In late June I flew from the west coast to Buffalo, NY to perform a wedding for a young man who was just a boy when I served as his pastor there in the early 2000s.  During my week-long stay there, 3 paranormal experiences were brought to my attention; and I've decided to share them under 3 themes: (1) an amazing healing in response to prayer; (2) the exorcism of a demonic haunting;
(3) a haunted house we visited--the Van Horn mansion.

(1) The groom's Dad, Mike, told me about his friend who was recently diagnosed with a huge inoperable tumor in the center of his brain (confirmed by MRIs and other medical means).  Doctors were about to perform additional tests to determine iwhether it was malignant,and  if so, how severely, when Mike's friend asked him to pray for his healing.  Mike did and subsequent MRIs confirmed that the tumor was gone!

When I returned to Washington state, I learned that a parishioner's mother had a huge malignant tumor atop her spinal column.  Its impact had damaged her optic nerve and her inner ear.  But after prayer, it calcified and was rendered harmless.  In one case, the tumor vanished; in the other case it did not, but was rendered harmless. 

On another site, I was engaged in an ongoing debate with a close-minded atheist, CH.  I typed a post, asking him how he would cope with his young son's serious sudden affliction.  Then I felt foolish because I knew nothing such an affliction.  So I changed the post to address the meaningfulness of his life if he were confined to a nusing home and could only hope for a rare successful bowel movement.  How then would he justify his constant claims that his life was just as meaningful as mine?  I puzzled over why my original post had presumed his young son's serious physical crisis.


Shortly thereafter, I learned that his 2-year-old had a large tumor attached to his heart and had suffered temporary cardiac arrest as a result.  The boy was fighting for his life, and now, though improved, for some quality of life after the brain damage.  He will apparently never ealk or speak again.  I was struck by the 2 reported healings of tumors shortly after I learned of CH's son's tumor.

I asked CH this question: Would you rather have  your son healed through prayer in a way that strongly pointed to divine intervention or cling to your atheistic belief that prayer is an ineffective waste of time and have this belief confirmed as a self-fulfilling prophecy?   I felt I needed to ask that question because I believed CH's close-mindedness would render my prayers for healing ineffective. 

CH dismissed the question as hateful and I've done a lot of soul-searching about its appropriateness.  In retrospect, I do think it was appropriate as tough love because it exposed just how close-minded CH is.  In fact, it is the sort of question that unglues atheists by pointing to the most important reason to explore the possibilties of faith by direct experience.  In CH's case, I think the hard truth is this: he would rather accept his son's disability as the enemy he knows and fit that reality into his worldview than see his son healed and have to rethink his atheism!  Odd that after CH took great offense, I was exposed to the 2 tumor healings I've just described. 

I will outline cases (2) and (3) in my next 2 planned posts.

Don

(2) EXORCISM OF A PARANORMAL HAUNTING

When she was in high school, Karen's sister had dated a young man who worked at the local Burger King, Timothy McVeigh, and found him to be a very nice and courteous young man.  Who could have known he would become the Oklahoma City bomber?  Sometimes ordinary experience evolves into a ghastly outcome.

When I was their pastor in Buffalo, Mike and Karen often discussed the ralationship between Christianity and the paranormal with me.  Their younger son, N, did not seem interested in our discussions because they were too remote from his own life experience.

What none of us knew is that during my last year in Buffalo, N had become addicted to pharmaceuticals.  During one drug haze, he got a young lady pregnant out of wedlock.  Now his parents were helping him cope with a child he and his girlfriend were ill-equipped to raise as teenagers.  In the stress of his new responsbilities N joined some friends and went to see the horror movie 'Paranormal."  The fear generated by the movie combined with N"s sense of lostness to open him up to a haunting. 

The first symptom occurred when N was roused from his sleep in the dark by a bright light shining in his closet.  This paranormal light terrified him, but he tried to ignore it.  But then the light was accompanied by physical manifestations.  For example, the blankets were ripped from N's bed by an unseen hand.  After these manifestations lasted several days, two Pentecostal Christians were called to perform a "house cleaning" ritual, but this had no effect.  Then a Nigerian Catholic priest with experience with evil shamans was summoned and his "cleansing" eliminated the problem. The family seemed more interested in my own family's encoutners with the demonic as a result of this terrifying ordeal.  Was the entity a demon or a mischievous discarnate human?  Who can know?  But the effects of the haunting were horrific on an already very vulnerable teenager. 

