Saint Birgitta

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Hello Bishop. This is the first time I'm blogging here. I just want to ask if you ever read the revelations of Saint Birgitta. If so, what is your opinion of them? - Ruben

"There are now three kinds of people among Christians as symbolised by the Hebrews. There are some who really believe in God and in My words. There are others who believe in God but lack confidence in My words, because they do not know how to distinguish between a good and a bad spirit. The third are those who neither believe in Me nor in you to whom I have spoken my words."

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The above extract from St Birgitta's revelations is easy to understand and accept, albeit superfluous I feel to what already exists in Holy Scripture. My view of her many revelations is, like the revelations of various other religious, they are difficult to form opinions about beyond the fact that they seem to have a relevance today despite having been made centuries ago.

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Birgitta Birgersdotter (circa 1303 – 23 July 1373) is the most celebrated saint of Sweden. She was the daughter of Birger Persson of the family of Finsta, governor of Uppland, and one of the richest landowners of the country, and his wife who was a member of the Folkunga family. Through her mother, young Birgitta was a relation of the Swedish kings of her lifetime. St Ingrid, whose death had occurred about twenty years before Birgitta's birth, was a near relative of the family. Birger's daughter received a careful religious training, and from her seventh year showed signs of extraordinary religious impressions and illuminations.

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In 1316, at the age of thirteen, she was united in marriage to Ulf Gudmarsson, who was then eighteen. She acquired great influence over her noble and pious husband, and the happy marriage was blessed with eight children, among them St Catherine of Sweden. The saintly life and the great charity of Birgitta soon made her name known far and wide. She was acquainted with several learned and pious theologians, among them Nicolaus Hermanni, later Bishop of Linköping, Matthias, canon of Linköping, her confessor, Peter, Prior of Alvastrâ, and Peter Magister, her confessor after Matthias. She was later at the court of King Magnus Eriksson, over whom she gradually acquired great influence. Early in the forties (1341 – 1343) in company with her husband she made a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostella. On the return journey her husband was stricken with an attack of illness, but recovered sufficiently to finish the journey. Shortly afterwards, however, he died (1344) in the Cistercian monastery of Alvastrâ in East Gothland.

Birgitta now devoted herself entirely to practices of religion and asceticism, and to religious undertakings. The visions which she believed herself to have had from her early childhood now became more frequent and definite. She believed that Christ Himself appeared to her, and she wrote down the revelations she then received, which were in great repute during the Middle Ages. They were translated into Latin by Matthias Magister and Prior Peter.

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St Birgitta now founded a new religious congregation, the Brigittines, or Order of St Saviour, whose chief monastery, at Vadstena, was richly endowed by King Magnus and his queen (1346). To obtain confirmation for her institute, and at the same time to seek a larger sphere of activity for her mission, which was the moral uplifting of the period, she journeyed to Rome in 1349, and remained there until her death, except while absent on pilgrimages, among them one to the Holy Land in 1373. In August, 1370, Pope Urban V confirmed the Rule of her congregation. Birgitta made earnest representations to Pope Urban, urging the removal of the Holy See from Avignon back to Rome. She accomplished the greatest good in Rome, however, by her pious and charitable life, and her earnest admonitions to others to adopt a better life, following out the excellent precedents she had set in her native land. The year following her death her remains were conveyed to the monastery at Vadstena. She was canonised on 7 October, 1391 by Boniface IX, and confirmed by the Council of Constance in 1415.

In 1999 Pope John Paul II named St Birgitta as a patron saint of Europe. Her feast day is celebrated on July 23rd, the day of her death. Her feast was not in the Tridentine Calendar, but was later inserted in the Roman Catholic calendar of saints in 1623 for celebration on October 7th, the day she was canonised by Pope Boniface IX. Five years later, her feast was moved to October 8th, where it remained until the revision of the Roman Catholic Calendar of Saints in 1969. Traditionalists continue to use the earlier calendars.

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Ghosts, Mediums, Psychics

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Hello +Bishop Sean. I would like to ask you, if I may, what your views are on ghosts? Also, what do you think of 'mediums' and psychics who attempt to contact spirits in haunted locations? Thank you and God bless, David Carter-Green.

What is a ghost? The disembodied soul of an otherwise dead person? The appearance of a deceased person or animal that manifests in either definable or blurry form? Apparitions that often appear suddenly and quickly, disappearing at a distance?

