#30: Matthew J. Cressler - Do Catholics believe in ghosts?

Belief in the spirit world is central to the Christian faith, but Catholicism takes communion with supernatural realities to a whole new level. Catholics pray not only to God but also to Mary and the saints. Catholics even talk to their dead, say prayers for them, and ask them, in turn, for intercession. The lives of the saints are filled with stories about miraculous healings, levitation, bilocation, visions of the afterlife, and mystical conversations with Jesus, the angels, and the saints.  But does this mean that Catholics believe in ghosts? Does the Catholic Church have a teaching on whether or not the dead can walk this earth, appear to people, and haunt places that were important to them? When Catholics pray to saints or talk to their beloved dead, how is this different from trying to make contact with the spirits of those who have departed this life?  The guest on this episode of Glad You Asked will help answer these questions. Matthew J. Cressler is a scholar of religion, race, and culture. He is the author of Authentically Black and Truly Catholic: The Rise of Black Catholicism in the Great Migrations (NYU Press) as well as numerous scholarly articles. Cressler has written for U.S. Catholic and many other publications, including America, The Atlantic, National Catholic Reporter, Religion News Service, The Revealer, and Slate. Together with Adelle M. Banks, he co-reported the Religion News Service series "Beyond the Most Segregated Hour," which won a Wilbur Award from the Religion Communicators Council. You can read some of Cressler's writings, and learn more about this topic, in the links below. "Paranormal activity: Do Catholics believe in ghosts?" by Tim Townsend. https://uscatholic.org/articles/201310/paranormal-activity-do-catholics-believe-in-ghosts/ "Ghosts of Christians past: The church's long history of hauntings" by Tim Townsend. https://uscatholic.org/articles/201310/ghosts-of-christians-past-the-churchs-long-history-of-spooks-and-hauntings/ "You can't have a Catholic imagination without horror," by Matthew J. Cressler. https://uscatholic.org/articles/202210/you-cant-have-a-catholic-imagination-without-horror/ "Exorcists, Abusers, and When Catholic History is Horror," by Matthew J. Cressler. https://therevealer.org/exorcists-abusers-and-when-catholic-history-is-horror/ "How the god you worship influences the ghosts you see," by Joel Abrams. https://theconversation.com/how-the-god-you-worship-influences-the-ghosts-you-see-84163 Glad You Asked is sponsored by the Claretian Missionaries. https://www.claretiansusa.org/