As an Agnostic man fish, who studies ancient European civilizations, their linguistics, archaeology and literature, I sometimes enjoy to come ashore from where my mind comfortably resides, and experience the religious practices of humans!
The insight of experiencing and observing these ceremonies, in contrast to their cultural origins is completely fascinating to me.

I recently attended the Catholic burial ceremony of my late aunty.
All throughout this service of lamentations, I observed the priest cantillate, as he reverberated numerous attempts to muster "parish" donations from the congregation's long pockets.
I observed the beautifully handcrafted, wooden stages of the cross which surround the pews, and thought about the thousands of euro each would cost, let alone the lavish gold relics found in this small, rural, Irish church. One of the thousands of others spread country wide, which additionally only increase in size and wealth to cathedrals and seminaries.
The early medieval records which I've studied, regarding the roman Catholic church's rise to power was now evident and before my eyes, some 1500 years later!

At the funeral home, I then observed my mother and aunties together in a room, for the first time since I was a child. Their hearts torn to shreds, tears pouring from their souls, some containing guilt and regret, other tears of love and fond memories, all absorbed by the fine cloths of the open casket. And yet all I observe peering through the low level hymns and church song playing in the background, was how they all possessed the exact same muttered, whimpering cry of absolute agony. It tore my heart to watch my mother's pain, as I sat across the room otherwise unaffected by the event. Knowing their past, my reveries led to conclude how they could only have developed such an unsettling, silent cry, as toddlers out of fear of being heard, beaten and worse.
Ironically this cry was mirrored in my great aunty and uncles cries. Once children who had been raise, beaten and abused in Catholic institutions.

I have learnt a lot from attending religious ceremonies and these barely scratch the surface. I have seen the power/comfort of belief through them. Yet for me seeing is not believing, it was feeling I had as a child, a distant memory today.
I'm not anti-theist, I try to take everything which I encounter as a learning experience.
Lightheartedly, as a consumer of music I dislike Justin Bieber's music. However, as a sound engineer and critical listener, I have the utmost respect for the music psychology, behind the scenes engineering/sound design and production quality displayed in his music.

I try to be as open minded, as best I can.

Have you any similar stories? ?✌&??