An appropriate Hallowe'en subject - interesting discussion on the radio about it, and how the perception of it has altered through the ages. In the Catholic Middle Ages, people thought of ghosts as helpful, often religious characters, who came to advise or warn quite often. After the Reformation in the early 17thC people began to think they were actively demonic - this view is still largely held in the US - presumably it was taken there by the Pilgrim Fathers and the other English free-thinkers who went over there in the C17th... and now this idea has returned from the US to haunt evangelical and charismatic Christians.
The author being interviewed said that a popular idea now was that buildings, especially those made of organic materials, held impressions of strong emotions, so deaths and births were often a factor in hauntings... this made a lot of sense to me. After all, many churches have a fantastically good atmosphere because of all the positive prayer going on there for centuries. The two best attested hauntings at my parents' house were connected with a birth and a death. What of the other ones? The moving wardrobe may have some other origin... and those bursts of laughter and noise I used to hear occasionally - who knows? I feel the atmosphere in Cippenham Place is very bad again, which is one of the reasons why I don't like going there. It's ennervating - I have to fight it. It makes me feel defensive and hostile - or is that just my family? No, I do think that there's something there now, maybe connected with my mother, or negative emotions concerning her last years there. I don't know whether this can be exorcised, since it is not exactly demonic.
Apparently ghosts seem to proliferate in England due to the anxiety about them after the Reformation - people were forbidden to pray for the dead, the doctrine of Purgatory was dropped, and people felt unhappy about the lot of those who had died recently, this anxiety seems to have proliferate belief in ghosts.
I think I've seen ghosts, Finn has seen one in this house, and I have certainly suffered from "atmospheres". I have always thought the story of the ghost on Salisbury Plain who "warned" my friend's son Mark was a very interesting and credible story, much more proactive than merely seeing a woman simply drifting through one's room. It is odd about my parents' house: I liked it when it was properly haunted - although it could be frightening. I didn't like the fact that they had a perfectly nice house exorcised, although it did get rid of the jumping wardrobe and the haunted cupboard. (And nearly did for the drinks cupboard - that's what happens when you get a charismatic evangelical to exorcise for you). Maybe what I experience there is a sense of closing in - the idea of fewer years ahead, the necessity to make peace with one's mortality (I think I have) and perhaps the restless unwillingness of my father to do this. Oh dear.
The author being interviewed said that a popular idea now was that buildings, especially those made of organic materials, held impressions of strong emotions, so deaths and births were often a factor in hauntings... this made a lot of sense to me. After all, many churches have a fantastically good atmosphere because of all the positive prayer going on there for centuries. The two best attested hauntings at my parents' house were connected with a birth and a death. What of the other ones? The moving wardrobe may have some other origin... and those bursts of laughter and noise I used to hear occasionally - who knows? I feel the atmosphere in Cippenham Place is very bad again, which is one of the reasons why I don't like going there. It's ennervating - I have to fight it. It makes me feel defensive and hostile - or is that just my family? No, I do think that there's something there now, maybe connected with my mother, or negative emotions concerning her last years there. I don't know whether this can be exorcised, since it is not exactly demonic.
Apparently ghosts seem to proliferate in England due to the anxiety about them after the Reformation - people were forbidden to pray for the dead, the doctrine of Purgatory was dropped, and people felt unhappy about the lot of those who had died recently, this anxiety seems to have proliferate belief in ghosts.
I think I've seen ghosts, Finn has seen one in this house, and I have certainly suffered from "atmospheres". I have always thought the story of the ghost on Salisbury Plain who "warned" my friend's son Mark was a very interesting and credible story, much more proactive than merely seeing a woman simply drifting through one's room. It is odd about my parents' house: I liked it when it was properly haunted - although it could be frightening. I didn't like the fact that they had a perfectly nice house exorcised, although it did get rid of the jumping wardrobe and the haunted cupboard. (And nearly did for the drinks cupboard - that's what happens when you get a charismatic evangelical to exorcise for you). Maybe what I experience there is a sense of closing in - the idea of fewer years ahead, the necessity to make peace with one's mortality (I think I have) and perhaps the restless unwillingness of my father to do this. Oh dear.
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