All language subtitles for 04 Eng The.Story.of.God.with.Morgan.Freeman.S01E04.Who.Is.God.HDTV.x264-ASCENDANCE

The blues
were born right here in

the Mississippi delta.

John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters,
BB King, Jessie Mae Hemphill,

I can't see 'em anymore,
but their spirit lives on,

right here.

♪ ♪

I can lose myself in music.

Hear it?

I feel it, and it transports
me to another time and place.

Some would call it
a religious experience.

Can't say that I disagree.

Makes me think of the all
the ways people around the world

connect to god.

Moses saw god in a bush.

Buddha found
enlightenment under a tree.

Muhammad experienced
Allah on a mountain.

Is there some universal
concept of god that

all religions share?

Or, is god fundamentally
different to people of

different faiths?

I'm setting out to
discover who god is.

God wants
to be your best friend.

To find out how believers around

the world see the divine.

The holy people
are around us, right now.

I'll explore
how the identity of god

has changed over the millennia.

He thought that
there were too many gods,

and not enough focus was on him.

I'll learn
how many gods merged into one.

It's a single force
that gives order into

our whole world.

And, I'll search for the

presence of god...

So, you're looking for
physical manifestations of god?

Yes.

Inside my brain.

I grew up with the Christian
concept of god, a single,

divine being who created
and governs the universe.

Of Jesus as god's
earthly incarnation.

I know that's not the way
everyone sees the divine.

I want to know how
other religions see god.

So, I'm going to India.

To hindus, there's not
one god, there are millions.

Busy little thoroughfare.

In the holy city of varanasi,
I'm meeting historian,

binda paranjape, to find out
how hindus see their gods.

At every corner of
the Lane, and just you'll see

anywhere, and
you'll see a shrine.

And no corner they can leave
without having a god there.

So like, we have got this
small little shrine here,

and it has got that elephant
headed god, ganesha.

Ganesha?

Yeah, it's a god
who removes obstacles.

Removes obstacles?

Yeah.

Hindu
deities come in many forms.

Some are male.

Some female.

Some are part
human, part animal.

Each one has
its specific powers.

So, she's
the goddess of disease.

So we...

Disease?

Yeah, so when you're diseased,

your body gets inflamed,
then you invoke her and she

sends the cool breeze,
and the body gets cool.

All right,
here's a question for you.

You've got a choice of how many?

Millions of them.

Millions of gods.

How do you choose?

Usually, it's the family.

The family, each family
has got one family deity,

and that is passed on
to the next generation.

Or, sometimes, in the
times of distress,

one goes to a god and
say, or goddess, that,

"please take me out
of this difficult time,"

and forever I'll worship
you as my personal god,

"or goddess."

I'm
interested in finding out how

these statues become
vessels for divine beings,

how hindus connect
to their gods.

So, binda is taking me
to an intimate prayer ritual.

Yeah, can you hear these chants,

which are going on?

Uh-hm, yeah.

They're chanting the chants for

invoking the goddess.

So, now we are
going to be blessed.

This
prayer ceremony is dedicated

to the goddess, Lalitha.

And so, this is Lalitha here,

this is her physical
representation?

What kind of god is she?

She was created to kill a demon,

and that is the
power of the virgin,

this 16 year old woman.

She's a virgin?

Yeah, so all the
potential is still in her,

so she has got the highest
form of energy in her.

And she gives that
power to others to fight

against their demon.

So, what they're doing
is that they're invoking the

goddess' one thousand names
and with every name,

they will offer her the flowers.

So, anything, any syllable
that we'll pronounced goes

to the goddess so, we're
saying these thousand words.

You have almost got all
the possible syllables that

you could have uttered.

So you can invoke her with just

about any syllable.

The goddess
is any form a speech,

the human sound,
and the world is supposed

to have been created
out of these rhythms.

For her devotees,

Lalitha exists in the rhythmic
energy of their chanting.

A divine energy
that powers their lives.

Anyway, the
goddess has blessed you,

that she has invited
here, believe me.

I believe you.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Seeing this ceremony
really helps me understand

what god means to hindus.

Behind all the gods,
binda tells me,

there is a single divine
energy that believers

seek to tap into.

