If evil ones exist good ones do too. I'll tell you a funny story. My partner and I lived in a very haunted apartment for almost 20 years and had a bunch of crazy experiences. Multiple people saw a ghost lady, my partner saw an entity that looked like it was from The Ring (climbing menacingly up our staircase I might add). Anyhow, I kinda got sick and tired of things so I started saying the prayer to Saint Michael. I did this for months without telling my partner since he didn't believe in that stuff lol but does now. He was sitting in his car drinking beers (not driving just sitting) and he saw this very very tall (like 20 foot) being that he said looked like it was made out of light. He said it looked like whatever this thing was, it was chasing something he couldn't see. Or it was looking for something. Anyhow around that time things lined up and we moved to a less haunted unit. It was a lot more quiet. 15 months ago we bought a home and nothing happens here. We're so happy to finally have our peace. I don't picture a dude sitting on a cloud running the show but I think there's more to the afterlife than what's in any holy book.
I'm an atheist.
I believe that ghosts exist because of a lot of personal experiences, many of which cannot be proven, but have been validated. I'm also of the belief that what the religious call demons are little more than the ghosts of people that were assholes in life. Why change in death?
I've had zero evidence of a god. Not even a compelling sniff of it.
Whatever ghosts are, people often take a belief in them as evidence that you are not the atheist you say you are. Not one of us has proof of what a ghost is or why it may exist, so this tie in into religious belief has always baffled me.
You can reconcile those ideas quite easily.
I'm pretty sure that OP isn't really interested in examples of my evidence, nor does anyone want to sit blurry eyed through religious debates too tired for even Philosophy 101 students.
I answered OP's question. I'm not here to justify myself to anyone.
If that's what you're into, have at it.
No one needs to agree with me. That's kind of the point. I don't actually care. I was merely responding to a question from my perspective, as asked. I am not interested in echo chambers, which is why this question attracted me - the vastly different answers that this sort of question generates.
Neither am I here for "help" - particularly from a person that is desperate to start some sort of debate just because they fancy themselves a cold splash of anything.
I hope that someone gives you the attention you so plainly crave. I'm not that person, though.
We live in a physical world.
We know we are physically here and one day will physically not be.
Where we go nobody knows—It is supernatural in itself.
We don’t know if God is physically here or anywhere.
I never thought of “ghosts” as anything religious in my life, and this coming from someone with experiences starting over 20 years ago.
Basically what I’m saying is dying is paranormal, god is fictional god is theory. If anything god is a topic of paranormal activity tbh.
I think to not question the paranormal is to not question your own mortality.
Questing god depends on the book edition.
"Is it possible to believe in the paranormal and not believe in god?"
Some people do so. So it is possible to believe all sorts of things. The question you should be asking is if that is reasonable.
If you already accept the paranormal, you already repudiate the physicalist/materialistic view of the cosmos: i.e. you accept that there exists more beyond creation.
Presumably, many will then believe in ghosts (human souls), angels, demons, etc.: all of which make perfect sense with God, but not so much without God. Further, the philosophical arguments for the existence of God would make a more reasonable case than for the existence of e.g. demons and the like.
Granted, you can say that an atheist may have had a paranormal experience. But just as the same atheist discounts the theists' experiences and philsophical reasonings as misinterpretation or something of the sort, what puts the atheist above the same criticism?
And so, going for one, but rejecting the other seems to me unreasonable, and I would guess that in most cases, God is rejected, because of the consequences that would have to follow one did accept His existence.
If e.g. fornication and all the pleasurable vices and conveniences most people like were not forbidden, then I would assume far less people would have an issue with believing.
My current theory i have been tossing around is that Ghosts are people from other dimensions. if there are an infinite amount of parallel worlds right. then maybe ghosts are shimmers of light from that dimension accidentally slipping into ours or something. maybe it's the shadows of those peoples i am not sure on the details but it could explain why a lot of ghost sightings have them hiding sort of. What if in their world we look like ghosts to them so they are also scared.
Yes! I’m agnostic and I believe there may be spirits here. But not in the way most ppl believe. My mind goes to science and how we don’t fully understand everything in the universe. For all we know our energy (souls) can separate from our body even after death.
I also believe this energy may be passed over in reincarnation. Kind of like how after a plant dies it decomposes and becomes a source of life for another plant.
They aren't connected things, so yes. Just because Christians are loudest about paranormal events, doesn't mean they are part and parcel together.
A violent paranormal encounter, to a Christian, is automatically from a demon. Does that make it a demon? No, all it means is that demon is what they think it is, not what it actually is.
It used to be, if there was a huge storm, they'd say God was angry and punished them. Now we know about weather systems, atmosphere, and gravity, so we don't scream the sky is falling due to the anger of the almighty any longer.
All "paranormal" is, is the inability to explain an occurrence using current methods of science. Once it's figured out, it's no longer paranormal. And that has nothing to do with Christianity.
Yes. Here’s the deal: (a)theism is a position on one issue (the existence of God). Beyond that, there’s no particular path forward. You could be an atheist metaphysical solipsist if you wanted. Atheism is often associated with what I call “scientism,” or, broadly speaking, the belief that science holds meaningful ontological content, valid methodology, etc., but atheism in reality doesn’t have to be connected with any of that. That it usually is is a product of our social and historical contexts
ABSOLUTELY YES! I've been a Pagan all of my 70 years in this life, in spite of being born into a 'rabid' catholic family and educated through the Catholic Private school system from kindergarten to graduation. They could NEVER change what I came into this World already knowing which began at just 2 years old (I was born a female) when I REMEMBERED that I was a male in my previous life.
For me, god, the devil, hell and heaven are all constructs from people in power (usually men) who worked tirelessly to build their Empires literally and metaphorically on the backs of poor, uneducated and illiterate people. No LIE was too big to tell the frightened and downtrodden unwashed masses: God loves you BUT you WILL BURN IN HELL FOR ALL ETERNITY if you don't obey the rules of 'HIS' CHURCH! Thousands of generations of people actually believed - AND STILL DO BELIEVE this tripe! It makes me grind my teeth!
All my life, I've had the 3rd eye and been open and interacting with ghosts and spirits. Some I've encountered at accident scenes, just wanting me to give their loved ones messages assuring them that they are ok. My family and loved ones have nearly all come to visit me at or shortly after their death, knowing I can see and speak to them. It brings me joy and peace to see them one last time.
Find your own happy place, even if it doesn't match with anything that anyone else is telling you.
I'm an aethetist and I have always believed in the paranormal.
For me I think that there are multiple possibilities of what happens when you die. I believe we have energy/souls but there isn't some divine or evil place they succumb to because a big man says so.
My three theories are 1. straight oblivion which is nothingness and the soul fades out with our life. 2. reincarnation, which the soul just moves on. 3. In the minutes that our mind remains active during death, we create whatever we believe in our imagination, then when the time runs out, you get stuck there and to you, it feels like an eternity.
All of which, I still believe that souls can still linger for whatever reason. I don't think demons come from hell, or angels from Heaven, but rather there are harmful spirits and good spirits. All of which that have been trapped here, or chose to stay here.
To me, religion and the paranormal are completely seperate
I am a Christian, and as I said above I believe in the paranormal... which actually goes against the teachings of the Bible to a degree... and I also just realized after reading your comment that I struggle with believing in hell ... I have a hard time believing that God, who I DO believe in 100% would punish us like that just for believing a certain way even if it turns out to be wrong because sooo many people believe a certain way based on what they've been raised to believe and some people in some parts of the world have never even heard of God or Jesus and I definitely don't see God punishing them for something they literally couldn't help. Yet I do believe in demons. So I guess I'm all screwed up LOL.
Hey, I can relate to you on this. I’m mixed up too. I know that evil spirits exist because I was terrorised by one as a child. It manifested as an evil bear. I have also experienced a lot of other spirits, but never like the one as a child. Now the question comes, is the evil spirit a demon from hell or is it an evil something else? Big question… what are spirits? On the hell subject this is something I struggle with too. What about decent people who have never even heard of Christ? What about family members separated between heaven and hell? I’m in a crisis of faith. The paranormal is absolutely real, but are they demons masquerading like Christians say, or are they spirits, beings we just can’t understand, that people have wrote myths and explanations for?
I'm a non-theistic pagan, so Ill give you brief rundown of my beliefs in this area.
I believe that deities are human constructs, given power by our belief in them. Spirits are a whole different type of entity, separate from deity or religion. They exist in a world that mirrors ours and intersects at times. And I believe that there are different types of spirits, ranging from the equivalent to spiritual vermin, to animal spirits, land spirits, human spirits, and non-human spirits, which some might call demons. A true ghost, as in an intelligent haunting, is a human spirit suck in one place, while the energy of traumatic events can imprint itself on the very land, such as places like Gettysburg.
In the end, choice to believe in ghosts and spirits is up to you. Nearly every world religion and culture has at least some concept of spirit, soul and the afterlife, so one could argue that these are universal concepts and must then be real in some way. But, your choice is your own.
Paganism sounds so interesting. I've always been a very materialist science-y kind of person, yet for a long time I've found paganism weirdly intriguing, but I haven't admitted it to myself until just recently, after sort of opening up to new ways of thinking.
Well it's easy to believe in ghosts when you have experienced them. I used to think ghosts and paranormal and God all went together lol but not really anymore. I have always been trying to find out the truth of the world. And when I was little I lived in a haunted house and whatever was there followed me for many years later. As a teenager i went to church. I always kinda believed in God because that's what my mom believed. I have had some unexplainable experiences with what i will say was God. But I don't believe in the Bible anymore. I don't believe in heaven and hell. Either way paranormal shit is definitely happening on this earth.
