experiencing someones soul leave the body at death

[The Theosist]

I believe in the preternatural.  I just think 98% of the people who think they experienced it are wrong, nuts, frauds.

And while I share your skepticism, that's where I differ on your presuppositions. Many may be frauds, and I have no reason to just believe anyone's claims of what he has experienced, but you seem to believe in the phrase "all in your head", that is, you will dismiss even a real experience as being somehow unreal. If I understand you correctly, if someone really experienced the phenomenon he calls a "ghost", you will, in the absence of "physical evidence", dismiss it as a creation of the brain or mind.

[Frank]

I believe in the preternatural.  I just think 98% of the people who think they experienced it are wrong, nuts, frauds.

And while I share your skepticism, that's where I differ on your presuppositions. Many may be frauds, and I have no reason to just believe anyone's claims of what he has experienced, but you seem to believe in the phrase "all in your head", that is, you will dismiss even a real experience as being somehow unreal. If I understand you correctly, if someone really experienced the phenomenon he calls a "ghost", you will, in the absence of "physical evidence", dismiss it as a creation of the brain or mind.

That's hardly fair.
He said:

I believe in the preternatural.  I just think 98% of the people who think they experienced it are wrong, nuts, frauds.

A Chinese Lady he knew had a preternatural experience in which a
saint's picture spoke to her. I am pretty confident he believes that
on evidence of her word alone. 

[Greg]

I believe the Chinese lady because she was completely secular, and a cripple, and then as a result of that conversion had 10 children who are all practicing Catholics and one of whom is going to become a priest/monk.

Results matter.

I don't believe the 4 Garabandal seers who were already Catholics, had LESS children combined than the crippled Chinese lady had by herself, all go to the new mass, and who made predictions that turned out to be verifiably false.

[Vetus Ordo]

The "church" still exists but they have less children than Iceland. 

A chimera of the church exists.  People who think they are Catholic but don't deliver. I thought the corruption of the best was the worst?

You appear to think unconverted pagans are worse than apostates.

I appear to think that countries whose culture has been informed by Catholicism for more than a thousand years, as it is the case with the "overtly-emotional" Southern Europeans where the Reformation didn't succeed and the Enlightenment was slow to gain traction, tend to be more open to the "woo" events, even if such people are bad sinners and fall away from the faith.

The countries of the "coold blooded vikings" who, according to you, are "far more rational," have been tragically cut off from Catholic culture for almost 500 years now. That has consequences. When "woo" events happen in Scandinavia, and other atheistic paradises on earth, people will tend to ignore them.

[awkwardcustomer]

Iceland is full of "woo".  Half of those "cold-blooded Vikings" believe in elves, according to the article queen.saints linked to.

In one 1998 survey, 54.4 percent of Icelanders said they believed in the existence of elves. That poll is fairly consistent with other findings and with qualitative fieldwork, according to an academic paper published in 2000 titled "The Elves' Point of View" by Valdimar Hafstein, who now is a folkloristics professor at the University of Iceland. "If this was just one crazy lady talking about invisible friends, it's really easy to laugh about that," Jónsdóttir said. "But to have people through hundreds of years talking about the same things, it's beyond one or two crazy ladies. It is part of the nation."

https://www.google.ie/amp/s/amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/280783/

This is a major "woo" phenomenon.  It just happens to be pagan "woo".

[Daniel]

To bring this thread back onto the rails...

I am looking to read stories about others experiences with feeling a loved ones soul leave their body at death. Has anyone read stories on this topic?  Particularly from a Catholic perspective?

No such stories come to my mind.

But I do vaguely recall a story where it is said that a priest administered last rites to somebody who was dying, but then the dying person fell back into habitual mortal sin, and he died, and at the moment of his death (or perhaps shortly later) the priest could feel an intense heat in the room, and the damned soul appeared to him or something.

Also, there is the story of King Tut's curse. One of the guys who opened the tomb died (in Egypt), and, at that moment, his dog (in London) is reported to have started barking, as if able to perceive his master's death. (And I think the dog barked so much that it died too.)

