Strange visions

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NathanCarson

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My faith in Jesus is very real. I’ve not been catholic for very long. I’m still in RCIA. My path to the catholic church was a strange one. It took coming very close to death to accept Jesus as Lord. It’s been three years roughly since I first prayed to him. The holy spirit led me to the catholic church. I see why I used to disagree on theology with protestants. Anyway, enough history.

I have always had strange visions. When I was a little kid, I used to just stare at the ceiling til’ I was swallowed up by light. It happened tonight at bible study. All I saw was the people in the room. Everything else but us dissapeared, and there was only light. Not in an instant. I was seeing this for a while. I don’t really have a sense of time at times like that. Far from brief though. I have bad visions sometimes too. I don’t like to talk about it. The bad one has tried to posses me. I thank God for keeping me safe. The other night he was trying to sway me. There’s a statue of Mary that almost seemed to have red eyes glowing. My pastor was a few pieus in front of me at the perpetual adoration chapel, and I felt like his head was going to spin around at me. This was in the chapel no less…I knew God was there to protect me. I can see through most of the false visions. Sometimes it’s hard to tell. I can’t even go into depth of all the things I’ve seen. Most of them are so horrible God has blessed me not to remember. I just know SOMETHING happened, but I don’t remember the full details. I don’t want to. I always can see the lamp in peoples eyes. When they shine. When they are dark. I can tell who prays for me sometimes. When I need prayer but can’t get the words, I hear them praying for me. I see their face. I always want to go up and thank them later, but I don’t know how to tell them. They never told me they prayed for me.

I attribute a lot of what I see to the enemy. If ever it’s God, I know, and am usually weeping tears of Joy.

I’m assure you I’m not crazy. Crazy is what I was when I denied Jesus.

So am I the only one?

is all my credibility gone?
 
NathanCarson,
You wrote," When I was a little kid, I used to just stare at the ceiling til’ I was swallowed up by light. It happened tonight at bible study. All I saw was the people in the room. Everything else but us dissapeared, and there was only light."

First, Nathan, please look for the prayer to St. Michael.
St Michael’s Prayer

Saint Michael defend us in Battle. Be our safegaurd against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray and do though, oh prince of heavenly hosts, by the power of God, Cast down satan, and all his evil spirits who wonder now through out the world seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.
This prayer was always said at Benediction prior to Vat. II.

You said the ceiling was swallowed up by light. There was a time when if I watched the Alter Boys light the candles before Mass, and I looked at the candle for over 30 seconds…I felt drawn into the light and the church filled with light so much I couln’t see anything but light. I could hear children and people but I was in a trance. When I heard a bell ring signaling the procession of the Priest I’d wake up. Later I tried it at home with a small candle, the same thing happened. I was not afraid but I was apprehensive. Later I did it at home and when I woke up I had written, by hand, 1/2 a page about bells. This went on for a year or so. For some reason I stopped looking at candles and said a simple prayer. I’d spell out the name of Jesus J-E-S-U-S and say Jesus protect me. All that went away.

Did you mean to say that when you looked into the eyes of people you could see good or evil? That is a gift of the Holy Spirit I believe.
 
“Did you mean to say that when you looked into the eyes of people you could see good or evil? That is a gift of the Holy Spirit I believe.”

yeah. pretty much.

At times when I follow God’s will, everything seems good. When I sin, the whole world seems a little darker. It’s when I’m in that darkness the light comes. Sometimes the world gets so dark, the light makes it dissapear.

thanks for the st. michael prayer. I had just stared praying it recently.
 
NathanCarson,
Have you been baptized, or are you going to be baptized at Easter? If you are baptized, I would seriously try to start making a regular confession sooner rather than later. Be sure to talk to your pastor about it, as he will be able to tell you whether or not you can recieve the sacrament now.
Continue to pray, and always be wary of the visions you see. While I am not in the same boat as you, I have done a bit of reading on the subject. Just remember that direct attacks from the enemy are only defeated by the power of the Holy Spirit.
I reccomend looking up Fr. Gabriel Amorth, the chief exorcist for the Diocese of Rome. You may find his books to be helpful.
God Bless,

Justin
 
Peace be with you. Regardless of whether or not the manifestations of evil are natural or supernatural, I have personally experienced that the best medicine is to sincerly repent of ALL your sins and make regular sacramental confessions. Do serious soul searching prior to confession and confess/renounce ALL the sins you have ever committed and all the patterns of sin in your life. Fasting as a means of repentance also is very useful.

To repent means to turn away from, to reject, to ardently desire not to repeat the sin. If you repent of all sin (starting with mortal sins) and receive reconcilliation, the foothold and influence of evil in your life will diminish. (I can’t say go away permanently because that is in the Lord’s hands). Realizing, renouncing, and sacramentally confessing all your sin may take a few months or much longer but you have some strong negative re-enforcement encouraging you not to sin. Only through the Grace of God bestowed primarily through sacraments will you be able to overcome.