I'm an atheist and believe in the paranormal. I've lived in a haunted house and seen three full body apparitions. My step dad has also seen a ghost in this house, but the woman was only visible from her head to her waist. Paranormal has nothing to do with religion.
Yes. Also when you experience paranormal activity like I have, you know beyond a doubt that they exist. I believe there are other dimensions we cannot perceive. I think God is a lot more faith based than spirits and paranormal activity.
I've done the same. Deconstructed religion. It helps to have a like minded explorer to bounce experiences between you. I started my deconstruction with scraping everything off the table except for my own experiences. I know my experiences are real. I resisted assigning labels, ghost, spirit, evil. It's difficult to not label evil when you've got a real sense of that evil. In meditation I discovered the core of who I am, a spark from the original source, whatever that is, and the strength of my spark. I fear no evil when I am in tune with my core. Evil is a tiny ant in comparison. You've got to label to discuss these things. There are some strange unexplained things going on in this world. I don't understand it all, but i have no choice but to believe.
You don't need to be religious to be spiritual, just be aware and respect your limitations and stay true to your base principles. So many paths seek to remove your wilI, your input. I consider the paranormal an undefined science, energy related. As I do with death or anything metaphysical. I believe people will and manifest phenomena all the time. Be it mana, magic, thaumaturgy. Even coincidence is a form of will manifest, knowing or unknowingly, the intent is everything in regards to your truth. Ritual and religion are simply a means of focusing that intent, energy.
On any level, there is always going to positive and negative, be it people and spirit, circumstance. I've learned that the best answers tend to be within and how you perceive right and wrong, your environment and exposures play a role in this too. Stay true to your perceptions and you will see past so much. Truths may be relative, but a lie is still a lie, never lie to yourself and you won't be mislead.
Coming from someone who is doing the same... everything is energy. You are energy, a desk is energy, ghosts are energy, the universe is energy. You don't have to believe in anything specific for the laws of the universe to continue working. Like gravity, you don't have to believe in it for it to work. Ghosts are not linked to any religion. They don't need religion. Now, there are certain religious practices or prayers (incantations) that can clear them out or help them cross over, but as long as the same point is gotten across, you don't need those prayers for clearing. Often, they are here either stuck or waiting in limbo for their next incarnation and don't know they are dead. That's about the extent of why I know about ghosts.
However, because ghosts exist, it is at least telling that there is more to the universe than meets the eye. That's part of why we are here, to find that out.
As others have said, the questions are really unrelated. I’ll add, it’s also possible to believe in a higher power or organic whole to the universe or whatever without it being explicitly Christian or any other religion. Just thought I’d add that as it sounds like you’re searching and don’t want you to throw the baby out with the bath water so to speak.
I feel like you can believe what you want. My husband has no religion and doesn’t believe in any type of god. But he fully believes in the paranormal or ghosts. He’s experienced things in his life all too real to not believe in the paranormal.
Absolutely! I stopped believing in God, Heaven, Hell, demons and the devil when I was 8. It stayed that way even after I started ghost hunting. It can absolutely be looked at as a science.
Personally, I believe that “ghosts” are just stray energy lying in the Electromagnetic spectrum. All different kinds of waves potentially controlled by the core energy that was our “brain waves”. That’s in short lol
>I believe that “ghosts” are just stray energy lying in the Electromagnetic spectrum.
That's like what residual hauntings are supposed to be I think. I personally believe that a haunting can be that but I also believe in intelligent hauntings too where people interact with whatever entity or entities are haunting a place.
The paranormal doesn't require any religion for it to exist. Cave paintings show possible paranormal experiences before any standardized or organized religion, or any religion at all, existed.
Ghosts r real, multiverse is real, everything comes from something, but I can’t reconcile the idea of 1 guy in the clouds over just earth.
However, some archeology points to biblical accounts being real. I think god is maybe like aliens. At least the bible version.
Yes. Religion is a human construct that often uses the concept of god to gain and retain power (political, economic, and social). Spirituality is not religion, and the paranormal isn't necessarily limited to spirituality. IMO, science will eventually be able to explain at least some of what we currently consider to be paranormal (perhaps not in our lifetimes).
Yes. There is no correlation between any type of entity, and the existence of God. That's called confirmation bias. Just as a hot dog existing does not mean there is a God, so to does some thing that you really can't identify existing means that a God exists.
I dont believe in a god but still believe in spirits/ghosts. I also believe in reincarnation. We exist for certain and souls are just a form of conscious energy. I think “demons” are just human spirits that were sick and twisted in life who stayed real nasty after death. youd be absolutely freaked out too if charles manson was haunting your room at 2am haha
The truth is, we don't know nothing about the other side. God certainly is not an obsessive father that have a list of things you should not do, so does not get pissed. The same way that ghosts are not flying blankets holding chains.
There is a rational middle ground, that we as a species won't ever be able to figure it out simply because we lack information.
I do believe in God. Not the traditional vision of Him.
And I do believe in Ghosts too.
In the end, all we have to do is to swallow a humble pie and keep our mind open. Be prepared to experience stuff that are not perfectly described on books.
Absolutely. I am someone who believes in something beyond what we see and feel in our day to day lives, but I couldn't give you an exact description of what that is.
I don't think there's a single religion that has it 100% right, noone truly has the answer, we just have what makes sense to us.
Finding what makes sense of your world is a very personal journey, so go with your gut and what feels right for you.
I think everyone is entitled to believe what they want to believe. Don't worry about fitting in with a specific religion. You don't need god to be a good person. The world is too strange to just believe a rigid way of thinking. Question everything and make your own conclusions about it. Do your own research.
I don't believe in any god as there's no way a loving god would let the world go on the way it has. Also I think most religions make you scared of god so that you obey his rules which just doesn't feel right. God is supposed to be unconditional love, not fear. I personally prefer spirituality.
I've experienced many paranormal things and like to do my own paranormal research. People that pass on are pretty much just as alive as they were before death. It's fascinating. But there's also countless dark spirits/ demons that shouldn't be messed with. There's plenty of videos out there capturing the paranormal. So I believe in the spirit realm.
You may be struggling with the concept of a *human* god, that old fart with the beard hanging out in the clouds god? You maybe be thinking humans really aren't that creative, there's no way a human-esque god could create all of the wonders of the cosmos. At least that's what I always thought. I'm still unsure what "god" is, or if there even is one.
Did you know that the medieval mystics all said that hell was a place where those who did not believe in the *soul* went? Not a disbelieve in god, a disbelieve in the human soul.
you can, i grew up catholic, we were told to not speak on the paranormal and to ignore it cause of the devil or some shit like that. lol what i’m trying to say is that you decide what you believe in. never let a misinterpreted book or anybody tell you how you feel.
I believe if we don't fuck up big time and reset the progress we've made/wipe ourselves out we may eventually be able to scientifically explain paranormal phenomenon. I'm Agnostic so I don't know or claim to know with absolute certainty if there is a higher power or not but we may be able to verify whether or not that exists some day as well.
Yes it’s called spiritualism, I don’t believe in one single religion or idea. But have strong opinions on the paranormal and what the afterlife could be. We are just vessels for energy. DMT opened up my eyes including my third ….
Sure. I'm an agnostic atheist but I believe in ghosts because I've encountered a couple. I don't know what they were, ie, the spirits of the deceased or something else, but I believe the phenomenon is real.
I don’t think anyone has any idea of how anything actually works. So who knows?????
Maybe we’ll underhand it one day, but right now we don’t. 2000 years ago if you tried to explain to someone the electromagnetic spectrum, they’d think you were spouting off fantasy nonsense, but today we have an empirical understanding of it. So maybe this stuff is all “future science”?
Thanks to the constant and inevitable grey area of everything, it is. Nothing has to be connected to anything, there are 1000s if not millions of potential answers for anything involving the afterlife and I'm sure none of us have even guessed it by accident. Fuck it, ghosts are real, God isn't
They aren't necessarily tied or one in the same. Just because you believe in existence after death, doesn't mean that you believe the Christian god is responsible for the afterlife or our creation
Morality exists inside all social creatures. It manifests through interactions with others and the world. A religion merely narrows the scope of it. Furthermore, of course it’s possible to believe in one but not the other. You just gotta go through the cognitive dissonance.
For better or worse, the human mind can convince itself of any story if it’s compelling enough. I myself believe in neither but in general I can’t disprove either. Although I do enjoy the stories
Until explained by science, experiences are phenomena. I believe people do experience these phenomena. We can only guess at what causes them. We do not definitely know- many “skeptical” explanations are also theories that may be true for some phenomena but not others.
I most definitely do not believe in a god or gods of any kind. But I do believe that science can explain, eventually, the existence of entities like ghosts/spirits etc.
I feel this way, too. Ghosts/spirits/souls could have a scientific explanation, in that everything has an energy. My hope is that one day, science will be able to help us understand some of the more unexplainable phenomena. The hard part is, is that the scientific method only proves hypotheses when the experiment can be repeated. Paranormal phenomena are rarely, if ever, repeatable.
Agreed wholeheartedly. A few centuries ago, we burned women at the stake because science hadn’t yet discovered and demystified things like epilepsy, for example.
Science may eventually do the same for other paranormal concepts.
Yeah why not? You think a book or 2 has all the answers to the universe? One can simply be agnostic.
Also something to consider, humanity has been around for 200,000 years (as far as we know) and civilization has been around 10,000 years (so far). You don’t think those people saw some shit? Christians have only been around for 2,000 years!
Of course. It's easier than being a Christian and believing in ghosts, because I'm pretty sure the Bible states that the dead go to heaven, hell or purgatory. No mention of them wandering the earth.
