Brewers and lawyers talk about him in muted tones, with as much irritation as admiration. Empirical studies on wonder are rare. However, a fascinating study of reverence is: ”Prayer and reverence in naturalistic, aesthetic, and socio-moral contexts predicted fewer complications after coronary artery bypass graft,” conducted by Ai et al. (2009). [7] These researchers studied fear after coronary artery bypass graft. Ai et al. (2009) examined a ”sense of fear in religious and secular contexts” by interviewing 177 patients. [7] In particular, they examined the relationship between faith and health and sought to find out whether religious forms of reverence practiced through faith and prayer produced similar results to secular forms of fear in the recovery of patients. Ai et al. (2009) state that ”because reverence encompasses both an affective and a cognitive component, we see it as a form of positive feeling/emotion associated with the injection of the sacred into different worldviews.” [7] These positive emotions have been thought to help patients recover. The first finding of Ai et al.
(2009) was consistent with other research that revealed ”positive influences of traditional religious participation on health outcomes.” [7] The second conclusion of Ai et al. (2009) was ”the positive effect of secular reverence on the absence of postoperative complications.” [7] From this point, Ai et al. (2009) concluded that ”the ability to feel fear in important naturalistic, moralistic, and aesthetic contexts appears to improve recovery after bypass surgery.” [7] Curiously, ”religious reverence did not have the same positive effect as secular reverence in circumventing restoration.” [7] This inconsistency suggests that more research needs to be done on reverence in patient recovery. Woodruff sees ceremony and ritual as key elements for meaningful human life when practiced with reverence. ”Without reverence, rituals are empty” (Woodruff, 19). The ceremony and ritual are found at home, in meetings, in votes, and in religion, and these actions provide the context for the feeling of fear. But often these situations are so common that the cult of emotions disappears from the human consciousness. ”The ritual and wonder in living together are so familiar that we hardly notice them until they are gone” (Woodruff, 35). Woodruff argues that ”reverence, ceremony, and respect do not disappear, they cannot disappear from a functioning society” (Woodruff, 36). He asserts that ”what we lose is not reverence, but the idea of reverence” (Woodruff, 36). He hopes that the importance of reverence in society will be recognized again and that this recognition will improve humanity.
He suggests ”bringing the idea of reverence back to its proper place in ethical and political thought” (Woodruff, 38). Walker said the instructors emphasize respect for human life and the dignity and freedom of all. In his book Reverence: Renewing a Forgotten Virtue, Paul Woodruff assesses the current understanding of the cult of emotions in the modern era. He believes that a true understanding of reverence is lacking both in modern society and in ”modern discussions of the ancient cultures they cherished” (Woodruff, 3). These ancient cultures include Greece and China in particular. The best definition of Woodruff`s wonder is: ”The well-developed ability to have feelings of fear, respect, and shame when it is the right feelings” (Woodruff, 8). Thus, Woodruff`s definition of fear involves the combination of three other emotions: respect, shame, and fear. ”Respect is for others, shame is about one`s own flaws, and reverence is usually felt for something transcendent” (Woodruff, 65). Although Woodruff recognizes the relationship between reverence and religion, he argues that ”reverence has more to do with politics than with religion” (Woodruff, 4). In his book, Woodruff attempts to separate the common misconception that reverent emotions can only be associated with religion.
David Pugmire`s article ”The Secular Reception of Religious Music” explores the unique experience of fear through music. In particular, it explores how religious music has the ability to evoke emotions of fear, fear, wonder and reverence in lay people who do not have the necessary context to fully understand the transcendent through religion. « Sacred music seems to have a surprising power over unbelievers, not only to accelerate or delight them, as other music does, but also to treat them, like few others, with what might be called devotional feelings. » [5] Nevertheless, Pugmire argues that the layman cannot fully understand the nature of sacred art, including sacred music. ”His undisputed expressiveness can only lead him to emotional access, not to emotions in the most complete sense, that is, emotions with appropriate objects supported by appropriate judgments.” [5] I have a strong respect for traditions and no taste for democracy – that would be too long a step. Pugmire believes that reverence belongs to the range of emotions that can be divided into their devotional or sacred forms, ”emotions of fear, solemnity, agape, hope, serenity and ecstasy.” [5] But this classification of emotions raises an interesting question: can all emotion be purely religious? ”A central candidate for a distinctive religious emotion would be reverence.” [5] But this is not completely different from the rest of the emotions that have nothing to do with transcendence or religion. « Reverence is indeed more serious and an attitude in which one is more ceded than their secular approaches in the form of approval, appreciation or respect. » [5] But this does not make it purely religious. In fact, ”Kant was able to claim reverence as our most important moral emotion without invoking a fundamental theological basis for it.” [5] ”Equally respectful of her invigorating brother: she plays a role in our experience of the sublime, of which Kant claims to find a completely secular account.” [5] To connect secular and sacred emotions, Pugmire examines emotions that can be experienced equally in both contexts. They are: ”Love, humility, sadness, compassion, joy, serenity, ecstasy.” [5] Pugmire then suggests that devotional emotion is: ”The transfiguration of worldly emotion into what might be called the emotion of last resort, for which the reception and expression of religious images are particularly well suited, and not by chance.” [5] The emotion of the last instance refers to the ability of the emotional imagination to lose the sense of self and engage with the infinite and the unspeakable. Pugmire suggests that religion ”provides a surprisingly appropriate vocabulary for expressing emotions of last resort.” [5] Reverence is perhaps the most critical of these ”emotions of last resort” and can be made adequately accessible through religious music. After building his case with a vision of classical Greek culture, he looks at classical Confucian chinese society.
”Childlike piety expresses respect within the family” (Woodruff, 103). The most important part of his connection between reverence and the Chinese is his understanding of li. ”Li also refers to politeness or reverence” (Woodruff, 105). An interesting link between Greek and Chinese society is: ”Both notions of reverence flourish with the disappearance of polytheism and the rise of agnosticism. Reverence survives and thrives in these circumstances because it is something people need to deal with the most obvious, common, and inevitable facts of human life—family, hierarchy, and death” (Woodruff, 110). Most of his information about reverence in Chinese culture comes from analects. Woodruff believes that a break in tradition is not necessarily disrespectful and that relativism is imperfect. People should criticize all cultures and all forms of reverence (Woodruff, 155). This included the officers who had turned their backs on the Jumbotron, but now there was only reverence in their ranks. ”In the presence of death, we expect ourselves and others to be respectful; waiting seems natural, and yet the ceremonies by which we express our reverence in these times take very different forms in different cultures” (Woodruff, 50).
In his conversation about funerals as times of reverence, he points out that reverence goes beyond faith and is constant throughout human history, even when religions change (Woodruff, S. . . . .