They say that
it's just a principle,

it's like pure energy form,
which is neither a male

or a female, or having any name.

So they are just
given one name, brahman.

So, in the western church,

in christianity, judaism,
even islam, there is one god,

it's just, it's pure energy.

There is no name you
could put to him.

There's no face
you can put to him.

There's nothing you can touch.

Can we make a comparison there?

Yeah, it's like
the tree having the trunk,

and then the branches
and leaves also.

We have the
shade tree of brahma, right?

Okay.

Yeah, so beautiful,

that's really nicely described.

Thank you,
all right, how about some lunch?

You game for that?

Right, and
we can invoke gods for

giving us good lunch.

I like the
way believers here find gods

that best suit
their own beliefs.

It's like a
spiritual fingerprint,

unique to each person.

It's unlike the
monotheism of the west.

But, maybe that's
only on the surface.

On the surface,

hinduism looks like
a religion of many gods.

But underneath the surface,

there is a single divine energy.

So, why do some cultures see
many gods and some only one?

Where did the idea of
worshiping a single god

first take root?

Perhaps it began here,

Stonehenge, britain's iconic,

5,000 year old monument.

The culture that built
Stonehenge had to endure long,

cold winters.

Their survival depended
on plentiful crops,

so it would make sense to
focus on the single source

of energy that drove
all of that, the sun.

An archaeological team is
uncovering new evidence that

may reveal the beliefs of
the people who once lived here.

We're going to look at the ditch

and the interior, here.

Vince Gaffney
and Paul Garwood have been

studying a giant,
c-shaped enclosure,

less than two miles
away from Stonehenge.

The enclosure, called
Durrington walls,

was built around 4,500
years ago and appears to be

aligned so its opening
faces the rising sun on the

mid-winter's day.

This is a
ground-penetrating radar device.

But what
interests Vince and Paul is

the remains of an older
monument they found buried

underneath it.

The radar located a series of

very large features.

There's a long arc of stones,

or large buried features
underneath the bank.

So they've remained undetected,

effectively, for
several thousand years.

The hidden rocks are massive.

Each of them as tall as two men.

They also form part of
a c-shaped monument,

but the direction this c
faces is different from the

orientation of the
mound that buries it.

There was an
earlier monument of a very

different form on this site.

It was looking towards beacon
hill and these dramatic line

of hills to the east,
which is a dominant,

topographic feature
in this area,

and certainly must have
had significance at the time.

Vince and Paul
think the original monument

may be older than Stonehenge.

They don't know what its
alignment to the hills meant.

Perhaps the hills were
revered as divine,

or were associated
with ancestors.

But after the ancient
britons built the iconic

stone circle at Stonehenge...

They demolished the old
stones at durrington walls,

and made a new mound,
faced the same direction as.

Stonehenge, toward the
rising, mid-winter sun.

They've been pushed over,

and the bank of the later
henge monument has actually

been placed on top of them.

It moved in its orientation.

It's form changed, and
presumably, to some extent,

its function.

The creation
of Stonehenge itself,

and the building of
the new architecture,

durrington walls, suggest
a shift towards a greater

emphasis on the sun as
the main focus of worship

and religious interest.

The builders were trying to
establish a very particular

connection with summer.

The people of
Stonehenge may have been the

first to worship the sun as
a single, all-powerful god.

But in focusing on the sun,
I wonder if they lost something.

When the gods were ancestors,

or rivers, or mountains,

they were much more accessible,

easier to connect
to, to speak to.

How do you speak to
a god that's so remote?

I hope to find the answer
at my next destination, Egypt.

More than a thousand years
after Stonehenge was built,

an Egyptian man also
decided to worship the sun.

His idea was considered
so dangerous,

that his memory was
nearly wiped from the face

of the earth.

Thank you very much.

Today, just a few mementos
of his life remain at

the Cairo museum.

Hey!

Oh, there you are!

Hello.

Hello.

Amid the remains of dozens
of pharaohs, egyptologist,

Salima Ikram is going
to help me find one whose

name is Akhenaten.

There he is.

Akhenaten.

Yeah, he
thought that there were too

many gods and not enough
focus was on him.

"There were needs
to be an important god,

whom only I can channel."