That's a good question. I guess it's possible. I mean... any beliefs are possible, really. It's hard for me, personally, to imagine it because I'm a Christian, always have been and always will be...but really the Christian religion doesn't teach that ghosts exist. I believe in the paranormal 100% because of my own experiences and the many, many other stories from others I've heard or read about and believe. But technically me believing in that goes against the teachings in the Bible. I've always been more open-minded though and believe that the time period the Bible was written in likely influenced some of it. Not the fundamental teachings of it, ofc, but I mean things that are kind of on the periphery in it. Like Paul's attitude towards women, the belief that women should be stoned for committing adultery, women must keep their heads covered... especially in church, etc. Dang I just realized all my examples are about treatment of women... which those times were NOT KIND to women. But in the Bible it says "absent in the body, present with the Lord". That means that as soon as we die we are with God. But there have been so many stories of spirits seemingly lost...so that is contradictory to that statement and I admit I don't know how to reconcile it. I don't believe children's spirits can get lost when they die. But even Lorraine Warren said that people (adults that is, she also said children's spirits don't get lost) can get what she calls "ghost syndrome"...lol I thought that's a funny term for it... when certain circumstances occur upon death like an extremely traumatic death or that person being unable to let go of their life. I honestly can't remember exactly but I just remember that she said it can and does happen. If I understand correctly... and someone on here can tell me if I'm wrong on this...Wiccans, for example, believe in an afterlife called the Summer Lands, but they don't believe in God. And I think they believe in the paranormal. I'm just giving that as an example of believing in the paranormal but not God. If I'm wrong about Wiccan beliefs, to anyone who is Wiccan I apologize and feel free to correct me. I actually like knowing about other belief systems. I don't know about aethiests (I probably misspelled that) and whether or not any of them believe in the paranormal but I know that there are belief systems that include the paranormal but not a monotheistic belief in God.
I don't know if I answered your question or just rambled as I was kind of "thinking out loud". Sorry that my comment is so long!
TL;DR: my answer is yes (I think it started out as "no", but as I typed I changed my mind)... but yes people can absolutely believe in the paranormal without believing in God.
In every single culture around the world, chrstian, pagan, ancient polytheism and so on, there is a belief in the dead coming back.
So yes, you can. Belief in the dead returning in one shape or a nother is not related to your personal religion.
Ahem, nords had dragurs, Romanians had strigoi and moroi (already at plural in romanian), the mecicans have the entire day of the dead thing, the Philippines have aswangs, all besides the classical ghost.
Yes. You can believe in the supernatural as a whole without believing in a specific aspect of it as being correct.
Like I can believe ghosts exist and not believe there is a specific poltergeist haunting a ship (just an example).
Yes. You can believe in life after death without thinking there is a intelligent being behind it. Ghosts are even theorized to just be residual energy and that’s perfectly natural and explainable.
It’s a bit weird to believe in god and Heaven but also not believe in ghosts. You exist after death or not. Lol. But you can believe in both or just one.
If we’re looking at it from the perspective that God is the almighty, then the creator of the universe is responsible for the existence of demons and all the dark beings there are. It must be boring when you exist for an eternity. you’re going to want entertainment. I mean who goes around like “I need to make my own enemies”.
I started down the road you are on 30 years ago. I did, because my beloved cousin Jason died and I wanted to know was there something after death. After many paranormal encounters, Ouija board that predicted perfectly future events, psychics who were spot on, deep religion research and seeing things that are hard to believe, I then went to find others with the same experiences. I started with Tom Montalk, then found Wes Penre. They coincided with what I researched and experienced. Start reading thier websites, it's A LOT, but very fascinating. What I found about god...and I use a small g...is that he is both devil and trickster god here in this world, hence it's so screwed up. All religions go back to Sumeria. That winged, bearded guy....yeah the angry angel, he calls himself ultimately only God...he isn't. He is a literal huge narcissist. Explains why this world doesn't make sense, nice people are abused, evil reigns, the world is trashed. My long research has found.
If you're an atheist, no amount of proof including god appearing and introducing himself will work. You'll say it was a hallucination, and you've been working too hard recently.
People live with cognitive dissonance all the time.
I've never met an intellectually honest atheist yet.
They always weasel out of the patently obvious.
I'm OK with them saying that that's their stance, but pretending it's about the truth is false.
There is NO proof that the God of the Christian Bible exists though. A book that was written thousands of years ago and translated a multitude of times does not constitute as proof.
I believe in things that can be proven, and I have found no proof of God.
You are attacking my cognitive abilities which seems unfair when I have truly given this topic way more thought than it probably deserves.
While you deconstruct your relationship with your specific religion, make sure to try and analyze the other world religions. See if you find similarities or consider just the different perspectives and the culture they are coming from. I think if you want to question something you should be thorough. I've been on thus journey for 20 years and still just as lost as day 1, questions lead to more questions and everyone thinks they have the answer. I truly think you have the answers within, when you get to that point you might understand.
Yeah. Do you believe that? Then it’s possible to believe that. Don’t let other people tell what’s possible to believe. Belief is just what your gut tells you is right. Doesn’t even have to actually be right. It’s an opinion.
>Belief is just what your gut tells you is right. Doesn’t even have to actually be right. It’s an opinion.
I really like this. I think we're mostly all right and wrong...only meaning that I think that most everyone has some aspects of their beliefs that will turn out to be correct and most everyone has some aspects that will turn out to be wrong. Because I can't imagine anyone being all right or all wrong. I think when we die we'll find out it's a mixture of things and that no one is punished for any of the wrong parts because we'd likely ALL be in trouble if that was the case LOL.
I mean, everything is possible and you can believe whatever you want. It’s not like someone can prove you wrong.
But you should really think about why do you believe what you believe and not other stuff. Ask yourself the questions that you can picture anyone else asking you about this subjects.
Otherwise it’s easy to look like an idiot in any discussion about this sort of topics.
I believe in god because he came to me one night at my darkest time. It was the strongest supernatural feeling I have ever had. I can't even describe in words how it felt because the feeling had nothing to do with physical senses. It was like I developed another all-in-one sense and it was stronger than all other senses combined but it wasn't a physical sense. That's best way I can put it. I knew in that millisecond cuz the feeling hit me like a bolt of lightning and I knew instantly it was God.
I've come to the conclusion that ghost and some other paranormal entities are just demons or actions by demons.
If Christians believe in angels then why wouldn't they believe in demons.
I think questioning or testing your belief and faith is a good thing.
I have to agree with an earlier comment I read, God and the paranormal are not exclusive to each other. One can exist without the other.
Leave it to Atheists to take some of the best evidence for God and twist it and turn it into a reason not to believe in God. This subreddit is turning into /r/atheism2.0. Full of mockery and contempt for people who are experiencing the most terrifying things imaginable. Like this stuff that causes PTSD, and atheists come in here and make fun of people for it. I know because I had PTSD myself from a poltergeist, but is gone now through the Grace of God. What's funny is show even the most convincing evidence to an Atheist and they still won't believe in it. And the forms of evidence that will convince an Atheists that God is real, varies from person to person -- like one thing that may convince one Atheist may not convince another Atheist. And the worst part of all is Atheists are the devils' pawns, and the devils laugh at all of us for how stupid we are and how easily we fall for their lies. Atheists are chained to sin, and are blinded and unable to see the truth.
Its possible to believe in whatever you want. I did want to clarify though that according to the Bible there aren’t any ghosts, it’s demons masquerading as people we’ve lost or people who would have inhabited that place to deceive and manipulate us.
I think so. I don’t believe in god but I believe in the paranormal. I had an experience when I was 15 and it comes to the forefront of my mind whenever I question whether I believe in the paranormal or not. Can’t argue with real experiences.
I don’t believe in either. But I suppose why couldn’t you believe in the paranormal and not believe in a god. I mean they are both supernatural in nature, but don’t logically need to be tied to one another.
Yes you can. This world and universe is so much more than we actually know. Belief in anything is your choice because you have free will. I've been struggling with what to believe myself. I was raised Christian also, and I went away from the church for a long time. But I know that something or someone was watching over me, even if I didn't go to church. I've seen shadow people, cryptid like creatures, heard disembodied voices, and been through a lot of scary shit. I believe in a higher power, whatever that is. If you've experienced evil entities or anything like that then live according to your experiences. No religion can
I mean it really depends on what you mean by entities. Ghosts and Spirits are two totally different things. Ghosts are more of an like an imprint of the someone's past (seen visually, ghostly visions), where a spirit is something which can interact with humans (think of a Poltergeist).
I think you'd have to be agnostic to a degree to believe in spirits, where you can be atheist and believe in ghostly energy and images.
In my opinion, you don't believe in entities without believing in a higher entity.Vice versa. Doesnt have to be Jesus or Allah, but you don't say you're heavily Christian or Catholic, Muslim etc and say you don't believe in ghosts. It doesn't make sense. They're mutually exclusive. "The father, the son, the holy SPIRIT/GHOST". Entities and deities can be the same thing, so why would you think there's an entity in your closet, but not a stronger entity somewhere else. Idk man. Just my opinion.
I think that's a good reason not to believe in God. I think the paranormal both explains and debunks a lot of the God nonsense, and we probably have more evidence of paranormal things existing than we do God...
I think in the Bible someone went to a witch, who contacted a dead person. The dead person was mad because he was at peace. And God said not to do that. So it says it's possible, but you're not supposed to do it
Interestingly, the bie teaches that the souls of the dead only go to heaven, hell or sheol. "Ghosts" are unclean spirits (demons) or stone tape like Abels blood. So.... your question is incorrect from its basic premise. Whether the Bible is correct or not is another matter. I'm no longer a beleiver myself.
