Ghosts, Spirits, & Other Ways Home

If we are to believe in the presence of ghosts at all (and I think that I do), it should be a cautionary belief, for what we are dealing with is truly beyond our rational explanations. Here we have presences that have clearly not moved on, for probably a host of reasons. I suspect that a great many are like students who were on their way to school and turned wrong- got off track, possibly for hundreds of years of our time, ignoring the regular route and choosing to go their own way (it seems we may still be blessed and curse with free choice, even after death for a time). They may have changed their course for what seemed to them to be good reasons: perhaps a sick relative, a feeling of things unfinished, an overly concerned heart for a loved one or a real attachment to a paticular place. There are also others who have undoubtedly remained for selfish reasons, refusing to do what they should because there may be advantages of staying here (so they believe) - or perhaps they know that certain punishment awaits and are playing a game of "spiritual hookey" for a while, surviving on the energy of the living people around them- on fear, on regret, but probably primarily negative energy (positive energy would be a certain trip home). Whatever the reasons, the fact that they are here is probably more tragedy than adventure, in every sense of the word. The idea of the ghost who lives forever happily haunting people with playful goodwill is more than likely a human invention. They must, eventually, find their way home- as we all must do. Perhaps they are the ones who Christ spoke of, as being called back at the time of the end- the Great Reckoning of all spirits "living and dead". All of this is my own theories, and it is not necessary to believe any of it- the Bible is quite silent on these matters, for it is a book written for the living, not the dead. The truly regrettable thing is the living man, walking about his life as though a ghost- never reaching out or touching any other soul. They may be in a far worse predicament than our lost, ghostly travelers.