missing.
1:38.3	But how to find out what it is.
1:40.8	How to begin when you've never started.
1:44.1	There's lots of ways.
1:46.1	Sometimes you just go to the church that's in your neighborhood,
1:48.9	or a friend invites you to their religion's holiday celebration,
1:52.1	and you just kind of go from there.
1:54.2	Or sometimes you're struck down by a sudden revelation,
1:58.0	like Saul on the road to Damascus.
	...

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