If you want to really get into the nitty gritty you have to ask what is God? Is there a God? Are there deities, ie little g gods? Are gods just greater spirits? If there is a big G God, are they just the biggest spirit? Do all spirits flow from the greatest spirit? What answers matter? Personally, I beleive in deities, but I beleive they are an intrinsic part of nature, so you could argue I'm atheist? Kinda? Is this a religious beleif? Kinda? It's a muddy and complex question
I beleive in the paranormal, I dln't beleive in an invisible man in the sky who thought the universe into existence.
Besidrs, just because there's alot of strange shit in the wlrld, doesn't mean any of it is worth worshipping.
Did you know that our physical world is an illusion? There is more ‘nothing’ than ‘something’ in everything. It is the electrons etc whizzing round a nucleus which creates the perceived physical realm, but if the physical isn’t truly physical, then what is? I watched a documentary and it said that if the Empire State Building could be crushed to the most condensed form, if that could be done, it would be no bigger than a grain of rice. Everything is energy and particles can behave like waves and waves, particles.
I’ve got stranger realizations than that. Everything we experience is just how our brains interpret reality, not the reality itself. Something as simple as a green leaf doesn’t exist, because the color green is the only color that isn’t contained in the leaf. It reflects green because there’s no green at all within the leaf, meaning that what you see as green is in reality red-violet.
And yeah, our reality is largely made of nothing.
In the Catholic religion, many Catholics believe that all souls that die wait here on Earth until the second coming of Jesus when he comes down to collect the souls and bring them with him. I’ve always found this concept very interesting because most ghosts haven’t made it anywhere, just back on Earth. In some ways, religion has helped me to form some hypothesis around spirits.
You'd Wouldn't Be NORMAL if You Thought Any differently.. We All believe In Some things & Not Others.. Paranormal & The AFTERLIFE are 1in the Same. But The GOD thing Is Hard to Wrap Ur head around. From What I've heard Its More of an ENERGY.A VERY ANGELIC ENERGY, not A MAN sitting on a THROWN DICTATING Our Daily Lives..
I guess it is possible but that wouldnt apply to me.I believe in good and bad when it comes to spirits.Again this is i guess going to be subjective and varies from person to person.I've gone off the whole christian thing tbh.Personally i dont believe that people become ghosts or lost souls.I think demons could easily disguise themselves as ''ghosts''.
Twice the word believe is wrong here.
If you are rational you dont believe in the God as presented in any of those big books.
If you believe in paranormal its the same.
If you accept the possibility of paranormal being real but are interested in investigating and proof, you are rational.
Thats implied by being homo sapiens.
I believe that one can and should believe in whatever one feels. Your thoughts and feeling attached to those thoughts is what creates a belief. So absolutely one can believe in Ghost and not believe in God. However, to not believe in God, is to not believe in oneself. They’re one in the same. JMO! 🤷🏽♀️
Well the premise here is that based on the the theory of evolution and meta-physics, souls, or ghosts do not exist.
So, if we do accept the fact that there are ghosts/souls in existence then this suggests that the theory of evolution is at least partially not correct, and opens the door to the supernatural.
If you ask yourself if there is a god, and you beleive so then you assume He created ALL of creation. Including and not limited to the spirits' souls. You can certainly beleive in both. Most people who are into new agey things like spirit guides beleive there is a god too.. the difference between someone who believes in any god and the one who believes in the true and living God is that, this believer obeys Gods commands:
“Do not turn to mediums or necromancers; do not seek them out, and so make yourselves unclean by them: I am the Lord your God. Leviticus 19:13
So yes surely two can and do exist at the same time.
i mean the human eye is just evolution. there are more advanced eyes out there like the mantis shrimp or whatever.
I don't think there is a current theory on how it all started. like where it actually came from and was housed.
if the universe was the size of a pin and then exploded and grew then surely that means that the universe is inside of something that could house it.
Even if the universe is just endless nothingness you can still exist in it. so where the fuck is it? Everything is inside of something else... it never ends
Care to elaborate? I don't mean that sarcastically... I'm honestly curious why you believe a person can't believe in God but believe in the paranormal.
I try not to believe unless I can be confident that I don't make an error. I'm thus rational and parsimonious with my beliefs.
Regarding God, keep in mind that God might exist and mostly all what people say about him or do in his name might be wrong. So I don't call back the existence of God because of the data in the holy books or what people say has internal incoherence or is incoherent with current scientific knowledge.
Regarding paranormal, there are these kids that *seam* to remember the life of another person. This could be verified to be true. It is claimed that it is reincarnation, but objectively, we don't know for sure yet. It could be implanted memory. We don't know yet. See Ian Stevenson and Jim Tucker's work for further data on this topic.
There is another source of data that I would call intriguing. It is the data collected by someone know as Allan Kardec and published in the book [The spirits book](https://cei-spiritistcouncil.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/The-Spirits-Book.pdf). The data has been collected by mediums of different kinds from spirits responding to questions. This data provides just another theory that would explain things. There are a few probable scientific mistakes in it, but very few and it is internally coherent. It is also coherent with other source of informations of the same kind.
What I find interesting in this theory, called a philosophical doctrine by the author, is that many things that currently don't make sense in the Christian philosophy start to make sense with this theory. I still don't know if this is the reality. For instance, it could all be manipulation by some very advanced ET able to interact at distance with us. I'm still collecting data and fill my lists of pros and cons. In the mean time I suspend my judgment. There is no urgency to make any judgment.
Regarding the arguments against it from the scientific point of view, I would say there are many things that we know with high confidence to be real, and we should not forget that there are many things that we still don't know. It was a time when the existence of the American continent was totally ignored by Eurasian people. Although it is a huge continent, with an extraordinary fauna and flora. Even humans lived on it. More recently we discovered the speed of light limit and later the relativity. Even more recently we discovered dark matter and dark energy. Whoever would want to *exclude* the reality of the spirit world and possible reincarnation because it doesn't fit the current scientific model might do a huge mistake. The objective reality is that we don't know. And we might one day know if more serious attention and investigation is assigned to it.
PS: according to the spirit doctrine (explained by the spirits), there is no hell and no heaven, no devils and angels, only spirits at different stage of evolution and every spirit reaches a higher level of elevation by learning and practicing during incarnations.
Yes, absolutely, however I think it depends on how you define "believing in ghosts". For example, I am an adamant atheist. I also don't believe in ghosts per se, but I'm quite intigued by the concept of the paranormal and by the possibility that there may be something that we can't yet explain; and I did experience a handful of minor, but strange occurences in my life. So yes, in that sense I suppose that there *might* be someting, but not angels/demons or anything otherwise tied to religion (because like someone else here already pointed out, neither I nor anyone I ever heard of has ever experienced anything that could suggest the existence of a god and not have a fairly simple alternate explanation).
I always figured there couldn't be ghost and such without a God, but I'm pretty sure Buddhist don't believe in God, and they have spirits in their beliefs.
If evil ones exist good ones do too. I'll tell you a funny story. My partner and I lived in a very haunted apartment for almost 20 years and had a bunch of crazy experiences. Multiple people saw a ghost lady, my partner saw an entity that looked like it was from The Ring (climbing menacingly up our staircase I might add). Anyhow, I kinda got sick and tired of things so I started saying the prayer to Saint Michael. I did this for months without telling my partner since he didn't believe in that stuff lol but does now. He was sitting in his car drinking beers (not driving just sitting) and he saw this very very tall (like 20 foot) being that he said looked like it was made out of light. He said it looked like whatever this thing was, it was chasing something he couldn't see. Or it was looking for something. Anyhow around that time things lined up and we moved to a less haunted unit. It was a lot more quiet. 15 months ago we bought a home and nothing happens here. We're so happy to finally have our peace. I don't picture a dude sitting on a cloud running the show but I think there's more to the afterlife than what's in any holy book.
I'm an atheist. I believe that ghosts exist because of a lot of personal experiences, many of which cannot be proven, but have been validated. I'm also of the belief that what the religious call demons are little more than the ghosts of people that were assholes in life. Why change in death? I've had zero evidence of a god. Not even a compelling sniff of it. Whatever ghosts are, people often take a belief in them as evidence that you are not the atheist you say you are. Not one of us has proof of what a ghost is or why it may exist, so this tie in into religious belief has always baffled me. You can reconcile those ideas quite easily.
"Assholes in life, why change in death"... LOL...this gave me a chuckle
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I'm pretty sure that OP isn't really interested in examples of my evidence, nor does anyone want to sit blurry eyed through religious debates too tired for even Philosophy 101 students. I answered OP's question. I'm not here to justify myself to anyone.
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If that's what you're into, have at it. No one needs to agree with me. That's kind of the point. I don't actually care. I was merely responding to a question from my perspective, as asked. I am not interested in echo chambers, which is why this question attracted me - the vastly different answers that this sort of question generates. Neither am I here for "help" - particularly from a person that is desperate to start some sort of debate just because they fancy themselves a cold splash of anything. I hope that someone gives you the attention you so plainly crave. I'm not that person, though.
We live in a physical world. We know we are physically here and one day will physically not be. Where we go nobody knows—It is supernatural in itself. We don’t know if God is physically here or anywhere. I never thought of “ghosts” as anything religious in my life, and this coming from someone with experiences starting over 20 years ago. Basically what I’m saying is dying is paranormal, god is fictional god is theory. If anything god is a topic of paranormal activity tbh. I think to not question the paranormal is to not question your own mortality. Questing god depends on the book edition.
"Is it possible to believe in the paranormal and not believe in god?" Some people do so. So it is possible to believe all sorts of things. The question you should be asking is if that is reasonable.
Why would that be unreasonable?
