Ghost's

[Philippe]

im defending Catholocism in a protestant forum and i was asked to post the Catholic theological view on ghosts. i cant seem to find any official documents about this and i was wondering if u could help me

thanks, God Bless,

- Philippe

[BLAZEr]

mind you, this isn't from the catechism, but here it goes:

The soul is created by God at the moment of conception, and its home is the body until the death of the body. At the death of the body the sould undgoes its particualr judgement and goes either to hell or to purgatory/heaven. If a soul is in heaven it would not leave the place of glory to wander the earth. If the soul is in hell, it could not be aware of the earth since the earth is a good, and the soul in hell does not experience goodness.

So this leaves to me, one explanation for ghosts: They are angels and demons. Angels scripturally have taken a semi-physical form (even if just to be seen and heard) so it would seem to me that demons would also have such capabilities.

What most people describe as ghosts, I figure, are demons or angels instead. Either way, a quick prayer to St. Michael should take care of the problem.

[Theologian in Training]

While there is no definitive teaching by the Church on one's belief in ghosts, I have found the following [url="http://www.saint-mike.org/library/brojp/7ghosts.asp"]link[/url]
quite helpful in discernment. Also, you might check out what your fellow phatmassers had to say on this topic [url="http://phorum.phatmass.com/index.php?showtopic=68&hl=ghosts"]here[/url]

Hope that helps.

God Bless