Rivival Tents

I was talking with a friend today about Our Subject, and I asked him if he had had any religious training as a child. He said not much, because his mother's mother had been a tent revivalist and his mother would have nothing to do with organized religion. The grandmother had been well-known and traveled much, taking her daughter with her.

I realized then, since we were talking about These Things, that when you come from a culture that proscribes drinking alcohol, and dancing, and secular music, the only time that you can have a altering of your consciousness is in the ecstatic worship at the revival tent.

When these events were popular--and they are popular still--they were attended as entertainment as well as for spiritual change. There was singing, and dancing, and many sects including the possession and speaking in tongues. It is possible to induce all these altered states without plants, but with only power of oratory, and the group mind to raise energy and bring the people to another state. Although it has few of the physical appearances of paganism, it does have the elements that produce a magical state of being in the participants. And since reaching these states is an imperative in humans, when all other avenues to joy are suppressed, the Tent Revival becomes the Road to Heaven.