And from Wikipedia:
Reincarnation is the religious or philosophical concept that the soul or spirit, after biological death, begins a new life in a new body. This doctrine is a central tenet of the Indian religions.[1] It is also a common belief of various ancient and modern religions such as Spiritism, Theosophy, and Eckankar and is found in many tribal societies around the world, in places such as Siberia, West Africa, North America, and Australia.
Supernatural: supernatural
adjective
1 supernatural powers: paranormal, psychic, magic, magical, occult, mystic, mystical, miraculous, superhuman, supernormal, hypernormal, extramundane; inexplicable, uncanny, unaccountable, unbelievable, non-rational, weird, mysterious, arcane. ANTONYMS natural, normal.
2 stories about a supernatural hound: ghostly, phantom, spectral, magical, mystic, other-worldly, unearthly, unnatural, unreal, mysterious, fabulous; informal spooky.
And further from Wikipedia:
supernatural (Medieval Latin: supernātūrālis: supra "above" + naturalis "nature", first used: 1520–30 AD) is that which is not subject to the laws of physics, or more figuratively, that which is said to exist above and beyond nature. In philosophy, popular culture and fiction, the supernatural is associated with the paranormal, religions and occultism. It has neoplatonic and medieval scholastic origins.
In my reading of this thread, these appear to be the three words that trouble you the most. I shall therefore deal with them in some depth, hoping that you will respond to this post with reasons for the problems you have with my disquisition:
EvidenceAs may be seen, my dictionary gives three instances of the word, therefore before I continue to work through those, I shall present Wikipedia's explanation:
Evidence, broadly construed, is anything presented in support of an assertion.
Now, to deal with the three instances in my online dictionary:
1 they found evidence of his participation in the burglary: proof, confirmation, verification, substantiation, corroboration, affirmation, authentication, attestation, documentation; support for, backing for, reinforcement for, grounds for.
Evidence in this instance, refers to the usage of the word with which you appear to be most familiar, as shown in your insistence that courts use this to decide on the guilt or otherwise of an accused.
Remembering that this is a rational/skeptical forum, and not a legal one, and I am not an expert on international law, I am merely able to comment on the situation as it is dealt with in South African courts.
DIRECT EVIDENCE This is the evidence of a person who has experienced something crucially relevant to the case. For example, the testimony of A regarding the murder he saw B committing would be regarded as direct evidence.
HEARSAY EVIDENCE Testimony from A that he heard B telling C that he had seen the accused, D, commit murder would be regarded as hearsay evidence (and, generally, rejected), if B was not in court to be cross-examined. In some cases, however, hearsay evidence will be accepted - for example, if a police officer reports the voluntary confession of the accused.
CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE If a statement is made to the court from which an inference may be drawn as to the existence or non-existence of a disputed fact, such a statement constitutes circumstantial evidence. For example, testimony from A that he saw B, blood-stained knife in hand, leaving the house in which C was stabbed to death would be regarded as circumstantial evidence that B was the killer. Circumstantial evidence will be accepted only if:
The inference drawn from it is consistent with all the other proved facts;
It is the only reasonable inference in the light of all the facts (in a criminal case);
It is the more plausible conclusion from among several conceivable ones (generally in a civil case).
EVIDENCE OF CHARACTER Because this type of evidence is generally considered to be legally irrelevant, it is inadmissible. In a criminal case, evidence is not normally permitted about an accused's previous convictions until after a verdict of guilty is pronounced. Exceptions may be made if:
The accused asserts that he or she has a good character;
The accused attacks the integrity of the prosecution witnesses; or
The facts in a previous case are so similar to those in the case before the court that it is unlikely to be mere coincidence that the accused was involved in both.
http://www.legalcity.net/Index.cfm?fuseaction=RIGHTS.article&ArticleID=6290631As may be seen from my bolding of parts of the quote from that website, evidence is dealt with under strict rules, and not accepted merely because someone claims that their evidence is valid. Therefore unless you can show that it works otherwise in other courts, your claim that courts accept eye-witness or other evidence, is largely fallacious.
2 the court refused to accept Mr Scott's evidence: testimony, statement, sworn statement, attestation, declaration, avowal, plea, submission, claim, contention, charge, allegation; Law deposition, representation, affidavit; rare asseveration, averment.
3 the room showed evidence of a struggle: signs, indications, pointers, marks, traces, suggestions, hints; manifestation
These two deal with evidence from the point of view of witness evidence, and may be the cause of your confusion about the word, which on this forum is intended to be used in the sense of scientific evidence, which is defined, by Wikipedia as:
Scientific evidence is evidence which serves to either support or counter a scientific theory or hypothesis. Such evidence is expected to be empirical evidence and in accordance with scientific method. Standards for scientific evidence vary according to the field of inquiry, but the strength of scientific evidence is generally based on the results of statistical analysis and the strength of scientific controls.
Therefore I can only conclude that the problem is not that the word "evidence" is actively forbidden or even partially-forbidden, it is merely that we (i.e. the membership of the forum which does not include you in this case) have a different interpretation of the word. Where you want it to include ALL evidence, the majority of the members of this forum employ the definition as given in this statement by the late Carl Sagan (
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Extraordin ... y_evidence):
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence was a phrase made popular by Carl Sagan. It is the heart of the scientific method, and a model for critical thinking, rational thought and skepticism everywhere.
The evidence put forth by proponents of such things as gods, ghosts, the paranormal, and UFOs is highly questionable at best and offers little in the way of proof. Even if we accepted what evidence there is as valid (and it is highly debatable if we should), limited and weak evidence is not enough to overcome the extraordinary nature of these claims.
I am sure that you cannot disagree that when one makes extraordinary claims, such as those regarding the other two problematic words, i.e. "supernatural" and "reincarnation" (defined above) these are extraordinary claims, and therefore the above does apply in those cases.
by 
Catholics (except for the monarchy), and increasingly we hear the phrase 
