Michael O’Brien, writing for the Salt Lake Tribune [1], recently published an article that begins with reminiscing about his childhood as a Roman Catholic kid in the time of the cultural phenomenon created by the release of the motion picture The Exorcist.
O’Brien writes:
Have you ever heard the phrase “there must be something in the water”? I probably first started to understand this notion 50 years ago, as a Catholic kid growing up during “The Exorcist” cultural phenomenon. Holy Water was one of the heroes (or so I heard, again and again) of the movie. The cinematic version of the sacred H2O helped control or repel the demonic beast within the poor young girl’s body.
For Catholics, Holy Water becomes an important tool—so to speak—in protecting the individual or his home from evil. O’Brien recalls how the monks from a Trappist monastery gave his mother a little plastic bottle filled with holy water for prescriptive use at home as needed.
Indeed, for those of us outside of Roman Catholicism, it would seem that every “good” Catholic home had a bottle of Holy Water, a font near a door where one could dip their fingers and cross themselves, or other means for retaining a bit of water obtained from the local parish church in case of emergencies.
O’Brien’s article, one filled with both humorous remembrances as well as subtle inferences about the mysterious nature of Holy Water, might be considered a sort of introduction—a Holy Water 101—a preface to a more serious discussion of the importance and symbolism of water blessed for use against evil.
O’Brien recalls his own interest in Holy Water as well as that of his childhood peers after watching it being used in the The Exorcist:
Our parish priest and school religion teacher, Father John LaBranche, watched all this hubbub with great interest. He was a faithful but practical man, one who could teach theology one minute and drive the school bus the next.
He understood that our youthful tendency to perceive things so literally was both our greatest strength and our most glaring weakness. He also recognized a good teaching moment when he saw one.
One day in class, he asked, “How do you make holy water anyway?” We were stumped, but interested.
Father LaBranche smiled mischievously and told us, “Take a gallon of water, put it on the stovetop, and boil the hell out of it.”
Of course, the old priest was being factitious, using humor to garner the attention of pre-teenaged boys, but in reality, he wasn’t too far off base.
Holy Water is prepared in a sacramental rite in which a basic exorcism is performed, exorcising any elemental demons from the water as well as the salt that is sprinkled into the water during a prayer in which God is asked to bless the salt, recalling the blessed salt “scattered over the water by the prophet Elisha” and invoking the protective powers of salt and water, that they may “drive away the power of evil.”
The charge persists that holy water is not found in Sacred Scripture and is an invention of the Church. This is not the case, as there are a handful of biblical references to blessed water and its effects.
The first is actually in the beginning of the Bible: “The Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters” (Gen. 1:2). Emerging from the void, God’s first act was to move across the waters of the earth he was prepared to form, first being sure to bless the waters for the goodness of his creation and the coming forth of all other matter. The Catechism acknowledges this: “Since the beginning of the world, water, so humble and wonderful a creature, has been the source of life and fruitfulness” (1218).
We even have a recipe for holy water in the Old Testament, not distant from that found in today’s rituals: “The priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel, and take some of the dust that is on the floor of the tabernacle and put it into the water” (Num. 5:17). Later in this same book, we find instructions pertaining to one defiled by touching a corpse: “He who touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean seven days; he shall cleanse himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and so be clean” (19:11-12).
For some time, Christian pilgrims have journeyed to the Jordan River to immerse themselves in the water made holy when Jesus was baptized. Most Protestants believe in only one baptism for the remission of sins, but none the less, some want a second, largely symbolic, baptism in Jordan.
Likewise, it could be said that Catholics “renew” their baptism through the frequent use of Holy Water. As Protestants, we could argue that this might be an unnecessary act, but I have to ask why not use Holy Water—not as a means of obtaining salvation—but as an additional part of the armor of God Paul spoke of. (Ephesians 6:11)
Religious symbolism is effective when it appeals to both the intellect and the emotions. Christian symbolism invests objects or actions with an inner meaning expressing Christian ideas. Elemental symbols were widely used by the early Church. Water has a specific symbolic significance for Christians. Outside of baptism, water may represent cleansing or purity.
It is this symbolism that drives demons away. Holy Water, water blessed for service in the name of Christ, becomes to the entities of the demonic realm a sort of caustic solution that threatens to wash away the negative energy that sustains them. It is not so much the water per se, but rather the inclusion of Christ in the preparation and usage of the solution, that becomes offensive to demons.
Catholics believe that only a priest can bless Holy Water by virtue of the mystery of Apostolic Succession, while Protestants believe that any born-again Christian has the same abilities. The subject of who is right and who is wrong regarding this point of contention is not open for debate in this discussion. But rather, the fact that Holy Water can be an effective tool in the battle against evil is the point that we are here to underscore today.
Catholics need no urging to use Holy Water as a preventive or prophylaxis, just as doctors inoculate patients to prevent disease. To my Protestant brothers and sisters, I would ask, “As long as we use the correct frame of mind, in keeping with reformation doctrine, what is it going to hurt?” Holy Water will not hurt the individual, but it will help keep demons at bay.
[1] The Salt Lake Tribune, By Michael Patrick O’Brien | Feb. 18, 2024
Two interesting articles recently came across my desk that should be of great interest to all Christians but probably will only be noted by those involved in Deliverance Ministry.
The first, an op-ed from End Time Headlines, [1] decries the widespread failure of Christian Churches to adequately discern the spirits, in particular the evil ones.