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Spectres have certainly been sighted moving through physical barriers such as walls and doors and are often accompanied by a noticeable drop in temperature. Poltergeists are thought to be a form of ghost which takes energy from people, most often children or teenagers, and convert it into the ability to move solid objects. Poltergeists will allegedly announce their presence with rapping, or other noises, and generally create disorder. They apparently like to generate acts of mischief such as throwing furniture about. A ghost, ultimately, is believed by some to be the energy or soul of a living person. When we die, it is supposed, this energy is released from its corporeal shell and is believed to do one of two things: move to a higher spiritual place according to the individual's religious beliefs, or stay behind and linger earthbound for an unspecified time. Why ghosts linger is never satisfactorily explained, but the most popular theories include unfinished business, the need for closure and to say farewell, a wrongful death, or perhaps to communicate a warning.

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Ghosts are allegedly photographed, videotaped and recorded on audio devices. It does seem, however, to be their choice and not ours. It has been claimed that ghosts can be detected with devices such as EMF detectors, thermal scanners, electrostatic detectors and tri-field meters. Ghosts may make themselves visible to the living from time to time, but I often wonder if what we are seeing is always the apparition of a dead person? Ghost lights have nevertheless been seen and recorded in every country and civilisation. These mysterious lights are usually seen as white or blue balls or yellow spheres (though occasionally as flickering candle flames) glowing in the darkness. Some scientists have suggested that the lights are caused by swamp gas, electricity, magnetism, or some phosphorescent material; yet so far no definitive natural source has ever been discovered for the sightings. There have been attempts to trap a ghost light for examination, but, pursued, they invariably always seem to be just out of reach. They acquired the name ignis fatuus, meaning "foolish fire," because it is thought foolish to try to follow or capture such a phantom light. According to certain legends, the light of an ignis fatuus is the ghost of a sinner who is condemned to wander the world for eternity. In parts of Britain, it is sometimes called the will-o'-the-wisp and is considered to be a death omen.

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I tend toward scepticism where the majority of recorded sightings of supposed discarnate spirits are concerned, but, as with all things thought to be supernatural, retain an open mind. Some apparitions, I suspect, might be the original scene occuring in its own time and, of course, the same space with the imprint somehow managing to be eerily glimpsed in our time due to circumstances that enable a "time window" into the past which we do not fully comprehend. This has nothing to do with the supernatural, as I would define it, and is preternatural, by which I mean it is most likely to be understood scientifically at some point in the future. Could the surviving emotional memory of someone who has died traumatically and tragically, but is unaware of having become deceased, be another explanation? They may appear confused or frightened. Not being ready or yet able to let go of the physical attachments, they remain in the old and familiar places, repeating the same acts indefinitely until something or someone breaks the cycle for them. The theories are seemingly endless and, needless to say, spectres attributed to the dead might actually be demonic entities masquerading as loved ones.

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My view on mediumship is the scriptural one; certainly mediums who prey upon the vulnerable and charge money for their "gift." A gift, by its nature, is something given and received freely.

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One needs to define "psychics" before I can opine because some are mistakenly confused with mediums. I am considered psychic, for example, as are a great many people. This is by no means a voluntary condition. I, therefore, define a psychic as having the ability to receive information in ways other then the normal five senses. This is something the psychic cannot control, but might be able to develop.

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Professional "psychics" who charge money for their supposed "gift" is a practice I would unreservedly condemn. Mediums and psychics who attempt to contact spirits at haunted locations are also to be discouraged and, to my mind, are playing a most dangerous game. Should anything supernatural manifest there is every possibility of it being demonic. Those who summon such entities would not necessarily be equipped to deal with what they unleash when unlocking doors best left closed.

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Ironic Byronic Archetype

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Dear Bishop Manchester, I'm a university student with a great appreciation for your work and writings. As many of my studies deal with the supernatural, I would love to pose a few questions to you -- particularly regarding Lord Byron -- simply for my own knowledge. I am an ardent lover of Byron and even hope to visit his grave this January, but in my research of him I find many references that would suggest that he had some involvement with vampires, or that he himself was a vampire. I refer not only to his literature and the odd description of his habits provided by Dr. Polidori, but his personal diaries where he refers to the unquenchable thirst and being haunted by those who are neither living nor dead. I dare even site you as possible evidence to Byron’s involvement with vampires, as I understand many cultures believe that the living descendants of vampires have a special ability to hunt them. What, if any, was Byron’s involvement with actual vampires, in his home country or abroad, or what is your opinion on the theory that he had intercourse with these creatures, if he was not one himself? I thank you kindly for anything you have to say on the matter. With deepest respect, Jordan Andrea, Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana.

