Ghost, Schmost...Angel, Schmangel

In a story in the Alabama Press-Register a reporter interviewed several experts on religion and its relationship with the paranormal. The article is an interesting read and I urge you to take a look at it.

In short the article discusses the various ways in which religion and the paranormal are viewed. For example, how religious based supernatural beliefs are acceptable such as a risen savior, miracles, angels, and demons while paranormal beliefs can be treated with disdain be they Bigfoot, UFO's or ghosts.

However, the most interesting parts of the article look into the relationship of religion to paranormal beliefs. According to the article Catholics seem to believe more in paranormal activity than most other denominations.

"Catholics actually score pretty high on paranormal beliefs, which if you look at Catholic theology, that kind of makes sense," said [Baylor Professor Carson] Mencken, citing the role of apparitions, such as those of the Virgin Mary in Medjugorje.

It seems that for those who consider themselves Christian but do not attend church regularly there is a greater belief in paranormal events. One commentator even went so far as to claim that believing in UFOs was the "non-religious" version of believing in Guardian Angels. Interesting, concept to say the least.

Among people who self identify as spiritual rather than religious there is also a greater chance they will believe in paranormal phenomena. But, one of the most interesting observations was this:

Christine Wicker, author of Not in Kansas Anymore: A Curious Tale of How Magic is Transforming America, meanwhile, posited that one factor behind the "resurgence of magical thought" is "widespread disappointment with organized religion."

She cited Daniel Maguire, an ethics professor at Marquette University who said belief in the great faiths is collapsing. "People are looking for something to replace them, much as they did in the first century as Christianity began to rout paganism. Now it seems to be the other way around," she wrote.

Cecil Taylor, dean of the School of Christian Studies at the Southern Baptist-affiliated University of Mobile, put it this way: "In a post-Christian age, when the Christian consensus is removed, all sorts of paganism rushes in to takes its place. And I view most of these things as a renaissance of paganism."

Despite the self-serving claim that paganism is to blame to the shrinking of Christianity (a common theme of denial in that faith), the gist of the statement does seem to be true. As people turn away from the major religions they seem to clasp onto paranormal phenomena with the same vigor and zeal.

Certainly, some of the strongest believers are those who were once very religious or brought up in religious homes but turned away from those beliefs for some reason. Now they seem to cleave to ghosts and orbs with the same religious devotion and view anyone who dares to point out an error in those beliefs as an "unbeliever" and scorn them. Most serious researchers have been in this situation.

Of course, many of these post-religious zealots eventually become "investigators" themselves and like Biblical Archaeologists often bring their strong convictions with them. This makes their work sketchy at best as everything is tweaked to fit within their neo-religious notion of how the Universe functions in much the same way Biblical Archaeologists working for fundamentalist universities will interpret archaeological ruins to fit their Biblical notion of history.

The article makes some excellent points, although I would argue that Southerners are less likely to believe in ghosts. In my experience the opposite is true. Despite religious leaning it is such a current within folklore that very few people I have met in the South don't have some story of a ghostly encounter to share. In this case, I think they were trying to rationalize their findings among Fundamentalists by consciously ignoring a paradox between religion and regional culture.

At any rate, interesting read.

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