Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Pagan
My True Ghost Story

My True Ghost Story

Last updated on: May 23, 2015 at 10:12 pm by Jason Mankey

My True Ghost Story 2015-05-23T22:12:17-06:00 Jason Mankey

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

As a boy I was fascinated with the paranormal, and while I’ve become far more skeptical as an adult, I still have an ongoing interest in UFO’s, cryptids*, ESP, and ghosts. Unfortunately I’ve never seen a Sasquatch or felt like I’ve a psychic experience, but I have seen a ghost. In addition to that, not only have I seen a ghost, I’ve felt a ghost, which made the experience even more real.

In 1995 I lived in a giant old house in Cape Girardeau Missouri with a gaggle of roommates (the turnover in that house was fast and furious, but at any given time there was usually at lease ten folks living there). Our landlord talked about the house as being “pre-Civl War,” though he might have been exaggerating the age of the place a little bit. Regardless of whether or not it was that old, it had at least seen over 100 winters by the summer of ’95.

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

Shortly after we moved in we strange things began occurring in the house. All of these things were benign, none of us were ever scared, but they were noticeable. The most common of these anomalies were lights turning on and off for no particular reason, and this happened throughout the entire house. You could be lying in bed at four am and all of sudden have your bedroom light turn on, all with your bedroom door closed and locked. Bathroom lights might suddenly go dark while you were in the shower, and that kind of stuff happened when there was no one else in the house, and with frequency.

Some of my roommates reported things being moved around, a set of keys left in the sitting room might end up in the kitchen. Living with ten people the key thing is not surprising, anyone could have moved them, the lights were a whole different phenomenon. I suppose they could be reasoned away by “old wiring,” but we weren’t buying that. All of us were convinced that we had a ghost in the house, though we weren’t freaked out by it.

Southern Missouri in the summer time should probably be called “Southern Misery,” due to the overwhelming heat and humidity. Cape Girardeau is a city built on a swamp next to the Mississippi River, to say that it’s humid is like saying the ocean contains water. There are days there in August and July when it’s impossible to fall down, the overwhelming amount of moisture in the air will keep you vertical. It’s the only place I’ve ever lived where you can swim while standing up on dry land.

On a sweltering July night, broke and bored, my roommates thought it would be fun to have a seance and attempt to talk to the ghost in our house. Since I was the resident Witch of the house (for a whole year at that point! An expert!) I was elected to conduct the seance. It wasn’t the first seance I had ever lead, due to my fascination with paranormal and the occult I had led a couple in high school, but it wasn’t something I did all that often.

(One of the high school era seances did produce some results. That particular seance was held while on a church youth group trip, and occurred at a church in East Tennessee. Two of the sixteen kids at that seance claimed to have seen a dead relative that night, and all of us thought that things in the room shifted a little bit: words on posters were different in the morning, pictures on the wall looked different during our seance, etc. I didn’t have any experiences that night, other than things looking different during the seance, but it was interesting that other people did.)

Before starting the seance in Cape, I told everyone that it would be done in a Wiccan style for protection. No one objected, so I called the quarters, cast a circle, and called the Goddess into our circle (I didn’t really have much of a relationship with The God yet). With the preliminaries out of the way I had everyone hold hands around our dining room table, and began to call to the spirits of the dead.

While I was asking for the dead to attend us, I felt two things. The first was an abundance of energy near our front porch, it felt like an army of ghosts trying to break into hour house. The second thing was a light, curious, energy, hovering at the very edge of our circle. I had a cast a circle that night for protection from the spirits, and it worked like a charm. I could feel energy outside of it, but nothing was entering our sacred space. More curious than scared, I took a deep breath and spoke to the airy energy at the edge of our circle: “Spirit who lives with us in this house, you are welcome to enter our circle.”

When I said those words the creepiest thing happened, I felt a freezing cold crawl across my wrist, from the outside of the circle towards the center. I was holding hands with my friend Scott, and when I felt that icy touch, he looked right at me and said “Did you feel that?” Let me again state how hot it was that night, temps that day were near 100 degrees with a high amount of humidity. That night was cooler, but it was still hot and miserable, there were no cold north winds that evening. There were windows in that room, but I was on the other side of them, and if a breeze had caused that icy touch it would have come across the center of the circle towards me, this touch started on the non-window side of the room.

I’ve had a few “holy S#@t” moments in my life, and that ghost-touch ranks as the biggest of them. You will never convince me that sensation I felt came from anything but a ghost. The fact that the person next to me also felt it, and in the same place, gives me even more faith in that conviction. I was touched by a ghost, period, and the experience was far from over.

Shortly after we felt the ghostly presence enter our circle I asked it for a sign so that those it hadn’t touched could experience it. A moment later a blobby looking ball of energy began to coalesce in the center of the table. This energy was about the size of a basketball, and a ghostly, glowing white. After forming it began to move upwards, thinning out as it did so. It was almost like watching a pitcher pour in reverse. As the stream of ghostly energy began its upward climb it began to dissipate at the peak until nothing was left.

Shortly afterwards we decided that it was time to end the seance and I dismissed all of the spirits. The ghostly energy I felt on my front porch began to wane, and I thanked the Lady, the quarters, and took down the circle. After that seance we never had a light suddenly turn on or off again. The skeptical will rationalize this experience in their own way, and that’s fine, but I’m sure I saw (and felt) a ghost that night.

For more ghosts stories and encounters with the paranormal at Patheos click here.

*A cryptid is an “unknown animal” like a Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster.

CLICK HERE TO “LIKE” PATHEOS PAGAN ON FACEBOOK

It’s easy to do, like Patheos Pagan and Raise the Horns on Facebook!

Previous Post

October 24, 2012

Samhain Ritual & The Goddess of Death

Next Post

October 30, 2012 Dear Halloween, Where Did You Go?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Editorializing Gateways to Paganism Guest Posts Holiday Histories Led Zeppelin News and Views Occult Pagan Pagan TV Club Paganism polytheism Ramble On Reviews Ritual Strange Days Uncategorized

Select a Month August 2026 March 2026 February 2026 November 2025 September 2025 August 2025 April 2025 August 2024 April 2024 February 2024 December 2023 October 2023 August 2023 June 2023 May 2023 January 2023 October 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 April 2012 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What was the purpose of the cities of refuge?

Select your answer to see how you score.

To train future priests To store food for famine To house the sick To protect those accused of manslaughter