Amanda Large Teague was meditating the first time she says she met the ghost of a 300-year-old Haitian pirate. She thought he was rude to interrupt her solitude, so she told him to leave. Then he showed up again.
The third time he visited, Teague, of Belfast, said she decided to talk with him.
After she communicated with the ghost for several months, Teague said, she became convinced that he was Jack Teague, who she later claimed had inspired the character of Captain Jack Sparrow in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies. (Experts challenge these assertions.)
Teague’s beliefs, which fall under the umbrella of New Age spirituality, test the boundaries of what types of faith people in Western cultures are willing to accept. Though experts say Teague’s story is an outlier and not representative of most New Age spirituality, the range of beliefs — which includes reincarnation and astrology — is more common among Americans than it may seem.