When we are talking about peoples opinions of "superphysical fenomenons" we can split them into three categories, those who don´t believe in superphysical fenomenons, those who do believe, and those who had themselves had a "spiritual experience". The last group generally has left the terms of believe/not believe, and has an inner conviction, a knowing that there is something more than here and now.

Who then are believers/non believers? First of all every person of course gets an opinion of the world that is in level with her ability to understand, and the information she has been provided during her life. Naturally we must accept the fact that people have different abilities to understand reality, just as we are different in all other ways. Therfore we can never, and should never, all have the same opinion of our world. What should be important is that we get a picture of reality as accurate as we are able to grasp. But do we all get that, through upbringing, school etc?

Have the people, who have chosen to believe in the Bible letter by letter, heard about the Church meeting in 325 a.c? The roman emperor Konstantin stated that the christian religion should be the state religion of the Roman empire. In a meeting with some bishops who could not even read, and a man named Eusebius, who could read and write, it was decided what writings should be in the Bible and what shouldn´t. At this occation it was also decided how Jesus should be regarded by the Church. Was he God, was he the son of God or was he an ordenary man? After some discussion it was decided that he was God, but he was also the son of God. 

Have the strict Bible believers ever heard of the Church meeting in 533 a.c, where the emperor Justinianus decided it was time to remove the teachings of reincarnation from the christian Church? The Pope himself refused to participate in the meeting, but the teachings of reincarnation got banned. In spite of this a lot of people continued to honor the older teachings, and several hundreds of years later the "Katars" controlled large areas in south Europe. They believed in reincarnation, they were peacful and they did not eat meat. Eventually they were all killed or chased away by the christians, a dark part of our history.

When I went to school I never heard of these events. Why not? Is there any other explanation than the power the church has had (and still has) over the people? Would the strict belivers of the Bible have remained the same dogmatic wiew if they had learned about these things in their youth? I don´t believe so.

A good friend of mine, who is a teacher in religion, once showed me a text and asked me to say what it was. I had no problems to recognize "Our Father" even if some words were a bit different. "This text is found on hieroglyfes in Egypt", my frind said. "They are a lot older than the New Testament! "

Then what about those who have chosen to be pure materialists, and not believe in anything? Why have they made such a choise? In many cases, the direct reason is that they have seen through the fictions and dogmatism of the church, and chosen to turn their back on it. Should these people have concidered an other opinion if they had been given an alternative? Our materalistic society has decided to abandon the mysticism. Either you are a strict materialist, that´s ok, or you enter an established Church, that´s ok too. This in spite of that the Church represents a fundamentally opposit opinion than the materialism.

But if a person starts telling about strange experiencies she´s had, than the mysticism enters our life, and that person suddenly becomes dangerous. Such a person still gets opposed today, both by the Church and by the materialistic society. She is regarded as a threat against the order and could even loose her job. (I have seen examples of this.)

Several different investigations shows that at least 10% of all people have had some kind of spiritual experience. Today, almost everybody chooses to be silent, or just tell their closest friends about it. The reason for this is that we have a society were such experiencies are not accepted. How would it be if we had a society were any person would be ecouraged to tell about inner experiencies? Would a person who is now a strict materialist, have thought different if she had heard a large part of her fellow humans talk about different mystical experiencies? Would she have thought different if she had heard about the huge amount of serious experiments of "superphysical fenomenons", being made in laboratories all around the world? I believe so. And I would call such an open society a culture. I wouldn´t call our present society that.

Ok, so does it matter what we belive then? Should our society have looked different if these thought had been more accepted? Actually, there is an interesting investigation here, that showes how people change their personality after having a "near death experience". Those who previosly were dogmatic Bible believers change and becam more widely acceptive. Those who previously were strict materialists adapts a general, not churchbound religiosity. They all get a strong feeling that life is important, and that we must show love to our fellow humans.

It´s easy to understand why such thought are regarded as a threat by our society.