So, he changed things.

Radically.

He, basically, closed down
most of the temples, said that,

"there is a special god,
the sun god, the aten,"

and that, "you can worship
the aten, through me."

And that didn't go over too well

with a few people?

No, no, that
was not a very popular move,

because, of course,

all the priests of the other
important gods were shut down.

Around the year 1350bc,

Akhenaten declared the sun
would be Egypt's only god.

In doing so, he would found
the first faith in recorded

history with a single deity.

But it would not last.

As soon as he died,
the old priesthood struck back.

This piece has been hacked away,

as you can tell.

You can see how the name
of the king is hacked out.

The name of the aten
is also attacked.

Everything there is chip,
chip, chip, chip, chip,

chip chip, chip, and
it's gone away, because of...

Destroyed, they just destroyed

his memories...

The best they could.

Akhenaten hoped his son
would continue this legacy,

but his son was only
nine years old when he

took the throne.

His name was, Tutankhamun.

Here is the
coffin of king Tutankhamun.

The most famous pharaoh.

Absolutely.

But he
took the throne at aged nine?

Nine to nineteen,

only ten short years.

Ten short years?

I would imagine that a
nine-year-old taking the

throne would be under
the thumb of the old guys

who would say,
"look, we can't keep this up,

we got to go
back to what works."

Yeah, absolutely.

He did what he was told,
probably, and effectively,

his reign sort of knocked
out Akhenaten's reign,

and we have a return
to the religion.

Right, to the gods.

The old
gods are back in full force.

Tutankhamun's priests erased.

Akhenaten's monotheistic
religion and tried to

erase him from history.

Here we go.

This is Akhenaten's sarcophagus.

This is his sarcophagus?

Or, what's left of it,

because it's all
smashed to pieces.

Well, that's what you get,

trying to change the world.

Well,
the poor thing didn't manage

to change it for very long.

Do not
fool around with the gods.

Well, Akhenaten's experiment
in monotheism failed.

But I can't help
wondering if what happened,

oh, around 1300bc,

didn't influence the
beginning of another religion.

But it was here on
the banks of the nile that

Jewish tradition says,

Moses was found
among the bulrushes.

And from that period,
belief in a single god began

to spread around the world.

How did the belief of
a small band of israelites

spread so far and wide?

Today, almost 4 billion muslims,

christians and Jews worship
the same, single god.

What was so special
about this god?

I'm traveling
around the world to find out

how people of different
faiths connect to the divine.

And uncovering how our
ideas of who god is have

evolved over the millennia.

My quest brings me to Jerusalem,

because half the people
on the planet can trace their

god to this ancient city.

It was here,
around 3,000 years ago,

that belief in a single,
all-powerful deity took root.

I meet Jewish philosopher,
yoram hazony to find out how

one god won out over many.

This is the old
city, old Jerusalem.

The old city of Jerusalem,

and stores like this have
been lining these streets

for thousands of years.

Except, you know, that
thousands of years ago,

they actually sold idols.

Like representations of
gods, like little figurines.

In fact, there's an old
rabbinic story from about the

time of the talmud,
that Abraham's father was

a idol shop owner.

So, these idols,

what were these gods for?

So, the gods, they represent,

in the old pagan religions,
they represent anything

that a human being
could want or need.

There's a god that
brings the rain.

Just a rain god.

You want
victory on the battlefield,

so there's a god of war.

But you would have to figure out

how you're gonna please
all the different gods and

get what you wanted
from them, wouldn't you?

Right, exactly.

So some of those gods,
all they want is like,

you know, a party.

They want wine and song,
and some good food.

That's not such a bad thing.

But, some of those gods
demanded bloodshed.

So, "you want something
from here, here it is",

I want something from you.

"I want you to sacrifice
your son," or something.

Okay, all right,
all right, all right.

How do I get now,
from the rain god,

I got a god of fire,
to one I can't see,

I can't touch, I don't
know for sure is there?

Well,
that's what this story about

Abraham is about.

Abraham looks around at
all these different gods.

There's gotta be
one set of rules.

One set of laws of nature,

one set of laws of morals
that apply to all human beings.

So, what does he do?

Where's he gonna go?

All right, let's take a walk and

I'll show you, come on.