Con

Mystic Tuba:

But every once in a while somebody listens. That being the case, I don't believe it is best to keep quiet because some people don't want to listen.

Nobody told the person Berserk communicated with that he had to take part on a public form.  If that person can't handle hearing and reading about differing viewpoints, perhaps he should isolate himself from the World by locking himself in his bedroom (no TV, radio, telephone or internet connection allowed.

"If that person can't handle hearing and reading about differing viewpoints, perhaps he should isolate himself from the World by locking himself in his bedroom (no TV, radio, telephone or internet connection allowed)."

Taking away one magical power and replacing it with asking someone to bow a magical power called The Divine Healing of Guru X, and the "offer" presented is still the same.

"Would you rather have  your son healed through prayer in a way that strongly pointed to divine intervention or cling to your atheistic belief that prayer is an ineffective waste of time and have this belief confirmed as a self-fulfilling prophecy?"

This is brazen and opportunistic dark side with complimentary cookies included.

<<I asked CH this question: Would you rather have your son healed through prayer in a way that strongly pointed to divine intervention or cling to your atheistic belief that prayer is an ineffective waste of time and have this belief confirmed as a self-fulfilling prophecy?   I felt I needed to ask that question because I believed CH's close-mindedness would render my prayers for healing ineffective.>>

Hi Don and welcome back!

In thinking about your question, let's turn it around and consider this scenario:

Suppose we had a devout Christian whose son was the victim of a terminal disease.  All medical avenues were explored with no hope of a cure.  The death of the child was just a matter of time.  Many prayers were rendered but nothing seemed to help.  Nevertheless the man and his family and church continued their prayers.

Now, let's suppose a "medicine man" with all the charms and amulets came on the scene.  The man approached the father and said "Would you rather have your son healed through my magic  or cling to your Christian belief that prayer is an effective way to cure illness instead of its being a waste of time"? 

It kind of changes things doesn't it.  The reason it does is because the word athiest is fraught with negative connotations.  Where we stand, an athiest is someone who is wrong and who needs a change in his belief system.

But now we have a case where a good Christian man whose belief system is challenged by someone who most people would say is a phony and a fraud.

So in the first example, the atheist is challenged to change his belief system, but he doesn't and therefore he is "stuck" in a belief that we don't share.

But in the second example, we would no doubt support the Christian man if he would reject the medicine man's offer.  In this case the man has a belief system with which we agree.

It's all in our own perspective on things and where we ourselves stand on any particular issue.  Sometimes I wonder whether having a strong belief system is a negative or positive.

Like everything else, "it depends."

R

Even though we don't want to be limited by our thoughts, I don't believe it is good to turn "belief" into a dirty word. Sometimes people believe things for good reasons. For example, I believe that unconditional love is a good thing. Does anybody want to fight me on this later point?

Hi Albert-

I would not fight you on your belief that unconditional love is a good thing.

But I would mention something about the word "unconditional."

Here is a quote from Guy De Maupassant, a 19th century French writer, about the word love:

"To love 'very much' is to love poorly: one loves -that is all- it cannot be modified or completed without being nullified." 

"It is a short word, but it contains all: it means the body, the soul, the life, the entire being.  We feel it as we feel the warmth of the blood, we breathe it as we breathe the air, we carry it in ourselves as we carry our thoughts.  Nothing more exists for us." 

"It is not a word; it is an inexpressible state indicated by four letters."

So let's consider PUL....the P and the U really are irrelevant.  Love simply IS.  It's a state of being.  To modify it in any way diminishes the true meaning of the word Love.

After all, Love cannot be impure, nor can it be conditional, and to think that it can is really a misunderstanding of what love really is.

R

Poster with an odd user name:

I created a site and wrote two books that to a significant extent serve the purpose of exposing the short comings of nonduality. A few people emailed me to say that what I had to say was very helpful. (I only know about the thoughtful people who took the time to write me.)

For example, one lady was doing quite well with her spirituality until she ran into nondual teachings. They had a negative effect. Then she found my site and found that what I had to say was very helpful. Here's a link to one of the relevant articles.

http://nondualityisdualistic.com/articles-2012/nondual-teachings-my-likes-and-di...

Whether I was motivated by love when I put a lot of money, time and effort into making my books and site available--well--I feel okay about this matter.

When it comes to ACIM--please--don't get me started.

Quote: