[Daniel]

Kara- I started speaking in tongues at the age of 15 when my older sister (who had been converted and witnessed to me) placed her hands on my head and said a prayer. I remember very clearly having the belief that 1) something wonderful was going to happen 2) I could actually 'do this' and 3) the Holy Spirit was a real force of some sort and was going to give me something. I've experienced a change in many of the concepts/ideas that I held since that time (strictly speaking, Buddhists aren't concerned with 'God'). I can, however, still speak in tongues.

The cultural and religious context in which speaking in tongues happens is fascinating. We bring so many layered meanings to it. And it's not that I'm trying to knock it here, though I admit that the last line of my first post was provocative. I played with the assumption that 'more' is 'better', which, strictly speaking, isn't necessarily so. I think a scientist would say that the difference in brain scans simply indicates a difference. What does that difference mean? That's what I'd like to know. I'm hoping we can start to understand what we think we are doing from what is actually happening.

Does the meaning we assign to speaking in tongues complicate matters? I think so.