Okay, all right.

So, right here,
we're looking at the absolute

centre of the religious world.

This is it.

This is the place.

We have, over there,
the dome of the rock.

Over there, Al-aqsa mosque.

The mount of olives.

And the valley of gethsemane.

And down below,
the western wall,

the holiest prayer
shrine of judaism.

Why here?

For one reason exactly.

When Abraham almost
sacrificed his son, Isaac,

it took place right
up there on that spot.

Now, let's remember,
Abraham's surrounded by

idolaters who were
sacrificing their children.

Murdering their own children.

Abraham
thought that he was following

god's commandments by
taking Isaac up there and...

But god says to him,

"you're not gonna
touch your son.

Not this time,
not for all time."

"There's one god," and he says,

"you are not gonna sacrifice
another child ever again."

And commemorating
that "never again" is the

reason that the Jews
built the temple here,

and from there,

judaism and christianity
make this the holiest place

in the history of the world.

That
brings up a question though.

This is an invisible god,

there's no way that you can
make some approximation of him.

Right, there's no idols.

It's a single force
that gives order,

the physical order and the
moral order to all of mankind

and to our whole world.

There's no representation,
'cause he's not a local power.

Temples to the single,

Jewish god stood on
this spot for almost

a thousand years.

Until the romans destroyed
the one that was standing

in 70ad.

But that destruction
did not end this faith.

The one
incredible thing about this is

that the one invisible god
that's beyond all things,

it turns out that, you know,
when you destroy the temple

to that one god...

You don't destroy the god.

You don't destroy the god.

It turns out, he's just as
much there as he was before.

And that's well put.

It's understandable.

The god of Abraham was a
god you could commune with

without any temples,
without idols.

For Jews, and also for
christians and muslims,

this invisible god
is always with them,

no matter when or
where they turn to him.

It's truly amazing that
three of the world's great

faiths exist in
such close proximity.

All worshipping
one god, the same god,

a god who has survived
calamities from the

destruction of the holy
temple to religious violence.

But how do you connect with a
god who has no physical form?

How do you know what's
divine and what isn't?

I have decided to return
to Cairo to try and

understand who
god is to muslims.

Islam believes in the
same god as Jews and christians,

but I wanna know if there
are differences in how

they think about the divine.

Historian of islam,
Ahmed Ragab has brought me

to the Al-Hussein mosque.

And you can just come in here,

just like a catholic church?

So it always open for prayer.

Yeah, yeah.

If you
wanna come in here and just

hang out with
yourself and Allah?

Yeah, absolutely.

I'm just
in time to hear what muslims

believe is one of the most
beautiful sounds in the world,

the call to prayer.

For the faithful,
the song of the muezzin is a

manifestation of god himself.

So that the
end of the prayer is by saying,

"as-salaam-alaikum"

much like you end
an encounter with anybody.

And it is because the
prayer is, essentially,

a meeting with god,
the function is goodbye.

Like, "hey," you know,

"see you later,
nice talking to you."

Exactly, see you the next time.

Prayer to Allah seems like a

conversation with a person.

But how do you speak to a
person who has no human form?

To help me understand, Ahmed
has arranged a meeting with

the mosque's spiritual
leader, imam Al-Amir mahfouz.

Thank you so much
for speaking with us.

Welcome.

In the Christian religion,

god is so manifested,

but there is
no such thing in islam.

So, who am I talking to?

Do I envision anything?

You cannot imagine god.

God is beyond imagination.

Whatever you would imagine
with our human minds,

god would be different from it.

One of the
most haunting and beautiful

sounds in the world is
the Muslim call to prayer.

What is the origin of that?

It is
said that one of Muhammad's

companions had a vision
while he was asleep,

where he heard this
call for prayer.

And then, when he woke up,

he went to Muhammad
and told him about it.

And he's made it into
this ritual of using it to

call for prayers every
day, five times every day.

The muezzin, how is he chosen?

Do you hold auditions?

There are auditions
where they would listen to

people and the one who
has the best voice will

be given the position.

Allahhhhhhhhhhu-aqbar.

How does that sound?

You have to work on it.

I have to work on it.

Okay, I get it.