Also your Guardian angel will protect you and you will feel much more confortable asking him for protection when your soul has little or no sin.
 
Dear friend

New Deacon has given you solid and foundational advice you would do very well to take and build upon.

You know, once you give your life to Christ Jesus , you enter into battle and it really is as simple as that and to begin with you will find a joy in faith and all will seem smooth and then soon after you will find an ardent attack and every device used to deter your path in Christ Jesus and this battle does not let up nor does is ever stop until the day you die. The path is hard, the road is narrow, which is over quoted I know, but it is the simple truth.

The battle is not with other people as no person alive is all evil or all good and no-one is really your enemy as all are capable of salvation since Christ died for all. Our battle is with evil spirits and manifest in the form of temptation with headlong intent to seperate you from God and all of this will be an onslaught on your faith.

What do you do?

Persevere and remain vigilant, don’t ever drop your guard, because the minute we become complacent is the minute we have strayed from the narrow path in Christ Jesus, be watchful and be prayerful, don’t worry, the Lord Jesus sustains you by His Cross and Ressurection, by His Eucharist and by His Love. Be fearless and as ardent in your will to strive forward in christ as anything that may have such a resolve to remove you from christ.

In my prayers

God bless you
 
Dear friend

New Deacon has given you solid and foundational advice you would do very well to take and build upon.

You know, once you give your life to Christ Jesus , you enter into battle and it really is as simple as that and to begin with you will find a joy in faith and all will seem smooth and then soon after you will find an ardent attack and every device used to deter your path in Christ Jesus and this battle does not let up nor does is ever stop until the day you die. The path is hard, the road is narrow, which is over quoted I know, but it is the simple truth.

The battle is not with other people as no person alive is all evil or all good and no-one is really your enemy as all are capable of salvation since Christ died for all. Our battle is with evil spirits and manifest in the form of temptation with headlong intent to seperate you from God and all of this will be an onslaught on your faith.

What do you do?

Persevere and remain vigilant, don’t ever drop your guard, because the minute we become complacent is the minute we have strayed from the narrow path in Christ Jesus, be watchful and be prayerful, don’t worry, the Lord Jesus sustains you by His Cross and Ressurection, by His Eucharist and by His Love. Be fearless and as ardent in your will to strive forward in Christ as anything that may have such a resolve to remove you from Christ.

In my prayers

God bless you
 
Thank you all for your responses.

One thing: I am not baptized. I still feel the stain of original sin on me, not to mention all those other things (which they are a lot). I lived very close to death for a long time. I also had a serious drug habit. Jesus cured me of the drugs. It’s been 3 years now since I used anything. However, sometimes I hallucinate. It used to be REALLY bad. I had to take medicine for a while. Since I’ve been going to church I hadn’t taken my medicine in a looooong time. Which is certainly ok. I was doing fine. I started to flip out for the first time in 6 months and didn’t know what was happening. I love Jesus for curing me of my previous lifestyle and my drug habit. However since I’m not baptized, and can not take the eucharist, I am more susceptible to the devil. Hallucinating is not always bad, if I do what God wants. If I turn away even for a second it gets bad. Given the advice on here I realized two things: 1) what I was seeing was not necessarily God inspired, I was hallucinating. 2) I should take my pill.

Thanks for putting up with me, and your advice.

On an interesting side note: given that I am so often hallucinating I get used to it. When I make the sign of the cross with the holy water, it’s almost like the wiping my eyes clean. It only lasts for so long though. I greatly look forward to my baptism and the eucharist. The eucharist especially appeals to the addict part of me. (“you mean I eat this and it takes me closer to God?..I might know something about that”).
 
NathanCarson,

May almighty God bless you protect you from all evil and bring you to everlasting life.

Good news for you brother! With the Rite of Initiation you receive an exorcism! Then after Baptism, confirmation, and eucharist you will receive ample sanitifying and actual grace. You will be reborn with any sin whatsoever - FREE FROM ALL EVIL.

Until then DO NOT take any pride whatsoever in your visions. Completly reject them. Do not use them as a source to bring attention to yourself. Pride is the root sin of all sin.

The Catechism (1259) States: “For catechumens who die before their Baptism, their explicit desire to receive it, together with repentance for their sins, and charity, assures them the salvation that they were not able to receive through the sacrament.”

