Mystical Mythology of the World

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DIVINE APPARITIONS

Visions, revelations and apparitions are supernatural manifestations due to the direct intervention of a power superior to man in which God makes himself, his will, or other information known to mankind.

The recipient of a revelation is commonly referred to as a visionary, a seer or a prophet if the divine message reveals future events. Supernatural apparitions of divine forces have been known in every religion since ancient times. And it’s by far the most frequent of all miraculous phenomena within the Catholic Church.

Apparitions usually occur while the recipient is in a state of ecstasy or a trance-like condition. They are either induced spontaneously or brought on by intense prayer, meditation or fasting. Ecstasy is characterized by expanded mental and spiritual awareness while the activity of the senses is usually suspended.

Three types of apparitions

The Catholic Church, following St. Augustine, outlines three types of apparitions or visions: intellectual, imaginative and corporeal.

Intellectual vision
The intellectual vision is perception without the presence of a visual object. As St. Theresa has said, "It is like feeling someone near one in a dark place." The object of an intellectual vision can be anything, but most often is a higher theological concept such as the Holy Trinity, the essence of the soul, the nature of heaven, and the like.

Imaginative vision
The imaginative vision is somewhat more 'concrete' than the intellectual. Although it also lacks a visual object, the human imagination is touched to create a visual representation. Often the visionary is aware that it is a purely reproduced or composite image, which exists only in the imagination. This kind of vision occurs most frequently during sleep.

Corporeal vision
The difference between an imaginative and a corporeal vision is that the imaginative, while having a visual component, is not seen by the eyes and leaves no physical evidence of its effects. The corporeal vision, on the other hand, is registered by the human eye and at times leaves physical effects. The corporeal vision can either be a figure really present or a power superior to man, which directly modifies the visual organ and produces in the composite a sensation equivalent to that which an external object would. The presence of an external figure may be seen in two ways. Sometimes the very substance of the being or the person will be presented; sometimes it will be merely an appearance consisting in a certain arrangement of luminous rays.
Other Types of Phenomena

Locution
Sometimes the apparition is only heard, usually as an inner voice. This phenomenon is called locution.

Other phenomena
Phenomena such as weeping images of Jesus or the Virgin Mary and people showing the marks of stigmata may obviously also be considered as divine apparitions. These are therefore often investigated and judged by the Vatican congregation, which deals with private revelations.

Here let the heart abide,
For winter is over and done
Where Heaven is opened wide
On a woman clothed with the sun.

Sr. Mary St. Virginia Cyril Robert, Mary Immaculate: God's Mother and Mine (1946)


 

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