How do you explain the millions of people in history who have seen visions?

Question

Of the Blessed Mother Virgin Mary?
What do you think fo this Photo?
http://www.visionsofjesuschrist.com/weeping18.htm
Also do you believe in what they say about opening your THIRD EYE?
To open the third eye:
Close your eyes, clear your mind, then focus both your eyes just in the middle of the eyebrows. it is said that attention is food for the third eye. it is hungry, give it food, pay attention to it.
Close your eyes, with eyes closed let your eyes move as if looking at the center point between your eyebrows, when you are near the right point, your eyes will become fixed. it will be difficult to move them as your third eye is a magnet for attention.

Answer 1

Do NOT open your 'third eye'. Its an occult trick that has something to do with voodoo and/or raikie. It opens a door to the 'spirit world' that is very hard to close and can lead to demonic problems.

Answer 2

The photos were nice. There are a thousand possible explanations for this sort of thing, the most obvious of which is the mere chance coincidence of shapes. You know, the "gods" of other religions have been photographed as well - as have many a ghost, sasquatch, UFO, etc - does that prove they "exist"?

As for visions, it's pretty easy for anybody to obtain visions. You don't even need LSD. To construct elaborate metaphysical theories from the content of somebody else's vision, though, is just absurd. I can provisionally agree that St Teresa of Avila, e.g., "saw God" without subscribing to Catholicism. People of every religion and no religion have experienced visions; the obvious conclusion is that religion isn't the essential factor.

But it's just bizarre that you follow up a question about apparitions of the "Virgin" with a question about the Third Eye.

Answer 3

I think the people often see what they want to see....

The human brain wants to make a pattern out of chaos... Constellations, cloud pictures, forms and faces seen in tree bark, paint or plaster swirls... If one is very religious it is no surprise that these imagined forms take on the appearance of religious figures for these individuals.

Once one person sees an image simply saying it looks like the virgin mary on this grilled cheese sandwich can place the idea of the image in anothers head and they see it too..

I have heard the third eye describes in many ways and heard of opening it in many ways...

Look at a burning candle for a period of time then close your eyes and consentrate your eyes on where the candle was and you can still see the candle burning......

Look at a religious photograph (or any photograph) stare directly at the center keep staring for 30-45 seconds then close your eyes you will see the photograph still..

All are optical illusions..

More optical illusions..

http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_illusion

http://www.moillusions.com/2006/04/american-flag-optical-illusion.html

Answer 4

What purpose do these "visions" serve? I think they are bogus. These people are liars and dupes. What does the Pope think of "the third eye"? Is that related to having eyes in the back of your head? Why do no educated people ever see this stuff? It's always some fanatic in some backwards country that ends up in a nunnery to keep her from talking. How many of these accounts were proven false? What do you think of Mary on a burned tortilla? Would you bow down to that?

Answer 5

The last time I used my third eye, I was arrested.

Millions of people also dream, millions of people lie every day. The fact that millions have visions, doesn't give the visions any credence.

I attended a church where a lady claimed to have a vision that showed my Dad being killed in a car accident that year. He didn't die, didn't even get into a car accident. Her vision was clearly just imagination, just like most visions.

Answer 6

I explain it the same way I explain people seeing visions of Krishna, Buddha, Venus, Osiris, or any other deity--tricks of the mind, induced by drugs, alcohol, meditation, injury, optical illusions, sickness, or mental illness. The photos at that website obviously have been altered. Why would the JEWISH mother of Jesus resemble a 15th-Century European woman? And how could she have been a virgin if she had several children after Jesus? Catholics are gullible simpletons.

Btw, if you keep doing that, your eyeballs will stick that way and all the other kids will make fun of you.

Answer 7

Good imaginations coupled with knowledge and or belief of the particular system of faith the vision concerns.

Nostradamus saw visions too but like much prophecy it was termed to be able to fit a variety of scenarios and therefore subjective to whomever was doing the interpreting of the quatrains.

Answer 8

Lots of people have mental illnesses. I for one have no desire to emulate them.
And that is exactly what these "visions" are.

Edit; after seeing these laughable photos I'd say that the perpetrators are either very lazy (my 7 year old does more convincing stuff on photoshop than that!) or just plain stupid.
Honestly if that's what you consider proof, I'd hate to see what you consider hearsay.

Answer 9

I believe it the same way so many have seen space aliens out at Area 51. I believe it the same way I believe so many have been abducted by aliens and been operated on. I believe it the same way I believe that when Mars aligns with Jupiter, on a Thursday, during a rainstorm, when you face east, snap your fingers twice and say 'humba wumba' three times, you'll see 10 minutes into the future.
In other words, people lie.

Answer 10

You are mixing religion here.The appearance of the Blessed Mother and the third eye are opposite ends of the spectrum.

Answer 11

Why do we need to explain it?

It sounds to me like the third eye thing is crossing your eyes with them close and they do temporaily lock focus when they are crossed, opened or closed.