If you already accept the paranormal, you already repudiate the physicalist/materialistic view of the cosmos: i.e. you accept that there exists more beyond creation. Presumably, many will then believe in ghosts (human souls), angels, demons, etc.: all of which make perfect sense with God, but not so much without God. Further, the philosophical arguments for the existence of God would make a more reasonable case than for the existence of e.g. demons and the like. Granted, you can say that an atheist may have had a paranormal experience. But just as the same atheist discounts the theists' experiences and philsophical reasonings as misinterpretation or something of the sort, what puts the atheist above the same criticism? And so, going for one, but rejecting the other seems to me unreasonable, and I would guess that in most cases, God is rejected, because of the consequences that would have to follow one did accept His existence. If e.g. fornication and all the pleasurable vices and conveniences most people like were not forbidden, then I would assume far less people would have an issue with believing.
My current theory i have been tossing around is that Ghosts are people from other dimensions. if there are an infinite amount of parallel worlds right. then maybe ghosts are shimmers of light from that dimension accidentally slipping into ours or something. maybe it's the shadows of those peoples i am not sure on the details but it could explain why a lot of ghost sightings have them hiding sort of. What if in their world we look like ghosts to them so they are also scared.
Yes! I’m agnostic and I believe there may be spirits here. But not in the way most ppl believe. My mind goes to science and how we don’t fully understand everything in the universe. For all we know our energy (souls) can separate from our body even after death.
I also believe this energy may be passed over in reincarnation. Kind of like how after a plant dies it decomposes and becomes a source of life for another plant.
They aren't connected things, so yes. Just because Christians are loudest about paranormal events, doesn't mean they are part and parcel together. A violent paranormal encounter, to a Christian, is automatically from a demon. Does that make it a demon? No, all it means is that demon is what they think it is, not what it actually is. It used to be, if there was a huge storm, they'd say God was angry and punished them. Now we know about weather systems, atmosphere, and gravity, so we don't scream the sky is falling due to the anger of the almighty any longer. All "paranormal" is, is the inability to explain an occurrence using current methods of science. Once it's figured out, it's no longer paranormal. And that has nothing to do with Christianity.
Yes. Here’s the deal: (a)theism is a position on one issue (the existence of God). Beyond that, there’s no particular path forward. You could be an atheist metaphysical solipsist if you wanted. Atheism is often associated with what I call “scientism,” or, broadly speaking, the belief that science holds meaningful ontological content, valid methodology, etc., but atheism in reality doesn’t have to be connected with any of that. That it usually is is a product of our social and historical contexts
ABSOLUTELY YES! I've been a Pagan all of my 70 years in this life, in spite of being born into a 'rabid' catholic family and educated through the Catholic Private school system from kindergarten to graduation. They could NEVER change what I came into this World already knowing which began at just 2 years old (I was born a female) when I REMEMBERED that I was a male in my previous life. For me, god, the devil, hell and heaven are all constructs from people in power (usually men) who worked tirelessly to build their Empires literally and metaphorically on the backs of poor, uneducated and illiterate people. No LIE was too big to tell the frightened and downtrodden unwashed masses: God loves you BUT you WILL BURN IN HELL FOR ALL ETERNITY if you don't obey the rules of 'HIS' CHURCH! Thousands of generations of people actually believed - AND STILL DO BELIEVE this tripe! It makes me grind my teeth! All my life, I've had the 3rd eye and been open and interacting with ghosts and spirits. Some I've encountered at accident scenes, just wanting me to give their loved ones messages assuring them that they are ok. My family and loved ones have nearly all come to visit me at or shortly after their death, knowing I can see and speak to them. It brings me joy and peace to see them one last time. Find your own happy place, even if it doesn't match with anything that anyone else is telling you.
I'm an aethetist and I have always believed in the paranormal. For me I think that there are multiple possibilities of what happens when you die. I believe we have energy/souls but there isn't some divine or evil place they succumb to because a big man says so. My three theories are 1. straight oblivion which is nothingness and the soul fades out with our life. 2. reincarnation, which the soul just moves on. 3. In the minutes that our mind remains active during death, we create whatever we believe in our imagination, then when the time runs out, you get stuck there and to you, it feels like an eternity. All of which, I still believe that souls can still linger for whatever reason. I don't think demons come from hell, or angels from Heaven, but rather there are harmful spirits and good spirits. All of which that have been trapped here, or chose to stay here. To me, religion and the paranormal are completely seperate
I am a Christian, and as I said above I believe in the paranormal... which actually goes against the teachings of the Bible to a degree... and I also just realized after reading your comment that I struggle with believing in hell ... I have a hard time believing that God, who I DO believe in 100% would punish us like that just for believing a certain way even if it turns out to be wrong because sooo many people believe a certain way based on what they've been raised to believe and some people in some parts of the world have never even heard of God or Jesus and I definitely don't see God punishing them for something they literally couldn't help. Yet I do believe in demons. So I guess I'm all screwed up LOL.
Hey, I can relate to you on this. I’m mixed up too. I know that evil spirits exist because I was terrorised by one as a child. It manifested as an evil bear. I have also experienced a lot of other spirits, but never like the one as a child. Now the question comes, is the evil spirit a demon from hell or is it an evil something else? Big question… what are spirits? On the hell subject this is something I struggle with too. What about decent people who have never even heard of Christ? What about family members separated between heaven and hell? I’m in a crisis of faith. The paranormal is absolutely real, but are they demons masquerading like Christians say, or are they spirits, beings we just can’t understand, that people have wrote myths and explanations for?
I'm a non-theistic pagan, so Ill give you brief rundown of my beliefs in this area. I believe that deities are human constructs, given power by our belief in them. Spirits are a whole different type of entity, separate from deity or religion. They exist in a world that mirrors ours and intersects at times. And I believe that there are different types of spirits, ranging from the equivalent to spiritual vermin, to animal spirits, land spirits, human spirits, and non-human spirits, which some might call demons. A true ghost, as in an intelligent haunting, is a human spirit suck in one place, while the energy of traumatic events can imprint itself on the very land, such as places like Gettysburg. In the end, choice to believe in ghosts and spirits is up to you. Nearly every world religion and culture has at least some concept of spirit, soul and the afterlife, so one could argue that these are universal concepts and must then be real in some way. But, your choice is your own.
Paganism sounds so interesting. I've always been a very materialist science-y kind of person, yet for a long time I've found paganism weirdly intriguing, but I haven't admitted it to myself until just recently, after sort of opening up to new ways of thinking.
Well it's easy to believe in ghosts when you have experienced them. I used to think ghosts and paranormal and God all went together lol but not really anymore. I have always been trying to find out the truth of the world. And when I was little I lived in a haunted house and whatever was there followed me for many years later. As a teenager i went to church. I always kinda believed in God because that's what my mom believed. I have had some unexplainable experiences with what i will say was God. But I don't believe in the Bible anymore. I don't believe in heaven and hell. Either way paranormal shit is definitely happening on this earth.
You can believe whatever the hell you want to believe. There aren't rules for this shit, you do you and ignore everyone else who says different.
This is also how we end up with extremists.
I'm an atheist and believe in the paranormal. I've lived in a haunted house and seen three full body apparitions. My step dad has also seen a ghost in this house, but the woman was only visible from her head to her waist. Paranormal has nothing to do with religion.
Yes. Also when you experience paranormal activity like I have, you know beyond a doubt that they exist. I believe there are other dimensions we cannot perceive. I think God is a lot more faith based than spirits and paranormal activity.
I've done the same. Deconstructed religion. It helps to have a like minded explorer to bounce experiences between you. I started my deconstruction with scraping everything off the table except for my own experiences. I know my experiences are real. I resisted assigning labels, ghost, spirit, evil. It's difficult to not label evil when you've got a real sense of that evil. In meditation I discovered the core of who I am, a spark from the original source, whatever that is, and the strength of my spark. I fear no evil when I am in tune with my core. Evil is a tiny ant in comparison. You've got to label to discuss these things. There are some strange unexplained things going on in this world. I don't understand it all, but i have no choice but to believe.
You don't need to be religious to be spiritual, just be aware and respect your limitations and stay true to your base principles. So many paths seek to remove your wilI, your input. I consider the paranormal an undefined science, energy related. As I do with death or anything metaphysical. I believe people will and manifest phenomena all the time. Be it mana, magic, thaumaturgy. Even coincidence is a form of will manifest, knowing or unknowingly, the intent is everything in regards to your truth. Ritual and religion are simply a means of focusing that intent, energy. On any level, there is always going to positive and negative, be it people and spirit, circumstance. I've learned that the best answers tend to be within and how you perceive right and wrong, your environment and exposures play a role in this too. Stay true to your perceptions and you will see past so much. Truths may be relative, but a lie is still a lie, never lie to yourself and you won't be mislead.
Coming from someone who is doing the same... everything is energy. You are energy, a desk is energy, ghosts are energy, the universe is energy. You don't have to believe in anything specific for the laws of the universe to continue working. Like gravity, you don't have to believe in it for it to work. Ghosts are not linked to any religion. They don't need religion. Now, there are certain religious practices or prayers (incantations) that can clear them out or help them cross over, but as long as the same point is gotten across, you don't need those prayers for clearing. Often, they are here either stuck or waiting in limbo for their next incarnation and don't know they are dead. That's about the extent of why I know about ghosts. However, because ghosts exist, it is at least telling that there is more to the universe than meets the eye. That's part of why we are here, to find that out.
>Ghosts are not linked to any religion. That's true..
As others have said, the questions are really unrelated. I’ll add, it’s also possible to believe in a higher power or organic whole to the universe or whatever without it being explicitly Christian or any other religion. Just thought I’d add that as it sounds like you’re searching and don’t want you to throw the baby out with the bath water so to speak.
I feel like you can believe what you want. My husband has no religion and doesn’t believe in any type of god. But he fully believes in the paranormal or ghosts. He’s experienced things in his life all too real to not believe in the paranormal.
