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Index
Cover
Half title
Medjugorje and the Supernatural
Copyright
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction: The Silence of the Birds
1. The Young Woman on the Hill
The Messages of Medjugorje
Visions of the Afterlife
Near-Death Experiences: A Comparative Study
More Questions on the Afterlife: Deceased Persons and Reincarnation
The Question of Other Religions
Secrets of Medjugorje
2. Public Revelation and Private Revelation: How the Catholic Church Discerns the Supernatural
Private Revelations and the Development of Doctrine
Official Norms for Evaluating Apparitions or Revelations
First Criterion of Discernment: The Visionary
Second Criterion of Discernment: The Theological Content of the Revelation
Third Criterion of Discernment: Spiritual Fruit and Healthy Devotion
Testing the Religious Ecstasy
Intervention of Competent Church Authorities
Medjugorje and the Church
3. Mysticism in the Twentieth Century
William James and the Study of Mysticism
James’s Four Marks of the Mystical State
A Pragmatist’s Approach: Discerning the Fruits of Experience
Respecting the “More” of Religious Experiences
Challenging the Limitations of Rationalism
The Authority of Mystical Experiences
Evelyn Underhill and Mysticism
Underhill’s Defining Marks of Mysticism
Categories of Visions (Visionary Phenomena)
Corporal Visions
Imaginative Visions
Intellectual Visions
Passive Imaginary Visions
Active Imaginary Visions
Active Intellectual Visions
Categories of Voices/Locutions
Intellectual Locutions
Imaginative Locutions
Exterior Locutions
Mystical Experiences and Visionary Experiences: Understanding the Nuances
Critiques of James and Underhill
Critiquing James: Hermeneutical Fallacies
Critiquing Underhill: Hermeneutical Reductionism
Underhill’s Reductionism
A Holistic Approach: The Case of Gemma Galgani
4. The Great Debate
Perennialism
The Perennial Invariant
The Perennial Variant
The Typological Variant
Constructivism
Complete Constructivism
Incomplete Constructivism
Catalytic Constructivism
Developments in the Debate: The Pure Conscious Experience and the New Perennialism
The Epistemological Question: A Kantian Hermeneutic or a “Kantian” Misreading of Kant?
The Bigger Picture
An Attributional Approach
Religious Experience and Reductionism
Neurological/Psychiatric Reductionism
Psychoanalytical Reductionism
Secular-Sociological Reductionism
Moving Toward Neuroscience and New Methodology
5. Medical and Scientific Studies on the Apparitions in Medjugorje
Scientific Teams Investigate
Behavioral and Psychological Studies
Neuroscientific Studies
The Question of Hypnosis and Self-Suggestion
Studies on Ocular and Visual Functions
Studies on Auditory and Voice Functions, and Sensitivity to Pain
Subjective or Objective Experiences?
The Results
6. Medjugorje’s Uniqueness: A Different Case Study for Neuroscience
Contribution to Discourses on Religious Experience
Epileptic-Seizure Interpretations
Interpretations of Hysteria
Interpretations of Hallucination
Methodological Considerations
Interpretations of Freud
7. Learning from Shortcomings, Moving Forward with New Methods
Epistemological and Hermeneutical Considerations
Deconstructing Taves’s Naturalistic Approach: Important Implications
The Myth of Secular Neutrality?
Escaping an Ontological Prison: Beyond the Dogma of Metaphysical Naturalism
Components of a Different Method
An Inductive Constructive-Relational Approach
Etic and Emic Perspectives
Criteria of Adequacy
The Constructive-Relational Approach in Medjugorje
Conclusion: Contributions to the “Eternal Battle-Ground”
Significance of the Medjugorje Studies
Epistemological Contributions to Studying Religious Experiences
Hermeneutical Contributions to Studying Religious Experiences
Contributions to the Criteria of Adequacy
Ontological Contributions to Studying Religious Experiences
Reconciling Religion and Science
Notes
Bibliography
Index
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