[awkwardcustomer]

Here's another "cold-blooded Viking" from Iceland, a politician no less, relating how elves saved his life after a car crash. 

In 2010, Árni Johnsen, a former member of the Icelandic Parliament, flipped his SUV on an icy road in southwest Iceland, careened off a small cliff, and survived without any major injuries. Later, he credited a group of elves living in a boulder near the wreck with saving his life. When a road was slated for construction over the rock, he insisted the roadmakers "save it," according to Jónsdóttir. He then called in Jónsdóttir to determine whether his suspicions about the elves were correct, according to an Icelandic Review article at the time. She found "three generations" of elves living inside it, and, in a meeting with the creatures, inquired about whether they wanted to be moved away to a safer location near Johnsen's home. "The elves thought about it and talked about it a whole lot," she told The Atlantic. "They said, 'If you can promise that you put our home on grass, because we want to have sheep. And this side of the rock has to face the view over the ocean and the small island.'"

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/10/why-so-many-icelanders-still-believe-in-invisible-elves/280783/

I suppose that "woo" is a bit like conspiracy theories.  While 90% per cent are nonsense, it's the remaining 10% that matter.

[Greg]

The "church" still exists but they have less children than Iceland. 

A chimera of the church exists.  People who think they are Catholic but don't deliver. I thought the corruption of the best was the worst?

You appear to think unconverted pagans are worse than apostates.

I appear to think that countries whose culture has been informed by Catholicism for more than a thousand years, as it is the case with the "overtly-emotional" Southern Europeans where the Reformation didn't succeed and the Enlightenment was slow to gain traction, tend to be more open to the "woo" events, even if such people are bad sinners and fall away from the faith.

The countries of the "coold blooded vikings" who, according to you, are "far more rational," have been tragically cut off from Catholic culture for almost 500 years now. That has consequences. When "woo" events happen in Scandinavia, and other atheistic paradises on earth, people will tend to ignore them.

If Our Lady of Fatima, the Miracle of the Sun and 1000 years of Catholicism leaves you with a birthrate of 1.3 (to Iceland's 1.7) and 2 Tridentine masses in the whole country and every Portuguese Bishop being a waste of space, then Iceland's woo has better results than Portugal's.

The Dogma of the Faith don't hunt.

What Catholics there are in Iceland are pretty solid.

https://reginamag.com/catholic-iceland/

[Vetus Ordo]

The "church" still exists but they have less children than Iceland. 

A chimera of the church exists.  People who think they are Catholic but don't deliver. I thought the corruption of the best was the worst?

You appear to think unconverted pagans are worse than apostates.

I appear to think that countries whose culture has been informed by Catholicism for more than a thousand years, as it is the case with the "overtly-emotional" Southern Europeans where the Reformation didn't succeed and the Enlightenment was slow to gain traction, tend to be more open to the "woo" events, even if such people are bad sinners and fall away from the faith.

The countries of the "coold blooded vikings" who, according to you, are "far more rational," have been tragically cut off from Catholic culture for almost 500 years now. That has consequences. When "woo" events happen in Scandinavia, and other atheistic paradises on earth, people will tend to ignore them.

If Our Lady of Fatima, the Miracle of the Sun and 1000 years of Catholicism leaves you with a birthrate of 1.3 (to Iceland's 1.7) and 2 Tridentine masses in the whole country and every Portuguese Bishop being a waste of space, then Iceland's woo has better results than Portugal's.

The Dogma of the Faith don't hunt.

What exactly is your point?

You asked why all "woo" events occur in countries with "overly-emotional people like Italy, Spain, Portugal etc and not Iceland" and I offered a plausible explanation that has to do with the longstanding influence of Catholicism in Southern Europe. Belief in the supernatural tends to get lost the more nihilistic a culture becomes, which was tragically the case in Scandinavia. Latin Europe is also suffering the effects of rapid secularization but the cultural roots are still stronger than in the North which apostatized sooner.

