Good Friday and a religious fit

Back in the U.S., the time around Easter was something of an "almost holiday" for those of us who worked in an internationally active business.

Much of Europe would go on vacation because schools in many European countries were taking a break and because nationwide holidays from around the day before Good Friday to the Tuesday after Easter meant most of our contacts were out.

While the Easter spill-over has lessened in the past twenty years or so, it has not disappeared. So, with the Europeans painting their Easter bunnies and chasing their Easter eggs, doing Easter things, we'd have a breather before the money making machine revved up for summer.

Over here in the more Catholic parts of the old countries, we are seeing people coast leisurely to an almost complete standstill on Good Friday.

The predominant religious belief at the K-Landnews has been described as an odd mix of bits and pieces, an Ikea kit spirituality, if you will, without assembly instructions and plenty of leftover parts.

It comes as no surprise that we ended up with PBS's NOVA Secrets of the Mind. Neuroscientist Dr. V.S. Ramachandran does a wonderful job explaining how neural pathways work, kicking some Freudian behind while at the same time proving that there is a subconscious world in our brains.

Goodbye Oedipus Complex, hello neural pathways!

And hello religious fits.

One phenomenon in religion has been puzzling our own little minds for many years: there seemed to be an awful lot of saints and prophets with conditions like epilepsy, super migraines and so forth. And visions and revelations tied to fits or episodes of these conditions. From the Leatherstocking Tales to Lourdes and many others, the idea of a religious fit intrigued us, and V.S. Ramachandran seems to have found pathways in the brain and matching firing neurons which are if not a full explanation then at least a great start of an explanation.

As Christians commemorate Jesus going through the criminal justice system of a bygone empire with the usual trappings of the snitch, the very public enhanced interrogation and the suffering, we hope that some of the lessons learned will have a positive effect in the weeks and months to come.

Have a very good Easter holiday.