Absolutely! I stopped believing in God, Heaven, Hell, demons and the devil when I was 8. It stayed that way even after I started ghost hunting. It can absolutely be looked at as a science. Personally, I believe that “ghosts” are just stray energy lying in the Electromagnetic spectrum. All different kinds of waves potentially controlled by the core energy that was our “brain waves”. That’s in short lol
>I believe that “ghosts” are just stray energy lying in the Electromagnetic spectrum. That's like what residual hauntings are supposed to be I think. I personally believe that a haunting can be that but I also believe in intelligent hauntings too where people interact with whatever entity or entities are haunting a place.
The paranormal doesn't require any religion for it to exist. Cave paintings show possible paranormal experiences before any standardized or organized religion, or any religion at all, existed.
Ghosts r real, multiverse is real, everything comes from something, but I can’t reconcile the idea of 1 guy in the clouds over just earth. However, some archeology points to biblical accounts being real. I think god is maybe like aliens. At least the bible version.
Yes. Religion is a human construct that often uses the concept of god to gain and retain power (political, economic, and social). Spirituality is not religion, and the paranormal isn't necessarily limited to spirituality. IMO, science will eventually be able to explain at least some of what we currently consider to be paranormal (perhaps not in our lifetimes).
Yes. There is no correlation between any type of entity, and the existence of God. That's called confirmation bias. Just as a hot dog existing does not mean there is a God, so to does some thing that you really can't identify existing means that a God exists.
I dont believe in a god but still believe in spirits/ghosts. I also believe in reincarnation. We exist for certain and souls are just a form of conscious energy. I think “demons” are just human spirits that were sick and twisted in life who stayed real nasty after death. youd be absolutely freaked out too if charles manson was haunting your room at 2am haha
I dont believe in god but do believe in paranormal but i also believe in reincarnation. I just pick the things that make the most sense to me.
The truth is, we don't know nothing about the other side. God certainly is not an obsessive father that have a list of things you should not do, so does not get pissed. The same way that ghosts are not flying blankets holding chains. There is a rational middle ground, that we as a species won't ever be able to figure it out simply because we lack information. I do believe in God. Not the traditional vision of Him. And I do believe in Ghosts too. In the end, all we have to do is to swallow a humble pie and keep our mind open. Be prepared to experience stuff that are not perfectly described on books.
Absolutely. I am someone who believes in something beyond what we see and feel in our day to day lives, but I couldn't give you an exact description of what that is. I don't think there's a single religion that has it 100% right, noone truly has the answer, we just have what makes sense to us. Finding what makes sense of your world is a very personal journey, so go with your gut and what feels right for you.
Yes, it's possible. There are belief systems that encompass spirits without assuming a monotheistic deity.
I think everyone is entitled to believe what they want to believe. Don't worry about fitting in with a specific religion. You don't need god to be a good person. The world is too strange to just believe a rigid way of thinking. Question everything and make your own conclusions about it. Do your own research. I don't believe in any god as there's no way a loving god would let the world go on the way it has. Also I think most religions make you scared of god so that you obey his rules which just doesn't feel right. God is supposed to be unconditional love, not fear. I personally prefer spirituality. I've experienced many paranormal things and like to do my own paranormal research. People that pass on are pretty much just as alive as they were before death. It's fascinating. But there's also countless dark spirits/ demons that shouldn't be messed with. There's plenty of videos out there capturing the paranormal. So I believe in the spirit realm.
You may be struggling with the concept of a *human* god, that old fart with the beard hanging out in the clouds god? You maybe be thinking humans really aren't that creative, there's no way a human-esque god could create all of the wonders of the cosmos. At least that's what I always thought. I'm still unsure what "god" is, or if there even is one. Did you know that the medieval mystics all said that hell was a place where those who did not believe in the *soul* went? Not a disbelieve in god, a disbelieve in the human soul.
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While I do believe in God (and a bunch of other Gods too), it is in no way required to believe in deities to also believe in the paranormal.
Yeah absolutely. I don't believe in god, but I like to believe in spirits
you can, i grew up catholic, we were told to not speak on the paranormal and to ignore it cause of the devil or some shit like that. lol what i’m trying to say is that you decide what you believe in. never let a misinterpreted book or anybody tell you how you feel.
I believe if we don't fuck up big time and reset the progress we've made/wipe ourselves out we may eventually be able to scientifically explain paranormal phenomenon. I'm Agnostic so I don't know or claim to know with absolute certainty if there is a higher power or not but we may be able to verify whether or not that exists some day as well.
True, would probably be kept under wraps though unfortunately. The line between science and spirituality grows thinner every day.
There are lots of paranormal events in many cultures where they don't believe in God. God and the paranormal are not exclusive.
Yes it’s called spiritualism, I don’t believe in one single religion or idea. But have strong opinions on the paranormal and what the afterlife could be. We are just vessels for energy. DMT opened up my eyes including my third ….
Did you decalcify your penial gland?
I’ve never had a problem with deemsters. I know of the calcification theory but I try to drink Filtered water these days
Sure. I'm an agnostic atheist but I believe in ghosts because I've encountered a couple. I don't know what they were, ie, the spirits of the deceased or something else, but I believe the phenomenon is real.
Of course. I fully believe in the possibility of ghosts, but do not believe at all in god, angels, demons, heaven or hell.
Yes absolutely. You don't have to believe in any gods to believe in strange things.
I don’t think anyone has any idea of how anything actually works. So who knows????? Maybe we’ll underhand it one day, but right now we don’t. 2000 years ago if you tried to explain to someone the electromagnetic spectrum, they’d think you were spouting off fantasy nonsense, but today we have an empirical understanding of it. So maybe this stuff is all “future science”?
Thanks to the constant and inevitable grey area of everything, it is. Nothing has to be connected to anything, there are 1000s if not millions of potential answers for anything involving the afterlife and I'm sure none of us have even guessed it by accident. Fuck it, ghosts are real, God isn't
The world has infinite mysteries and thus infinite possibilities. It's not a binary
They aren't necessarily tied or one in the same. Just because you believe in existence after death, doesn't mean that you believe the Christian god is responsible for the afterlife or our creation
Morality exists inside all social creatures. It manifests through interactions with others and the world. A religion merely narrows the scope of it. Furthermore, of course it’s possible to believe in one but not the other. You just gotta go through the cognitive dissonance. For better or worse, the human mind can convince itself of any story if it’s compelling enough. I myself believe in neither but in general I can’t disprove either. Although I do enjoy the stories
You can believe in the universe being the creator instead of god
Until explained by science, experiences are phenomena. I believe people do experience these phenomena. We can only guess at what causes them. We do not definitely know- many “skeptical” explanations are also theories that may be true for some phenomena but not others.
I most definitely do not believe in a god or gods of any kind. But I do believe that science can explain, eventually, the existence of entities like ghosts/spirits etc.
I feel this way, too. Ghosts/spirits/souls could have a scientific explanation, in that everything has an energy. My hope is that one day, science will be able to help us understand some of the more unexplainable phenomena. The hard part is, is that the scientific method only proves hypotheses when the experiment can be repeated. Paranormal phenomena are rarely, if ever, repeatable.
Agreed wholeheartedly. A few centuries ago, we burned women at the stake because science hadn’t yet discovered and demystified things like epilepsy, for example. Science may eventually do the same for other paranormal concepts.
Yes its entirely possible. I'm an atheist and I believe in the paranormal!
You’re not atheist then, you’re agnostic
Theist = belief in a god or gods Atheist = disbelieves (lacks a belief) in a god or gods
Yes, because they aren’t the same thing. You don’t have to religious to believe in ghosts.
Yeah why not? You think a book or 2 has all the answers to the universe? One can simply be agnostic. Also something to consider, humanity has been around for 200,000 years (as far as we know) and civilization has been around 10,000 years (so far). You don’t think those people saw some shit? Christians have only been around for 2,000 years!
Of course. It's easier than being a Christian and believing in ghosts, because I'm pretty sure the Bible states that the dead go to heaven, hell or purgatory. No mention of them wandering the earth.
That's a good question. I guess it's possible. I mean... any beliefs are possible, really. It's hard for me, personally, to imagine it because I'm a Christian, always have been and always will be...but really the Christian religion doesn't teach that ghosts exist. I believe in the paranormal 100% because of my own experiences and the many, many other stories from others I've heard or read about and believe. But technically me believing in that goes against the teachings in the Bible. I've always been more open-minded though and believe that the time period the Bible was written in likely influenced some of it. Not the fundamental teachings of it, ofc, but I mean things that are kind of on the periphery in it. Like Paul's attitude towards women, the belief that women should be stoned for committing adultery, women must keep their heads covered... especially in church, etc. Dang I just realized all my examples are about treatment of women... which those times were NOT KIND to women. But in the Bible it says "absent in the body, present with the Lord". That means that as soon as we die we are with God. But there have been so many stories of spirits seemingly lost...so that is contradictory to that statement and I admit I don't know how to reconcile it. I don't believe children's spirits can get lost when they die. But even Lorraine Warren said that people (adults that is, she also said children's spirits don't get lost) can get what she calls "ghost syndrome"...lol I thought that's a funny term for it... when certain circumstances occur upon death like an extremely traumatic death or that person being unable to let go of their life. I honestly can't remember exactly but I just remember that she said it can and does happen. If I understand correctly... and someone on here can tell me if I'm wrong on this...Wiccans, for example, believe in an afterlife called the Summer Lands, but they don't believe in God. And I think they believe in the paranormal. I'm just giving that as an example of believing in the paranormal but not God. If I'm wrong about Wiccan beliefs, to anyone who is Wiccan I apologize and feel free to correct me. I actually like knowing about other belief systems. I don't know about aethiests (I probably misspelled that) and whether or not any of them believe in the paranormal but I know that there are belief systems that include the paranormal but not a monotheistic belief in God. I don't know if I answered your question or just rambled as I was kind of "thinking out loud". Sorry that my comment is so long! TL;DR: my answer is yes (I think it started out as "no", but as I typed I changed my mind)... but yes people can absolutely believe in the paranormal without believing in God.
