Instead of deleting my old posts, I simply unpublished them. This came in handy when I decided to write my testimony. To my mind, however, those old posts told the story of the person I used to be. Not the person I had become. 

But that wasn't entirely accurate.  

Starting and Restarting 

I started The Mystic Review in 2010 when I was struggling to make sense of a very unusual dream. The blog was a place where I could share my search for answers and I loved doing that. 

Then when I returned to Christianity and eventually Catholicism there was no real need to do that. The answers were already spelled out.

But as I struggled to write my testimony I realized I still had questions. Questions not addressed, or at least not resolved by the resources of my Faith. So it made sense to come back to The Mystic Review and try again.

As of this writing the blog includes a mix of old and new(er) posts, many of which need to be updated.  So I hope you'll bear with me on that. 

The newer posts were posts I added to the platform after I returned to the Faith. I don't necessarily agree with everything said in these posts. I've unpublished some of these but will probably not unpublish them all.

The older posts need to be sorted. A lot will remain unpublished. Others will be updated. A few will be re-published, as is.

I hope to add new posts once or twice a month. Topics will include dreams, psychic phenomena, paranormal investigation, faith, NDEs, spirits and more. Spiritual posts will reflect a Catholic perspective. But not all posts will be spiritual in nature.

I hope you will check back! 

When I finished my upcoming book, The Spirit Dream, and turned it over to beta readers, I got some great feedback. The comments on NDE and psychic phenomena, in particular, convinced me to include an alternate viewpoint on those topics.  

A few days later, Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin  mentioned parapsychology and the Rhine Institute on his Mysterious World podcast. As it turns out, he actually taught a class on parapsychology at the Rhine. I like Jimmy Akin, so that got my attention. By the end of the day, I'd ordered a new book on parapsychology.

After reading that book, Parapsychology: The Controversial Science (affiliate link), I couldn't deny that there is statistically significant research on psychic phenomena, precognitive dreams and NDE. I realized that I had been too black and white in my thinking, both in my media and the The Spirit Dream. After some thought, I made the difficult decision to rewrite parts of the book and make some significant changes both here in the blog and in my media. 

This isn’t a 180-degree turn. I still think demonic influence is real, and that discernment is important. I still want The Spirit Dream to be cautionary in the regard. But I also think that my time as an evangelical might have influenced me more than I initially thought.

In Parapsychology: The Controversial Science, the author talks Benedict XIV and his work as promotor fidei. He ends that section by saying that Catholics were the first parapsychologists because we didn’t just accept miracles at face value and say, this supports our position. We investigated them with rigor. And to me, that is one of the things that sets Catholicism apart. We value truth. 

Now I have a new book called The Philosopher King: The Humanist Pope Benedict XIV (affiliate link), which came all the way from England and from the library of journalist, novelist and parapsychologist, Andrew Carr Mackenzie. And I can't wait to read it.

Lastly, if the scholarship stars align, I may be taking a course at the Rhine Institute about dreams and consciousness and possibly other parapsychology classes after that. My first major in school was experimental psychology, and I'm still interested in the science.

As always, I'll keep you updated!

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