So what are "spirits?"

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What are “spirits,” according to the Catholic worldview?

Are all deities, ghosts, astral beings, otherworld entities, guardians, spirit guides, avatars, ascended masters… are these all really just fallen angels pretending to be whatever tempts the person the most?

Are there any non-biological entities aside from angels (fallen or otherwise)?
 
Scholastic speculation has only inferred the existence of angels, but no other nonbiological entities. Note two things, however. First, each individual angel is an entire species unto itself, and the generic difference of angel is to be wholly incorporeal. That leaves a lot of room for diversity! Second, disembodied human souls are also incorporeal but only temporarily. So for now, we only know of two kinds of nonbiological entities, angels and souls.
 
tonyrey said:
why should** we** rule out any other forms of reality? 🙂
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Well that’s just it…

I was wondering if there ARE any other “realities” or creatures in the Catholic worldview? I’d figure that maybe there’s only the mortal world, Heaven, and angels… and that all the other “otherworld beings” people report are just fallen angels in disguise, tempting people to stray?
 
mgreen77 said:
I was wondering if there ARE any other “realities” or creatures in the Catholic worldview? I’d figure that maybe there’s only the mortal world, Heaven, and angels… and that all the other “otherworld beings” people report are just fallen angels in disguise, tempting people to stray?
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The Catholic worldview doesn’t concern itself with such things. Christians, like Buddhists, believe that gods (God is not a god) can’t save you, therefore they’re irrelevant, whether they really exist or not. We also inherit the Jewish taboo on dealing with other gods, since all gods, whether they’re demons or just what Navajos call Speechless Ones, aren’t entirely safe—demons are malicious, while “gods”, by all accounts, are very sensitive.

What’s very odd is, the Hebrew word “Loah” (cognate with the “lah” in Allah) didn’t originally apply to God, but to “a god”, in general—the Semitic languages predating Abraham by quite a bit, and all. The approach God takes to dealing with the Jews is essentially one of assuming the role of a standard Semitic tribal tutelary (like Babylonian Marduk or Assyrian Asshur), but with a “purity code” that incorporates most of natural law. Apparently, incidentally, anything in the Jewish law that isn’t (kashrut, for instance) can be chalked up to avoiding various practices of their neighbors; the “boiling a calf in its mother’s milk” thing, for instance, was apparently a fertility rite of the Hittites.
 
Hastrman said:
Christians, like Buddhists, believe that gods (God is not a god) can’t save you, therefore they’re irrelevant, whether they really exist or not. We also inherit the Jewish taboo on dealing with other gods, since all gods, whether they’re demons or just what Navajos call Speechless Ones, aren’t entirely safe—demons are malicious, while “gods”, by all accounts, are very sensitive.
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Which is why the “you shall have no other gods before me” commandment confuses me, since it makes it sound like God is one deity amoungst a collection of “other” gods, only that we’re supposed to put God first and foremost?

But that can’t be, since God created everything, so gods aren’t really gods… but what are they then? Fallen angels pretending to be deities?
 
mgreen77 said:
Which is why the “you shall have no other gods before me” commandment confuses me, since it makes it sound like God is one deity amoungst a collection of “other” gods, only that we’re supposed to put God first and foremost?

But that can’t be, since God created everything, so gods aren’t really gods… but what are they then? Fallen angels pretending to be deities?
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The others gods are false idols created by humans. They are usually related to one or more of the following; money, power, and pleasure.

Your confusion is attempting to equate what man creates and worships as a god (other than the true God) with the true God. These human creations are the subjects of the first line of your post.

So, there is a collection of sorts. Like a stack of $20 bills, of which all but one are counterfeits.
 
Yes they are all demonic. Satanists do call up demonic manifestations as do spiritualists at seances etc. Fascinating but extremely dangerous. Right now it is thought that demonic power is at an all-time peak because of the extraordinary number of abortions world-wide - each of which can be considered a Satanic sacrifice since it is a divinely ordained creature that is destroyed.

Apart from the Jews the entire ancient world (Old & New) worshipped & sacrificed to demonic entities who seemed to have limited powers of prophecy and power. We seem to be moving back to that position. A very scary time for the earth & its inhabitants.
 
Here, you are referring to Nephellim, the fathers of Giants in OT who existed before the Flood. That is one interpretation but it is disputed. They still would have been ‘Fallen angels’. How a spirit could mate with a physical body is quite a connundrum.
 
mgreen77 said:
And “demons” are actually all fallen angels?

Or are demons something apart from angels, such as the hybrid offspring of fallen angels and human women?
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Catholic theology considers fallen angels to be demons. Both are spiritual beings, the difference being that angels have their will oriented toward the good and demons have their will oriented toward evil.

“Spirit” as a form of being is considered to be any non-material substance, i.e., a real substance not composed of parts (i.e. matter or energy.)

The human soul is considered to be a spiritual substance intrinsically united to our bodies.
 
davidv said:
The others gods are false idols created by humans. They are usually related to one or more of the following; money, power, and pleasure.
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Corvettes. Mustang Shelby Cobra’s. Porsche Carerra 4’s.

And bicycles… custom made carbon fiber bicycles, eerily light and wicked fast… 😃

Sorry.
 
TimothyH said:
Corvettes. Mustang Shelby Cobra’s. Porsche Carerra 4’s.

And bicycles… custom made carbon fiber bicycles, eerily light and wicked fast… 😃
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LOL… and RX-8s… oh my you have no idea… an “eerily light and wicked fast” bicycle, only with two more wheels and a sound from Heaven 🙂

But I digress…
 
mgreen77 said:
I was wondering if there ARE any other “realities” or creatures in the Catholic worldview? I’d figure that maybe there’s only the mortal world, Heaven, and angels… and that all the other “otherworld beings” people report are just fallen angels in disguise, tempting people to stray?
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The vastness of the universe makes it likely that there are other intelligent beings and they need not be physical. The power needed to create such a universe means there are no obvious limits to what God creates… 🙂
 
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