Ask a Question - or - Return to the Faith and Spirituality Forum Index

Question Title	Posted By	Question Date
Stories of the Supernatural from my Mother	Ryan	Saturday, April 16, 2011
Question: Hello, here I am again. I have a question this time for some things I have been told by my mother. She attends mass every week with my grandmother, who is an extremely devout Catholic (but my mother does not take the Eucharist). She has problems being a part of the Church because she believes in reincarnation based on powerful experiences she's had in her life, therefore refusing to take the Eucharist out of reverence. My mother is not a liar. Just as she affirms reincarnation, she also affirms a miracle she experienced at Fatima while she was a complete unbeliever (so she had no reason to lie) that healed an otherwise terrible immobilizing sickness within 5 seconds (drinking the water). Her story of reincarnation is as follows: she was on a tour a long time ago at a port in Pennsylvania I believe, and part of the tour was a visitation of a navy boat. When they arrived at the boat to enter and tour, she began feeling incredibly sick. Then she began telling the tour guide what the boat looked like inside, knowing about the rooms and the interior. She had never been inside the boat before. Later on this day, a part of the tour involved the visitation of a house, and she too felt strange upon approaching and was able to recite what that house also looked like inside. As it turns out, the house belonged to a family who raised a young man who died in a World War II battle on that very same boat. Also, it is noted that the current Dalai Lama was chosen through a process where many different toys were presented to him as a child (with a very small number of them being toys the previous Lama enjoyed) and he selected on his own accord the very same toys the previous Lama enjoyed. Again, my mother has never had a single reason to lie to me about anything regarding the supernatural in her life. She also once played with a Ouija board which said two of her friends present there (Alan and Carl) would die one after the other. After this revelation, her friends and her decided the game was no longer a fun joke and they put the board away forever. Years later, Alan died in a freak accident at a paint factory, and years after that Carl died of AIDS. So she is no stranger to the supernatural, but I want to know if a demon was aiding her about this reincarnation incident. She claims her strong belief in reincarnation is one of the only things preventing her from being a full-fledged Catholic. I have tried to convince her of the nonsense of reincarnation and to come to the Church for the truth. But I can understand, given the extreme pseudo-veracity of her reincarnation account, why she cannot disbelieve in reincarnation. Please help me with this.
Question Answered by Bro. Ignatius Mary, OMSM(r) Dear Ryan: I would not call your mother a liar, but her beliefs are lies -- lies of the devil. She has been tricked and deluded by the devil. The devil can easily trick us when we use as the basis of our faith feelings and experiences not checked with the Church. Any feeling or experience we have must be tested against the Truth of God and His Church. St. John tells us to test the spirits (1 John 4:1). Apparently, your mother, in what is actually an arrogance and a pride on her part, chose to believe her experiences over the truth of God. I do have respect for her in that she realizes that she is in mortal sin and thus does not commit a worse sin by receiving the Eucharist. But, then I do not respect her in that she knows this and does not mortify her ego and submit to the teachings of God. The fact that she knows this is contrary to the True Faith, and does nothing about it, places her at the highest culpability. Her soul is in mortal danger. We must pray for her. Her experience of so-called reincarnation can be explained both from psychology and from demonology. This experience of knowing what something is without ever being in such a place is usually explained in that somewhere, sometime, lost in memory, the person has seen a picture of the place, or someplace similar, or it has been described to her by someone or in some written article or such. Since we do not remember this we then jump to conclusions when these events occur. If this phenomena is not that explanation, then how she learned the information was from demons. If one is truly a devout Catholic the rash judgment to reincarnation would not even occur to them. If such a thought did pop into one's head, it would be dismissed immediately. The fact that your mother accepted the lie of reincarnation so readily, so easily abandoned God and called God a liar, and hangs onto it so tenaciously tells us that she is not a devout Catholic at all. In actuality, your mother is a very weak Catholic with little faith. That is why the devil has attacked her so. She is an easy target. Now, pride and arrogance have taken over and she maintains these lies to her peril. The writer of Hebrews tells us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, (Hebrews 9:27) "And just as it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment..." That is God talking. If your mother denies this and instead asserts reincarnation then she is calling God a liar. Here is an article on what the Church Fathers said about this subject. Here is a story of a person who believed in Reincarnation but converted to the True Faith. The Dalai Lama story is easily explained. While the Dalai Lama did not know which toys belonged to the previous Dalai Lama, the people doing the testing did. Subtle body cues of the testers perceived subconsciously will tell the boy which toy to choose. Thus, the next Dalai Lama is not the reincarnation of the previous one, but merely the boy who most successfully subconsciously picks up the body language of the testers. As for the Ouija board, any information coming from it is demonic. Besides, oooo, I am having a vision. I predict that you and one of your friend will die one after the other someday. Well, dah! We all die. Alan and Carl died one after the other, years apart for pete sake, as will any two people on the planet. If one was to die before the other, that was a 50-50 guess. Demons do not know the future. Angels do not know the future. Saints in heaven do not know the future. No one but God, and those He tells, knows the future. And God does not tell the future to an evil spirit in the Ouija board. Your mother needs to get off her pride and arrogance, and re-evaluate her experiences in the light of the Truth of God. The only true explanation is that which is in obedience to God and His Church. There is an explanation that is natural and consistent with the Church, or there is no explanation we can know in this life, but we must still remain faithful to the Church. Your mother's eternal soul is in grave danger. Pray that she will mortify her pride and return to God. God Bless, Bro. Ignatius Mary Footer Notes: This forum is for general questions on the faith. See specific Topic Forums below: Spiritual Warfare, demons, the occult go to our Spiritul Warfare Q&S Forum. Liturgy Questions go to our Liturgy and Liturgical Law Q&A Forum Liturgy of the Hours (Divine Office) Questions go to our Divine Office Q&A Forum Defenfing the Faith Questions go to our Defending the Faith Q&A Forum Church History Questions go to our Church History Q&A Forum

