I believe in God. I also believe in ghosts. My belief in the former was actually facilitated by the multiple experiences I had with the latter. It proved easier to have faith in God once I believed in ghosts, especially after  my college education had destroyed Young Earth Creationism in my mind. As I've made clear in the past, I primarily believe in both of these things due to personal experiences, of events that I strongly believe actually happened to me. This does not mean that I consider myself gullible or easily fooled. I try not to make any firm conclusions prior to at least a minimal preliminary investigation. In fact, I am quite skeptical about fantastic claims and somewhat reluctant to make them myself, especially without some form of corroboration. A good friend of mine was involved in a number of my personal ghost experiences and verifies to this day that my recollections have been accurate, if not even conservative, so I am somewhat comfortable in saying my own ghost stories are true. Before I wrote about Scott Patterson's alleged supernatural experience at the New Mexico State Prison, I watched a lengthy documentary about the violence that took place during the infamous riot. While I cannot attest to the veracity of his ghost story, I can verify that the events he claimed that happened during the riot did indeed happen. Actually, the obscene violence during riot was even worse than what Patterson described. However, that does not necessarily mean that Patterson's story is true. It merely lend some credibility to the back story of his … [Read more...]