They have been closely guarded for more than 30 years, but guidelines on how to deal with divine apparitions of the Virgin Mary and “supernatural phenomena” have now been released by the Vatican.
The “norms” on how the Roman Catholic Church should deal with mystical apparitions were initially drawn up in Latin in 1978 under Pope Paul VI and were intended for strictly internal use. They shed light on the sorts of apparitions which have inspired the establishment of shrines such as those at Lourdes in France and Fatima in Portugal, which attract millions of pilgrims a year, many in search of cures for illnesses or other “miracles”.
The guidelines are intended to help bishops “in their difficult task of discerning presumed apparitions, revelations, messages or, more generally, extraordinary phenomena of presumed supernatural origin,” Cardinal William Levada, the American prefect of the CDF, wrote in a preface. Deciding whether a spiritual revelation is genuine or not is based on its “orientation to Christ Himself,” Cardinal Levada wrote. “If it leads us away from Him, then it certainly does not come from the Holy Spirit.” Determining whether a spiritual revelation is authentic or not is the responsibility of the local bishop, the Vatican said. He is required to set up a special panel of theologians, psychologists and doctors to judge the “psychological equilibrium and rectitude of moral life” of the person or people reporting the apparition and whether it corresponds with Church doctrine.
According to Islam there are no supernatural phenomena. God operates through Laws of Nature, possibly through quantum physics and yet unknown physics and revelation into human mind!
Christianity has always been at odds with science.