Mosques are designed to be
filled with beautiful sounds

and images that
delight the senses,

from elaborate architecture,
to versus of the quran,

written in the
finest calligraphy.

Many muslims see this
beauty as a manifestation

of god himself.

Islam sees god in all
things that are beautiful,

because god has
not physical form,

he can be experienced anywhere
with any of the senses.

But these experiences only
have an aspect of the divine,

god is always more
than we can imagine.

Across so many faiths
around the world,

and throughout time, people
have emulated the divine in

the beauty of their temples,
and glimpsed god in the

splendour of nature.

But some faiths believe god
can take a physical form.

And that form is a person.

I'm in shiprock,
new Mexico in the heart

of the Navajo nation.

I'm about to witness something
that few outsiders ever see,

a sacred ceremony where
a god and a human become

one single being.

Welcome.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

You're welcome.

Hi, Morgan.

How are you?

We have something for you too.

Oh, you do?

Yes.

Look out!

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Now, where are we going now?

We're going inside.

Are we?

Yes.

All right, I'll follow.

Inside the traditional
Navajo ritual hut, or hogan,

the Peterson family has
agreed to share with me the

ceremony that allows
their youngest daughter,

maysun to pass from
girlhood to womanhood.

By the end of the
four day long ritual,

one of the Navajo deities
will be living inside her.

Yeah, just like
that, and make a cone...

Oh, yeah.

Like a cone, like this.

The core of the ceremony is the

making of a giant corn
cake in honor of the sun.

How big is the cake gonna be?

It's gonna be huge.

Huge.

Are you the fire tender?

Yes.

Okay.

Maysun's older sister,
Kayla went through this same

ritual four years ago, and
learned about her connection

to the Navajo
gods, or holy people.

Do me a favor,
tell me about this ritual.

So, it's referred
to as, the Kinaalda ceremony.

Say that again.

Kinaalda.

Kinaalda.

I had my ceremony
when I was about 12.

And it's a puberty ceremony,
so it actually originates from

changing woman who, we call her,

asdza'a' nádleehé.

Asdza'a' nádleehé?

Yes.

Close though.

Close for the first.

Asdza'a' nádleehé.

The story originated
because they wanted changing

woman to bear children.

So, it all starts when
first woman and first man see

a dark cloud come
over gobernador knob and

they hear a baby crying.

And him and first
woman were instructed to care

for the baby by the holy people.

So, within 12 days,
she grew from an infant into

a 12-year-old girl.

In 12 days?

Yes.

She was ready to become a woman.

To grow into a woman,

maysun must connect
with the divine spirit of

changing woman, which
the Navajo believe still

inhabits the landscape.

Each day, she has to run
toward the rising sun.

Do the young ladies always
run east in the morning?

Yes.

So it goes back on the
story with changing woman,

as she becomes a woman.

When she does bear children,
it is with the sun.

The holy people
are around us right now.

This is an
opportunity for the ceremony

where these prayers come
upon her and push on her.

And it's all about her.

Yes, yes, yes it is.

So she gets all the prayers,

and your hopes
and your dreams...

And whatever it is that you

want for her.

Just whatever positive you
can push into the cake and

make sure that her life
is strong and complete,

and that she knows that
she has all these prayers

that will got with her.

Go with her.

As the corn
cake begins its slow overnight

bake maysun begins the
final night of her Kinaalda.

Tonight, she'll be joined
with the spirit of the Navajo

deity, changing woman.

She and her family will
stay in the hogan until dawn,

while the Navajo medicine
man sings sacred songs.

Are all of these songs
prayers and blessings for

the young girl?

Yeah, these can help her

along the way,

that she's already
changing into a young adult.

So I just sing for them
at the Kinaalda, okay,

to give them strength.

It's what the run
is about, okay.

With an endorsement, build
the muscles, and everything,

so they will be changed
slowly into womanhood.

There are many
more songs to be sung tonight,

but hearing them
all is prohibited for

outsiders like me.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

See you.

We'll see you in a bit.

Okay.

At dawn,
maysun makes the final and

longest run of her Kinaalda.

How are you feeling?

I think I'm gonna pass out.

You're gonna pass out?

Yes.

She's hot, she's gonna pass out.