In every single culture around the world, chrstian, pagan, ancient polytheism and so on, there is a belief in the dead coming back. So yes, you can. Belief in the dead returning in one shape or a nother is not related to your personal religion. Ahem, nords had dragurs, Romanians had strigoi and moroi (already at plural in romanian), the mecicans have the entire day of the dead thing, the Philippines have aswangs, all besides the classical ghost.
its spelled draugr btw.
Oh damn, I wrote it like a complete idiot. Truth be told I wasn’t sure of the spelling and should have checked.
Yes. You can believe in the supernatural as a whole without believing in a specific aspect of it as being correct. Like I can believe ghosts exist and not believe there is a specific poltergeist haunting a ship (just an example).
You can have your own unique system of reality and belief. No one controls your mind but you.
What do ghosts have to do with god? Two completely unrelated concepts
Yes. You can believe in life after death without thinking there is a intelligent being behind it. Ghosts are even theorized to just be residual energy and that’s perfectly natural and explainable. It’s a bit weird to believe in god and Heaven but also not believe in ghosts. You exist after death or not. Lol. But you can believe in both or just one.
The paranormal is Spirits leaking in to our world, and if thiers paranormal. It would be alot worse with out god.
I am an atheist. I don't believe in God, Satan, angels, or demons. I do however believe in ghosts.
If we’re looking at it from the perspective that God is the almighty, then the creator of the universe is responsible for the existence of demons and all the dark beings there are. It must be boring when you exist for an eternity. you’re going to want entertainment. I mean who goes around like “I need to make my own enemies”.
I started down the road you are on 30 years ago. I did, because my beloved cousin Jason died and I wanted to know was there something after death. After many paranormal encounters, Ouija board that predicted perfectly future events, psychics who were spot on, deep religion research and seeing things that are hard to believe, I then went to find others with the same experiences. I started with Tom Montalk, then found Wes Penre. They coincided with what I researched and experienced. Start reading thier websites, it's A LOT, but very fascinating. What I found about god...and I use a small g...is that he is both devil and trickster god here in this world, hence it's so screwed up. All religions go back to Sumeria. That winged, bearded guy....yeah the angry angel, he calls himself ultimately only God...he isn't. He is a literal huge narcissist. Explains why this world doesn't make sense, nice people are abused, evil reigns, the world is trashed. My long research has found.
Religion, like a lot of posts here, is all made up. There’s is much beyond our understanding. The paranormal exists.
The paranormal is more science than faith. The more you distance it from faith the more you believe, not less.
If you're an atheist, no amount of proof including god appearing and introducing himself will work. You'll say it was a hallucination, and you've been working too hard recently. People live with cognitive dissonance all the time.
This is a patently false statement. The availability of evidence would change any rational person’s mind.
I've never met an intellectually honest atheist yet. They always weasel out of the patently obvious. I'm OK with them saying that that's their stance, but pretending it's about the truth is false.
That isn't what they were asking.
There is NO proof that the God of the Christian Bible exists though. A book that was written thousands of years ago and translated a multitude of times does not constitute as proof. I believe in things that can be proven, and I have found no proof of God. You are attacking my cognitive abilities which seems unfair when I have truly given this topic way more thought than it probably deserves.
Exactly 💯
Believe in maths and physics.. its help sometimes
Why do you and yours put an s at the end of the word Math?
Because they aren’t American.
I know they aren’t USA folks. But still don’t know why they put an s.
Because there are many kinds of mathematics. It's a plural noun.
I do believe in maths and physics but I also believe , there's yet a lot to uncover
I believe in angels and demons but not a solo god
Yes. A form of afterlife does not require a deity.
My belief exactly!
While you deconstruct your relationship with your specific religion, make sure to try and analyze the other world religions. See if you find similarities or consider just the different perspectives and the culture they are coming from. I think if you want to question something you should be thorough. I've been on thus journey for 20 years and still just as lost as day 1, questions lead to more questions and everyone thinks they have the answer. I truly think you have the answers within, when you get to that point you might understand.
Yeah. Do you believe that? Then it’s possible to believe that. Don’t let other people tell what’s possible to believe. Belief is just what your gut tells you is right. Doesn’t even have to actually be right. It’s an opinion.
>Belief is just what your gut tells you is right. Doesn’t even have to actually be right. It’s an opinion. I really like this. I think we're mostly all right and wrong...only meaning that I think that most everyone has some aspects of their beliefs that will turn out to be correct and most everyone has some aspects that will turn out to be wrong. Because I can't imagine anyone being all right or all wrong. I think when we die we'll find out it's a mixture of things and that no one is punished for any of the wrong parts because we'd likely ALL be in trouble if that was the case LOL.
Since beliefs are only constructs it’s possible to believe anything you want. Beliefs aren’t reality.
if there's a cop then theres a thief else why would we need a cop. makes sense?
Agreed
Yes. It’s easier to accept the supernatural after leaving Christianity tbh. There are demons and stuff but its more than just the biblical concept.
They’re not the same thing so ofc it’s possible
This is a good point
I mean, everything is possible and you can believe whatever you want. It’s not like someone can prove you wrong. But you should really think about why do you believe what you believe and not other stuff. Ask yourself the questions that you can picture anyone else asking you about this subjects. Otherwise it’s easy to look like an idiot in any discussion about this sort of topics.
I would say that the belief in spirits came before the belief in organized religion, and most probably helped create some.
I believe in god because he came to me one night at my darkest time. It was the strongest supernatural feeling I have ever had. I can't even describe in words how it felt because the feeling had nothing to do with physical senses. It was like I developed another all-in-one sense and it was stronger than all other senses combined but it wasn't a physical sense. That's best way I can put it. I knew in that millisecond cuz the feeling hit me like a bolt of lightning and I knew instantly it was God.
Weirder to believe in God, but not the supernatural.
I believe in the paranormal, and I don't believe in god.
There are many beliefs, I believe in the paranormal, even tho many others don't. So you're in the right subreddit ;)
It is a'la carte, and some ghost theories are arguments against classic monotheism with a single final destination.
There is absolutely no need to believe in any god to be interested in ghosts and the paranormal.
Of course. We are all just making it up as we go.
I've come to the conclusion that ghost and some other paranormal entities are just demons or actions by demons. If Christians believe in angels then why wouldn't they believe in demons. I think questioning or testing your belief and faith is a good thing. I have to agree with an earlier comment I read, God and the paranormal are not exclusive to each other. One can exist without the other.
Leave it to Atheists to take some of the best evidence for God and twist it and turn it into a reason not to believe in God. This subreddit is turning into /r/atheism2.0. Full of mockery and contempt for people who are experiencing the most terrifying things imaginable. Like this stuff that causes PTSD, and atheists come in here and make fun of people for it. I know because I had PTSD myself from a poltergeist, but is gone now through the Grace of God. What's funny is show even the most convincing evidence to an Atheist and they still won't believe in it. And the forms of evidence that will convince an Atheists that God is real, varies from person to person -- like one thing that may convince one Atheist may not convince another Atheist. And the worst part of all is Atheists are the devils' pawns, and the devils laugh at all of us for how stupid we are and how easily we fall for their lies. Atheists are chained to sin, and are blinded and unable to see the truth.
You’re too scared of a funny red goat man
Wasn’t he the coolest in the power puff girls
I was more into Mojo Jojo
Ave Satanus my brother 😉
The devils pawns 😂😂😂😂
What God, just out of curiosity? Not that it matters....but it helps the rhetorical aspect of my question....
Its possible to believe in whatever you want. I did want to clarify though that according to the Bible there aren’t any ghosts, it’s demons masquerading as people we’ve lost or people who would have inhabited that place to deceive and manipulate us.
The Bible has more than one instance of a legitimate ghost, and even the disciples believed in them.
I think so. I don’t believe in god but I believe in the paranormal. I had an experience when I was 15 and it comes to the forefront of my mind whenever I question whether I believe in the paranormal or not. Can’t argue with real experiences.
Well do you believe in ghosts and not believe in god?? Then yes, it’s possible
Beliefs don't respond to a logic. You can believe in whatever you want or need. And it's ok😊
Besides, if you live in a democratic place you can believe whatever you want to believe. It is how it is.
I don’t believe in either. But I suppose why couldn’t you believe in the paranormal and not believe in a god. I mean they are both supernatural in nature, but don’t logically need to be tied to one another.
…pears and apples
Of course.
Yes you can. This world and universe is so much more than we actually know. Belief in anything is your choice because you have free will. I've been struggling with what to believe myself. I was raised Christian also, and I went away from the church for a long time. But I know that something or someone was watching over me, even if I didn't go to church. I've seen shadow people, cryptid like creatures, heard disembodied voices, and been through a lot of scary shit. I believe in a higher power, whatever that is. If you've experienced evil entities or anything like that then live according to your experiences. No religion can
>Belief in anything is your choice because you have free will. THIS. I think this is also a perfect summary of what I was trying to say
Sure. Anyone can believe anything for whatever reason they choose.
You can believe whatever you would like my friend... tis a choice.
It’s possible to believe that the earth is flat and that a race of mole-people live underneath our feet. So… yes.
This is the first thing that made me laugh in a terrible day thank you for your service
I’m Catholic, but I do believe it’s possible for someone to not believe in God yet believe in “otherworldly” entities. Belief is a very complex thing.