So if you sincerly intend to be baptized then you need not worry about your salvation due to the current lack of the sacrament. However, in the above did you catch the phrase “repentance for sin?” You may still do this. I recommend you talk to a priest ASAP. At the minimum ask if you may formally confess your sins to him and ask him to pray for/with you. You will not receive the sacramental grace but you will receive some grace. There is nothing to prevent you from doing a complete examination of conscience and rejection of all sin prior to your meeting. Then do it with the priest as a witness (confess and reject sins out loud). If you don’t want to do this through a priest, a deacon or a very devout lay person (a nun, a brother, a senior Eucharistic minister, etc.) will suffice. Just make sure the lay person does not try to imitate a sacramental confession too closely.

You may also confess and renounce sin by yourself but probably would be much less effective.
 
NathanCarson,

May almighty God bless you protect you from all evil and bring you to everlasting life.

Good news for you brother! With the Rite of Initiation you receive an exorcism! Then after Baptism, confirmation, and Eucharist you will receive ample sanctifying and actual grace. You will be reborn with any sin whatsoever - FREE FROM ALL EVIL.

Until then DO NOT take any pride whatsoever in your visions. Completely reject them. Do not use them as a source to bring attention to yourself. Pride is the root sin of all sin.

The Catechism (1259) States: “For catechumens who die before their Baptism, their explicit desire to receive it, together with repentance for their sins, and charity, assures them the salvation that they were not able to receive through the sacrament.”

So if you sincerly intend to be baptized then you need not worry about your salvation due to the current lack of the sacrament. However, in the above did you catch the phrase “repentance for sin?” You may still do this. I recommend you talk to a priest ASAP. At the minimum ask if you may formally confess your sins to him and ask him to pray for/with you. You will not receive the sacramental grace but you will receive some grace. There is nothing to prevent you from doing a complete examination of conscience and rejection of all sin prior to your meeting. Then do it with the priest as a witness (confess and reject sins out loud).

You may also confess and renounce sin by yourself but probably would be much less effective.
 
Sorry, I missed something you said previously.
I am not trained in psychiatry so I have a tendency to offer only “spiritual hammers” to solve problems. But please, please go back to whoever prescribed medication to you earlier and ask if you still need it. If they tell you yes, then please, please take the medication until they tell you that it is no longer needed. You may think you do better without medicine but anyone who observes your behavior will be a much better guide on that issue.

Regardless, the spiritual advice still stands. God’s grace is always the best medicine but it is not the only medicine!
 
I missed something you said earlier…

I am not trained in psychiatry so I have a tendency to offer only “spiritual hammers” to solve problems. But please, please go back to whoever prescribed medication to you earlier and ask if you still need it. If they tell you yes, then please, please take the medication until they tell you that it is no longer needed. You may think you do better without medicine but anyone who observes your behavior will be a much better guide on that issue.

Regardless, the spiritual advice still stands. God’s grace is always the best medicine but it is not the only medicine!
 
If I were to describe to you the full horrors I’ve witnessed, you would understand. I take no pride in these things. Pride was what made it so hard in the first place. Many of these things were a constant present, I just never saw them. The more lies I believed, the more they gathered around me. When I accepted Jesus, that’s when the battle began. I had trusted too much in a false understanding of God. Every way that I knew to get close to him betrayed me. Surely I say to you I repent. I have no choice but to. It’s been 3 years since I first prayed to Jesus. It took me a while to build that relationship. It just so happens I’ve been stepping closer to him.

I find that my prayers said alone are very effective. What I’m not used to is FEAR. I love the Lord. The closer I get to him, the more I’m learning to fear him. Which is a very good thing. It’s also something the devil is using to delude me.

As far as communion, I know a prayer for that. For those who can’t take communion physically, but ask for Jesus to give it to them spiritually.

I miss the parrish that brought me to the catholic church. It was in a much more loving environment. People try hard where I am at now, it’s just the community in which I live is one where you have to put your guard up to survive.

It’s not the ones who have love in their heart that I trust. It’s the ones who know how to give it back to the lord.

I always tried to be “good”. I was only ever serving myself. My rules weren’t necessarily that different than God’s rules. Except: I was trying be God. I just didn’t realize it. In accepting Jesus I had a powerful enemy to fight: me. It was then that I learned: me wasn’t me. I had been giving myself up to something else. When I started giving my will to Jesus, that something else made it’s presence known. Which resulted in what might be thought of as psychosis. How do you fight yourself when you’ve made your will that strong? The truth of that can cripple you. Most of the world is insane. They just don’t know it. Crazy recognizes crazy though. The only truth is Jesus. The church knows it. That’s why people had to paint a picture of a self-serving Jesus. Even though his whole point of coming was to serve us. He had to die on the cross for us, which means I must die for my brothers and sisters as well. I came close to dying while trying to save myself. By all means I should have died. Because of Jesus I was able to live. We all are.

I stress to you it’s not pride. It’s pride that makes me think I can do otherwise.
 
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