Lord Byron, parodied as Lord Ruthven by John William Polidori in The Vampyre (1819), fortuitously crystallised an archetypal image that is centuries strong; yet he abhorred the vampire almost to the same extent as do I.

John William Polidori (7 September 1795 - 24 August 1821) is credited by some as the creator of the vampire genre of fantasy fiction. Polidori was the oldest son of Gaetano Polidori, an Italian political émigré, and Anna Maria Pierce, a governess. He had three brothers and four sisters and was one of the first pupils at Ampleforth College. Polidori began his schooling in 1804 shortly after the monks, in exile from France, settled in the lodge of Anne Fairfax's chaplain in the Ampleforth Valley. He went on from Ampleforth in 1810 to Edinburgh University, where he received his degree as a doctor of medicine on 1 August 1815 at the age of nineteen.

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In 1816, Dr Polidori entered Lord Byron's service as his personal physician, and accompanied Byron on a trip through Europe. At the Villa Diodati, a house Byron rented by Lake Geneva in Switzerland, the pair met with Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, and her husband-to-be Percy Bysshe Shelley, and their companion Claire Clairmont.

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One night in June, after the company had read aloud from the Tales of the Dead, a collection of horror tales, Byron suggested that they each write a ghost story. Mary Shelley worked on a tale that would later evolve into Frankenstein. Byron wrote (and quickly abandoned) a fragment of a story, which Polidori used later as the basis for his own tale.
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Rather than use the crude, bestial vampire of folklore as a basis for his story, Polidori based his character on Byron. Polidori named the character "Lord Ruthven" as a joke. The name was originally used in Lady Caroline Lamb's novel Glenarvon, in which a thinly-disguised Byron figure was also named Lord Ruthven.

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Polidori's Lord Ruthven was not only the first vampire in English fiction, but was the first fictional vampire in the form we recognise today - an aristocratic fiend who preyed among high society.
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Polidori's story, The Vampyre, was published in the April 1819 issue of New Monthly Magazine. Much to both his and Byron's chagrin, The Vampyre was released as a new work by Byron. The poet even released his own Fragment of a Novel in an attempt to clear up the mess, but, for better or worse, The Vampyre continued to be attributed to him.

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Dismissed by Byron, Polidori returned to England, and in 1820 wrote to the Prior at Ampleforth; his letter is lost, but Prior Burgess' reply makes it clear that he considered Polidori, with his scandalous literary acquaintances, an unsuitable case for the monastic profession.
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In 1821, after writing an ambitious sacred poem, The Fall of the Angels, Polidori, suffering from depression, died in mysterious circumstances on 24 August 1821 at approximately 1:10pm, probably by self-administered poison, though the coroner's verdict was that he had "departed this Life in a natural way by the visitation of God."

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Polidori's fate has been to be remembered only as a footnote in Romantic history. Reprints of the diary he kept during his travels with Byron are available, but are rather hard to find for purchase on the internet.
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Polidori's diary, titled The Diary of John Polidori, edited by William Michael Rossetti, was first published in 1911 by Elkin Mathews (London). A reprint of this book, The Diary of Dr John William Polidori, 1816, relating to Byron, Shelley etc was published by Folcroft Library Editions (Folcroft, Pa.) in 1975. Another reprint by the same title was printed by Norwood Editions (Norwood, Pa.) in 1978.

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As well as being mid-wife to Frankenstein's monster, he was uncle to Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Christina Rossetti.

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Three films have depicted John Polidori and the genesis of the Frankenstein and The Vampyre stories in 1816: Gothic directed by Ken Russell (1986), Haunted Summer directed by Ivan Passer (1988) and Remando al viento (English title: Rowing with the Wind) directed by Gonzalo Suárez (1988).

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I have written about Lord Byron extensively in my book Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know. I do not believe for a moment that the poet was involved with vampires or that he fell victim to one. In this work, however, I touch on the haunting of Lady Caroline Lamb at Brocket Hall. Some have suggested that Lady Caroline Lamb might have been a vampire, but having researched all the evidence about her life and death thoroughly, and having visited her almost forgotten tomb many times, I can find nothing to support this notion. There is an illustrated plan of the Byron vault at Hucknall Torkard plus a close-up photograph of his and his daughter's coffins (taken when the vault was opened for Byron's exhumation in 1938) in my book. The description I provide of the poet's body as it appeared seventy-one years ago and what occurred to it immediately after his death in 1824, leaves little room for any theory about vampirism taking root.

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