Question Title

Posted By

Question Date

Stories of the Supernatural from my Mother

Ryan

Saturday, April 16, 2011

Question:

Hello, here I am again. I have a question this time for some things I have been told by my mother. She attends mass every week with my grandmother, who is an extremely devout Catholic (but my mother does not take the Eucharist). She has problems being a part of the Church because she believes in reincarnation based on powerful experiences she's had in her life, therefore refusing to take the Eucharist out of reverence.

My mother is not a liar. Just as she affirms reincarnation, she also affirms a miracle she experienced at Fatima while she was a complete unbeliever (so she had no reason to lie) that healed an otherwise terrible immobilizing sickness within 5 seconds (drinking the water).

Her story of reincarnation is as follows: she was on a tour a long time ago at a port in Pennsylvania I believe, and part of the tour was a visitation of a navy boat. When they arrived at the boat to enter and tour, she began feeling incredibly sick. Then she began telling the tour guide what the boat looked like inside, knowing about the rooms and the interior. She had never been inside the boat before. Later on this day, a part of the tour involved the visitation of a house, and she too felt strange upon approaching and was able to recite what that house also looked like inside. As it turns out, the house belonged to a family who raised a young man who died in a World War II battle on that very same boat.

Also, it is noted that the current Dalai Lama was chosen through a process where many different toys were presented to him as a child (with a very small number of them being toys the previous Lama enjoyed) and he selected on his own accord the very same toys the previous Lama enjoyed.

Again, my mother has never had a single reason to lie to me about anything regarding the supernatural in her life. She also once played with a Ouija board which said two of her friends present there (Alan and Carl) would die one after the other. After this revelation, her friends and her decided the game was no longer a fun joke and they put the board away forever. Years later, Alan died in a freak accident at a paint factory, and years after that Carl died of AIDS.

