Have We Evolved to Be Religious?

"We humans have many varieties of religious experience. One of the most common is self-transcendence — a feeling becoming part of something larger, grander and nobler. Most people experience this at least a few times in their lives. When the self thins out and melts away, it not only feels good but can be thrilling. It’s as though our minds contain a secret staircase taking us from an ordinary life up to something sacred and deeply interconnected, and the door to that staircase opens only on rare occasions. The world’s many religions have found a variety of ways to help people find and climb the staircase. Some religions employ meditation. Others use spinning, dancing and repetitive movements in combination with music. Some use natural drugs. Many secular people have used these methods too — think of the popularity of rave parties, which combine most of these techniques to produce feelings of “peace, love, unity and respect.” As the great French sociologist Emile Durkheim put it, we are “homo duplex,” or a two-level man.
The big question is, Why do our minds contain such a staircase?"
  Haidt: An Evolutionary Explanation for Religious Faith | TIME Ideas | TIME.com /more