Yeah.

I'm glad it's cold out here.

Okay, you're glad it's cold.

Otherwise you would
pass out, right?

No.

On this morning,

the spirit of the Navajo
deity has moved inside maysun

and made her a holy person.

Be proud, your cake is good.

That means things are
gonna work out just fine.

Right, right?

The cake can only
be eaten once it's been

blessed by maysun.

I can take a bite of it?

Yeah, yeah,
don't burn your tongue.

Now that
it's over, how do you feel?

I feel like,
I say this, I'm just like,

"mom, I survived,
it felt like boot camp!"

Great.

In the Kinaalda, Navajo girls
have a personal experience

of the changing woman.

One that can only
be gained through rare

moments of insight.

She is the spirit that infuses
the entire Navajo landscape.

If we believe that god
not only surrounds us,

but also has the power
to move inside us...

Can we, perhaps,
discover what god is by

looking inside our minds?

For thousands of years,

to many people,
god has been invisible,

intangible, a presence
believers can sense but

not see or touch.

But science may be
about to change that.

I took a train to
Philadelphia to meet a

neuroscientist who studies
what happens in our brains when

we have religious experiences.

I'm about to see whether
I can find the presence of god,

in my brain.

Doctor Andy Newberg is
pioneering an new field of

study he calls, neurotheology.

And I know that you have
done a lot of research on the

brain, how the brain reacts
to say, spiritual meditation.

Can you elaborate
on that for me?

Well, certainly, you know,

as we look at the brain,
we can see very substantial

differences when people are
either religious or spiritual

in their practices,
when they're trying to pray,

meditate on god.

You know, we can see
what's going on in us as

we think about god,
experience god and pray to god,

whatever the person is doing.

So, you're looking for physical

manifestations of god?

Yes,
you are looking for physical

manifestations of god.

Okay.

So, I'm interested in
find out if there is any

manifestation of god
within me, in my brain.

Right,
we can take a look at that.

Come on.

See if we can find it.

Little pinch.

Ow!

I'm sorry.

No, I'm kidding.

The process begins with an
injection of radioactive dye.

What happens if you drop that?

Well, if we
spill it on the floor,

we have to close that room,
and evacuate everybody.

So, don't spill it, okay.

Don't spill it.

With the radioactive tracer

in my bloodstream, Andy can
measure how much blood flows

through the various
parts of my brain.

The more I'm using
a part of my brain,

the more radioactive
dye it will accumulate.

I already did a baseline
scan while I was just resting

with my eyes closed.

Now, I'm attempting to
meditate on the divine

to see whether anything changes.

It's time to start focusing

on your breath.

All right.

Now,
just try to get in as good a

state as you can,
focusing on the breath,

just trying to
really bring really deep

concentration to it.

I think that'll be great.

So shall I start now?

You can go ahead and start now.

Okay.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Okay,
you can finish the meditation.

How did it go?

Fine, how long was that?

It was about 11 or 12 minutes.

Before the
radioactive tracer flushes

out of my system...

So you'll be on your back.

I have
to quickly climb into this

3D scanner and see whether
my brain has changed because

I mediated on god.

All right.

Well, look at that, two eyes,

a nose and the mouth.

Well, but to me,

it looks like you're
smiling a little bit.

What do you
see or do you see anything?

So these are
your two scans side-by-side.

Here's your resting scan.

Here's the meditation scan.

And you can see, if you
look at the frontal lobes here,

it's mostly yellow, just a
little bit of red, whereas,

if you look during
your meditation,

the whole frontal lobe
just kind of has blossomed.

So, if you are
concentrating on something,

if you're saying a prayer,
or if you're focusing on god,

if you're trying to
connect with god,

then you tend to increase the
activity in the frontal lobes.

How do I compare with say,

a nun praying, or,
let's say, a Buddhist monk

who is meditating,
do I compare at all?

As with the
nuns who were concentrating on

a prayer, the Buddhists who
were focusing on an image,

they all activated
their frontal lobes.

And that's exactly
what you did too.

And if I was contemplating the

image of god, could
you tell the difference?

We actually scanned an atheist,

who was a very good
meditator, and we asked him

to concentrate on god,
to meditate on god and he

wasn't able to activate
his frontal lobes very much.