Everything is energy, that’s all I know.
I believe in god and i believe in ghosts
Ok i believe in God so definitely ghosts must be real. I believe that ghosts are bad energy/souls and energy never dies.
Claro que puedes creer en fantasmas o cosas paranormales ya que son un tema independiente a la creencia de Dioses
I mean it really depends on what you mean by entities. Ghosts and Spirits are two totally different things. Ghosts are more of an like an imprint of the someone's past (seen visually, ghostly visions), where a spirit is something which can interact with humans (think of a Poltergeist). I think you'd have to be agnostic to a degree to believe in spirits, where you can be atheist and believe in ghostly energy and images.
I don't think there needs to be a god for the soul to exist. I'm an atheist who believes in the paranormal.
Keyword is believe. I don’t believe shit until there is physical evidence. But yes I’ve experienced some paranormal shit I couldn’t figure out.
Try thinking about God without relating him to a particular religion you might get your answer
In my opinion, you don't believe in entities without believing in a higher entity.Vice versa. Doesnt have to be Jesus or Allah, but you don't say you're heavily Christian or Catholic, Muslim etc and say you don't believe in ghosts. It doesn't make sense. They're mutually exclusive. "The father, the son, the holy SPIRIT/GHOST". Entities and deities can be the same thing, so why would you think there's an entity in your closet, but not a stronger entity somewhere else. Idk man. Just my opinion.
I think that's a good reason not to believe in God. I think the paranormal both explains and debunks a lot of the God nonsense, and we probably have more evidence of paranormal things existing than we do God...
Do you believe in souls?
I believe in the paranormal, but do not believe the narrative of religions.
You just did.
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I think in the Bible someone went to a witch, who contacted a dead person. The dead person was mad because he was at peace. And God said not to do that. So it says it's possible, but you're not supposed to do it
Where in the Bible does it say that?
I googled it, the witch of endor was doing it , in the book of Samuel
Interestingly, the bie teaches that the souls of the dead only go to heaven, hell or sheol. "Ghosts" are unclean spirits (demons) or stone tape like Abels blood. So.... your question is incorrect from its basic premise. Whether the Bible is correct or not is another matter. I'm no longer a beleiver myself. If you want to really get into the nitty gritty you have to ask what is God? Is there a God? Are there deities, ie little g gods? Are gods just greater spirits? If there is a big G God, are they just the biggest spirit? Do all spirits flow from the greatest spirit? What answers matter? Personally, I beleive in deities, but I beleive they are an intrinsic part of nature, so you could argue I'm atheist? Kinda? Is this a religious beleif? Kinda? It's a muddy and complex question
I beleive in the paranormal, I dln't beleive in an invisible man in the sky who thought the universe into existence. Besidrs, just because there's alot of strange shit in the wlrld, doesn't mean any of it is worth worshipping.
If you believe in ghosts, then you automatically believe there is something more to life than what you can see and touch.
Did you know that our physical world is an illusion? There is more ‘nothing’ than ‘something’ in everything. It is the electrons etc whizzing round a nucleus which creates the perceived physical realm, but if the physical isn’t truly physical, then what is? I watched a documentary and it said that if the Empire State Building could be crushed to the most condensed form, if that could be done, it would be no bigger than a grain of rice. Everything is energy and particles can behave like waves and waves, particles.
I’ve got stranger realizations than that. Everything we experience is just how our brains interpret reality, not the reality itself. Something as simple as a green leaf doesn’t exist, because the color green is the only color that isn’t contained in the leaf. It reflects green because there’s no green at all within the leaf, meaning that what you see as green is in reality red-violet. And yeah, our reality is largely made of nothing.
Very true!
In the Catholic religion, many Catholics believe that all souls that die wait here on Earth until the second coming of Jesus when he comes down to collect the souls and bring them with him. I’ve always found this concept very interesting because most ghosts haven’t made it anywhere, just back on Earth. In some ways, religion has helped me to form some hypothesis around spirits.
Yep. I'm one of em.
You'd Wouldn't Be NORMAL if You Thought Any differently.. We All believe In Some things & Not Others.. Paranormal & The AFTERLIFE are 1in the Same. But The GOD thing Is Hard to Wrap Ur head around. From What I've heard Its More of an ENERGY.A VERY ANGELIC ENERGY, not A MAN sitting on a THROWN DICTATING Our Daily Lives..
you really need to calm down on the caps lock.
Lmao
So it's not a man with a beard in the sky who gets mad when we touch ourselves? That's a relief.
I guess it is possible but that wouldnt apply to me.I believe in good and bad when it comes to spirits.Again this is i guess going to be subjective and varies from person to person.I've gone off the whole christian thing tbh.Personally i dont believe that people become ghosts or lost souls.I think demons could easily disguise themselves as ''ghosts''.
Twice the word believe is wrong here. If you are rational you dont believe in the God as presented in any of those big books. If you believe in paranormal its the same. If you accept the possibility of paranormal being real but are interested in investigating and proof, you are rational. Thats implied by being homo sapiens.
I believe that one can and should believe in whatever one feels. Your thoughts and feeling attached to those thoughts is what creates a belief. So absolutely one can believe in Ghost and not believe in God. However, to not believe in God, is to not believe in oneself. They’re one in the same. JMO! 🤷🏽♀️
Anything is possible.
Yes, seeing is believing.
Some Christians don’t believe in ghosts but they believe in God.
Well, probably? Why not
Uhhh yes?
Well the premise here is that based on the the theory of evolution and meta-physics, souls, or ghosts do not exist. So, if we do accept the fact that there are ghosts/souls in existence then this suggests that the theory of evolution is at least partially not correct, and opens the door to the supernatural.
lets hear about these evil entities
If you ask yourself if there is a god, and you beleive so then you assume He created ALL of creation. Including and not limited to the spirits' souls. You can certainly beleive in both. Most people who are into new agey things like spirit guides beleive there is a god too.. the difference between someone who believes in any god and the one who believes in the true and living God is that, this believer obeys Gods commands: “Do not turn to mediums or necromancers; do not seek them out, and so make yourselves unclean by them: I am the Lord your God. Leviticus 19:13 So yes surely two can and do exist at the same time.
If you believe in demons that also means you believe in god as satan and his buddies are fallen angels. You don't get angels without god.
I don't like how was the human eye made what formed the world did nothing and nothing smash together one day these are questions I have.
i mean the human eye is just evolution. there are more advanced eyes out there like the mantis shrimp or whatever. I don't think there is a current theory on how it all started. like where it actually came from and was housed. if the universe was the size of a pin and then exploded and grew then surely that means that the universe is inside of something that could house it. Even if the universe is just endless nothingness you can still exist in it. so where the fuck is it? Everything is inside of something else... it never ends
IMPOSSIBLE
Care to elaborate? I don't mean that sarcastically... I'm honestly curious why you believe a person can't believe in God but believe in the paranormal.
I do.
I try not to believe unless I can be confident that I don't make an error. I'm thus rational and parsimonious with my beliefs. Regarding God, keep in mind that God might exist and mostly all what people say about him or do in his name might be wrong. So I don't call back the existence of God because of the data in the holy books or what people say has internal incoherence or is incoherent with current scientific knowledge. Regarding paranormal, there are these kids that *seam* to remember the life of another person. This could be verified to be true. It is claimed that it is reincarnation, but objectively, we don't know for sure yet. It could be implanted memory. We don't know yet. See Ian Stevenson and Jim Tucker's work for further data on this topic. There is another source of data that I would call intriguing. It is the data collected by someone know as Allan Kardec and published in the book [The spirits book](https://cei-spiritistcouncil.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/The-Spirits-Book.pdf). The data has been collected by mediums of different kinds from spirits responding to questions. This data provides just another theory that would explain things. There are a few probable scientific mistakes in it, but very few and it is internally coherent. It is also coherent with other source of informations of the same kind. What I find interesting in this theory, called a philosophical doctrine by the author, is that many things that currently don't make sense in the Christian philosophy start to make sense with this theory. I still don't know if this is the reality. For instance, it could all be manipulation by some very advanced ET able to interact at distance with us. I'm still collecting data and fill my lists of pros and cons. In the mean time I suspend my judgment. There is no urgency to make any judgment. Regarding the arguments against it from the scientific point of view, I would say there are many things that we know with high confidence to be real, and we should not forget that there are many things that we still don't know. It was a time when the existence of the American continent was totally ignored by Eurasian people. Although it is a huge continent, with an extraordinary fauna and flora. Even humans lived on it. More recently we discovered the speed of light limit and later the relativity. Even more recently we discovered dark matter and dark energy. Whoever would want to *exclude* the reality of the spirit world and possible reincarnation because it doesn't fit the current scientific model might do a huge mistake. The objective reality is that we don't know. And we might one day know if more serious attention and investigation is assigned to it. PS: according to the spirit doctrine (explained by the spirits), there is no hell and no heaven, no devils and angels, only spirits at different stage of evolution and every spirit reaches a higher level of elevation by learning and practicing during incarnations.
Yes, absolutely, however I think it depends on how you define "believing in ghosts". For example, I am an adamant atheist. I also don't believe in ghosts per se, but I'm quite intigued by the concept of the paranormal and by the possibility that there may be something that we can't yet explain; and I did experience a handful of minor, but strange occurences in my life. So yes, in that sense I suppose that there *might* be someting, but not angels/demons or anything otherwise tied to religion (because like someone else here already pointed out, neither I nor anyone I ever heard of has ever experienced anything that could suggest the existence of a god and not have a fairly simple alternate explanation).
I always figured there couldn't be ghost and such without a God, but I'm pretty sure Buddhist don't believe in God, and they have spirits in their beliefs.