The following quote I can relate to because many people who joined the "I AM" or New Age Movement had been Catholics growing up

Why were they attracted to the "I AM" movement from Catholicism?

I think it's because of the idea of Transmutation that you get from turning wine or grape juice into the Blood of Christ and you get the Body of the Christ through the Wafers.

For example, in Tibetan Buddhism they sometimes give you ashes of high Lamas to ingest who were masters on all levels who are called literally "Living Buddhas". And in the Catholic Churches they still put bone fragments of Saints into the Altars of Churches to this day. So, to some degree this transmutation is universal around the world in various religions still. 

 

begin quote from AI Overview

 

Jack Kerouac's philosophy centered on a restless search for spiritual freedom, artistic liberation, and a deep synthesis of Eastern mysticism and his own Catholic upbringing. 

 

end partial quote from article on Jack Kerouac's philosophy of life.

 

So, for me, I realized by 15 to 18 years old that even though I had become religious in a life or death emergency I also began to realize that I couldn't really fit into the framework of the religion I had been raised in. However, this was also true of about 75% of the young people of the religion I was raised in to and might be true of all religions as well. (especially these days).

 

People in my era were forced to be religious in order to just survive at all. This is less physically true than it was then I see.

 

However, then the problem now is more: "How do people prevent their own suicide if they believe in nothing?"

 

This is what I observe now in people's lives.

 

By God's Grace