The Center for the Study of World Christian Revitalization Movements

 Fits, Trances & Visions: Experiencing Religion and Explaining Experience from Wesley to James, Ann Taves. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999. 449 pages. Reviewed by Janet Dean.                   Are unusual religious experiences - fits, trances, visions, speaking in tongues, clairvoyance, out-of-body experiences, and possession - real? Are they from God? Or, are they from the devil, one's imagination, hypnosis, insanity, imitation, weakness of character, or some sort of psychological condition? The answer depends on whom one asks. Imagine a conversation at one of my family gatherings - my sister-in-law spent two years in Sri Lanka studying the group dissociative religious…