So she is no stranger to the supernatural, but I want to know if a demon was aiding her about this reincarnation incident. She claims her strong belief in reincarnation is one of the only things preventing her from being a full-fledged Catholic. I have tried to convince her of the nonsense of reincarnation and to come to the Church for the truth. But I can understand, given the extreme pseudo-veracity of her reincarnation account, why she cannot disbelieve in reincarnation. Please help me with this.

Question Answered by Bro. Ignatius Mary, OMSM(r)

Dear Ryan:

I would not call your mother a liar, but her beliefs are lies -- lies of the devil. She has been tricked and deluded by the devil. The devil can easily trick us when we use as the basis of our faith feelings and experiences not checked with the Church. Any feeling or experience we have must be tested against the Truth of God and His Church.

St. John tells us to test the spirits (1 John 4:1). Apparently, your mother, in what is actually an arrogance and a pride on her part, chose to believe her experiences over the truth of God.

I do have respect for her in that she realizes that she is in mortal sin and thus does not commit a worse sin by receiving the Eucharist. But, then I do not respect her in that she knows this and does not mortify her ego and submit to the teachings of God.

The fact that she knows this is contrary to the True Faith, and does nothing about it, places her at the highest culpability. Her soul is in mortal danger. We must pray for her.

Her experience of so-called reincarnation can be explained both from psychology and from demonology. This experience of knowing what something is without ever being in such a place is usually explained in that somewhere, sometime, lost in memory, the person has seen a picture of the place, or someplace similar, or it has been described to her by someone or in some written article or such. Since we do not remember this we then jump to conclusions when these events occur.

If this phenomena is not that explanation, then how she learned the information was from demons.

If one is truly a devout Catholic the rash judgment to reincarnation would not even occur to them. If such a thought did pop into one's head, it would be dismissed immediately. The fact that your mother accepted the lie of reincarnation so readily, so easily abandoned God and called God a liar, and hangs onto it so tenaciously tells us that she is not a devout Catholic at all.

In actuality, your mother is a very weak Catholic with little faith. That is why the devil has attacked her so. She is an easy target. Now, pride and arrogance have taken over and she maintains these lies to her peril.

The writer of Hebrews tells us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, (Hebrews 9:27) "And just as it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment..." That is God talking. If your mother denies this and instead asserts reincarnation then she is calling God a liar.

Here is an article on what the Church Fathers said about this subject. Here is a story of a person who believed in Reincarnation but converted to the True Faith.

The Dalai Lama story is easily explained. While the Dalai Lama did not know which toys belonged to the previous Dalai Lama, the people doing the testing did. Subtle body cues of the testers perceived subconsciously will tell the boy which toy to choose. Thus, the next Dalai Lama is not the reincarnation of the previous one, but merely the boy who most successfully subconsciously picks up the body language of the testers.

As for the Ouija board, any information coming from it is demonic. Besides, oooo, I am having a vision. I predict that you and one of your friend will die one after the other someday. Well, dah! We all die. Alan and Carl died one after the other, years apart for pete sake, as will any two people on the planet.

If one was to die before the other, that was a 50-50 guess. Demons do not know the future. Angels do not know the future. Saints in heaven do not know the future. No one but God, and those He tells, knows the future. And God does not tell the future to an evil spirit in the Ouija board.

Your mother needs to get off her pride and arrogance, and re-evaluate her experiences in the light of the Truth of God. The only true explanation is that which is in obedience to God and His Church. There is an explanation that is natural and consistent with the Church, or there is no explanation we can know in this life, but we must still remain faithful to the Church.

Your mother's eternal soul is in grave danger. Pray that she will mortify her pride and return to God.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary

Footer Notes: This forum is for general questions on the faith. See specific Topic Forums below:
Spiritual Warfare, demons, the occult go to our Spiritul Warfare Q&S Forum.
Liturgy Questions go to our Liturgy and Liturgical Law Q&A Forum
Liturgy of the Hours (Divine Office) Questions go to our Divine Office Q&A Forum
Defenfing the Faith Questions go to our Defending the Faith Q&A Forum
Church History Questions go to our Church History Q&A Forum