So, in fact, if anything,
as you can see...

It went down a bit.

It's sort of
decreased a little bit.

Yeah, so, even though they said,

"yeah, I'm concentrating;

I'm trying to contemplate god,"

they just were not able
to do a very good job

of doing it,

'cause they didn't
really believe it.

So, I think, part of
what that told me is that

regardless of
what our practice is,

the key is, "do you believe it?"

Do you buy into it?

"Is it important to you?"

It's amazing
that somebody came up with the

idea that you could shoot
somebody full of radioactive

drugs and look at their brain.

The brain
is just so unbelievably

complex that it's not
that there's one god spot,

or one god part of the brain,

but it seems to be the
whole brain that gets involved.

And, ultimately, these
change the way you think and

feel about the world.

So, apparently,

it is possible to see
physical manifestations of

god inside us.

Whether you're
Christian, Buddhist,

or any kind of spiritual person,

experiencing the divine
actually changes the brain,

changes the way
we see the world.

That's really something.

The evidence that
experiencing god changes us

on the inside will come
as no surprise to believers,

including the people at
lakewood church in Houston.

I've come to see how
10,000 christians can all

have a meaningful, personal
experience with their god.

The pastors of
this mega-church,

Joel and Victoria Osteen,
have agreed to meet with me

before the service begins,

and let me in
on their philosophy.

I wanna
leave them something that

they can use this afternoon.

So, I don't do a lotta
doctrine and, you know,

I go practical.

Today, I'm talking about,
you know, using what

god's given you.

And so, when you leave,
you'll say,

"you know what, it was worth
me going to church today."

Let me ask you, can we pray?

We got about one minute,
and we're gonna pop out there.

So, I'm just gonna pray,
okay, yeah, look,

will you pray with us, Morgan?

Thank you for this day.

And lord, all the people
that have come out and

many who are gonna
watch on television and

listen on the radio,
and we just ask you that you

give us the words to speak.

That every person
would feel your presence,

your power, that they'd
feel encouragement and hope,

and inspiration.

That you'd know that
you have them in the palm

of your hand.

I just ask you,
father for a great service

in Jesus' name...

Amen.

Amen.

Thank you,
very honored to have you.

Thank you,
I'm very honored to be here.

We'll catch you afterwards.

You gotta watch it.

You'll be dancing
before you know it.

It doesn't
much to get me started.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Yes, it
is good to be in the house of

the lord and I am excited
to be here today, with you!

See, we were designed to
function at our best when we

are connected to god.

You've got power on the
inside, you can rely on.

Don't live life
in neutral, not passionate,

not intentional, not focused,
stir up what god's given you.

Dare to take those
steps of faith.

I'm gonna
ask a flat out question,

who is god?

I believe god
is our father, the creator,

somebody that gives us
purpose and destiny.

Well, sometimes it's
hard for people to say,

"how can I believe in
something I can't see?"

But it's what you choose
to believe through faith.

It's what you
choose to believe through faith.

When Jesus came, he said,

"look, I want
you to come to me."

So I tell people,

"you can talk to god
all through the day,"

like you talk to your friend.

In your thoughts, you can say,

"god, you know,
thank you for this day."

I think, that god can be
as involved in your life

as much as you want him to be.

So that's what we
try to teach people,

to get god out of your
Sunday morning box.

God has been a lot of things to

a lot of people and now,

here, you're
making god personal.

Yes.

Approachable...

And, helpful.

Yes, that's right.

The life
of god lives and dwells in us.

And it's a spiritual life.

It's your spiritual
power on the inside of you.

And that is what
we need to tap into.

That was quite a show.

Maybe 10,000 people
worshiping, celebrating,

each of them having his own
personal experience with god.

This is clearly a
faith in the god in you.

Your inspiration, your power.

God is so many things
to so many people.

The warm light of the sun.

The sound of sweet music.

An inner voice that
drives us forward.

A friend.

If you ask me who
god is, I would say,

there's a bit of the
divine in all of us.

There's god in you,
there's god in me.

The god in me is who I
really am, at my core.

The god in me is the
best version of me.

The god in me is
who I strive to be.

Who I was meant to be.