Ranting about how modern Portugal is full of sinners that fail your piety test is besides the point.

What Catholics there are in Iceland are pretty solid.

https://reginamag.com/catholic-iceland/

The small diocese of Reykjavík is Novus Ordo. That should disqualify them according to your standards, shouldn't it?

[Greg]

And your point is bullshit Vetus.  You lack the ability to rationalise since you became a slave to Islam.

Icelandic people believe in elves, because other Icelandic people believe in elves, and Southern Europeans believe they are getting messages from Our Lady every five minutes because the people around them take them seriously.

I believe in results.  If you claim to have communicated with Heaven, especially on a regular basis, then it should have some very concrete results in your life as a result.  Such an experience would leave a mark on your soul and you'd either need to accept it and be better as a result or reject it and be worse.

[Elizabeth.2]

I am looking to read stories about others experiences with feeling a loved ones soul leave their body at death. Has anyone read stories on this topic?  Particularly from a Catholic perspective?

He wasn't a loved one, but an old man who was trying to help my sister by giving her his house after he died..  He was in home hospice care. I overheard a Jamaican accented neighbor lady come and began asking him if he believed in Our Lord, renounced the devil and so forth.  (This was during my lost years. ) I didn't dare move from where I was, but listened in fascination.  After maybe 20 minutes, Mr. R, who had been unconscious and heavily dosed on morphine for days, began crying out, "I love you! I love you!"  with what sounded like extreme joy.  He died very shortly after.

[John Lamb]

Materialists make up for their lack of belief in particular "woo" by believing the general "woo" that the material brain gives rise to the entire world of consciousness. That's an unceasing magical spell.

[Greg]

I didn't dare move from where I was, but listened in fascination.  After maybe 20 minutes, Mr. R, who had been unconscious and heavily dosed on morphine for days, began crying out, "I love you! I love you!"  with what sounded like extreme joy.  He died very shortly after.

Entirely subjective.  I am sure dying people say all sorts of stuff all of the time.

People dosed up on morphine especially so.  He might have been remembering his wedding night.

If we see miracles in every corner then we devalue the few and rare real miracles.  I think extreme scepticism is warranted and to be encouraged.  Otherwise you have the boy that cried wolf syndrome where nobody bothers investigating the real miracle because they've seen so many religious nuts see Our Lady or Jesus in a piece of burnt toast or oil stain.

[The Theosist]

The "church" still exists but they have less children than Iceland. 

A chimera of the church exists.  People who think they are Catholic but don't deliver. I thought the corruption of the best was the worst?

You appear to think unconverted pagans are worse than apostates.

I appear to think that countries whose culture has been informed by Catholicism for more than a thousand years, as it is the case with the "overtly-emotional" Southern Europeans where the Reformation didn't succeed and the Enlightenment was slow to gain traction, tend to be more open to the "woo" events, even if such people are bad sinners and fall away from the faith.

The countries of the "coold blooded vikings" who, according to you, are "far more rational," have been tragically cut off from Catholic culture for almost 500 years now. That has consequences. When "woo" events happen in Scandinavia, and other atheistic paradises on earth, people will tend to ignore them.

If Our Lady of Fatima, the Miracle of the Sun and 1000 years of Catholicism leaves you with a birthrate of 1.3 (to Iceland's 1.7) and 2 Tridentine masses in the whole country and every Portuguese Bishop being a waste of space, then Iceland's woo has better results than Portugal's.

The Dogma of the Faith don't hunt.

What Catholics there are in Iceland are pretty solid.

https://reginamag.com/catholic-iceland/

This is fair enough. When a "supernatural" or "preternatural" event entails or promises testable outcomes, there's good reason to dismiss it when the test fails. Garabandal is one such example. Fatima may be another.

[Greg]

The problem with Fatima now is that it is open ended.

How long is reasonable to wait?  Another 100 years?

Another 300?

Will there ever come a day that people can state, "Fatima was false"?  I don't see how.