Over the last two centuries, science has convinced us that the physical world is the totality of existence.
In our piece titled The Reality of Non-Physical Reality [2] we reported that science disregards anything that it cannot measure, or otherwise quantify, define, or even experiment with. Because it defies their human limited science, it therefore must not exist. But as Christians we know, by faith, that God created spiritual entities we characterize as angels.
We also know that a number of these entities rebelled, were cast out of Heaven and fell Continue reading →
In recent episodes of Saint Michael’s Journal, we have reported on the curious hearings held by Congress on the subject of Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon, Extraterrestrial Aliens, and the threat these unknown entities might pose to National Security.
We have previously noted the irony in that, even hard-core UFO believers—those that want nothing more than to prove the existence of extraterrestrial entities—are skeptical of the many startling revelations made by whistle blowers during their testimony.
As we have also observed that there is indeed, a choir of voices, one that is rising to a crescendo, that insist that these sightings of the strange and unusual are not indicative of extraterrestrial visits, but rather a continuance of the ages old harassment and oppression from Satan himself.
In this episode we will look at these claims as well as other possible explanations for the Continue reading →
Listen to this presentation on Spotify (link above) or its now on Rumble
or read the text below!
In our videos on YouTube and Rumble as well as our Podcast on Spotify, the episode titled Paranormal Potpourri: A Bizarre Anthology, we explored the growing skepticism of the whistle blower testimony, during Congressional Hearings on UFOs.
It would seem that many, even those who are true believers and want nothing more than to witness credible evidence of visitors from outer space, even in this hardcore group, there are those who smell a rat in the testimony given thus far.
We discussed Art Levine’s essay, Spaceship of Fools which implies that the whistle blowers claiming knowledge of UFOs and their alien occupants, are simply hucksters looking for a cash cow.
Now we find another possible explanation for the sudden reversal of the elite who Continue reading →
In this Potpourri of Paranormal, a bizarre anthology, we begin by the way of an addendum to our previous presentation, Close Encounters of the Paranormal Kind, in this current episode we would like to share with you several more recent developments regarding topics mentioned in that previous work.
We examined how that Mr. Steven Speilberg, has not only produced great work in the Science Fiction genre, but he has been involved in several projects in the Horror category as well.
In that episode of Saint Michael’s Journal we noted Close Encounters of the Third Kind and the movie Poltergeist, both works in which Speilberg played a significant role, but very recently we learned that he had a certain degree of involvement in another classic horror film as well.
Writing for 24SSPORTS.COM, Dustin Huang [1] resurrects a 2009 Los Angeles Times article [2] that outlined how Speilberg came to suggest that Oren Peli reconsider the ending of his haunting story of a demonic invasion of a suburban tract house and it’s occupants.
Reportedly, PARANORMAL ACTIVITY, the film shot in just seven days on a meager budget of $15,000, produced, written, directed, photographed and edited by Oren Peli—an independent film maker—was making its rounds through the film festivals when it fell into Speilberg’s hands.
A mythology has grown around the original found footage movie that spawned several sequels, a video game and digital comics, a legend that insists that Speilberg had taken a copy of the film home to watch and decide if he wanted his Dream Works production company to get involved. Other legends insist that Speilberg is no stranger to spooky events, those events that in our previous episode we referred to as close encounters of the paranormal kind, and it would seem that in the case of Paranormal Activity, Speilberg endured such a close encounter.
Supposedly, while the copy of Paranormal Activity was in his Pacific Palisades estate, the door to an empty bedroom closed by itself and locked Speilberg out, forcing him to call a locksmith.
In both the Times article as well as Huang’s recent piece, this event in 2008 so rattled Speilberg that he wanted nothing to do with the project, but did make suggestions on how Peli might improve upon the film.
Peli re-shot the ending in four days and the rest is history.
Fans of Paranormal Activity no doubt think that the original work could not be improved upon, but we have to wonder if it might have been even more spectacular had Speilberg taken the project on, futher improving Peli’s original work.
A question more pressing is why did he pass, only making a suggestion about the major re-write of the final scene?
If you are familiar with his work, you know Speilberg is gifted, he can spot a gem of a story and refine it into a blockbuster. So why would he pass on something that might have made him millions? What was it about that incident of the bedroom door closing and locking itself that frightened the man so bad that he passed up the opportunity to earn millions of dollars?
It has been said that Speilberg alludes to prior life experiences as being the inspiration for his work; could he have suffered through an experience some time in the past, something eerily similar to the plot of Paranormal Activity?
Or perhaps was it a bad experience from his days working on the Poltergeist project that led him to avoid being involved in Paranormal Activity?
Perhaps it is nothing more than the publicity department generating rumors to pique moviegoer interest, but perhaps, just like the movie The Exorcist, Poltergeist is in fact plagued with an evil curse.
The internet site, Biography writes;
“The majority of the fuel for the alleged curse stems from the deaths of multiple cast members. In total, four cast members died during and soon after the filming of the series. Two of these tragic deaths were highly unexpected and puzzling, leading many fans to speculate on the trilogy’s eerie implications.”
Heather O’Rourke who was only six years old when she played the part of Carol Anne Freeling died just a few years after the first movie was released.
Dominique Dunne, who played the original older sister Dana Freeling, was murdered by her boyfriend in November of 1982 just months after the Summer release of Poltergeist.
Julian Beck, the evil preacher Kane, and Will Sampson the Native American Shamen both died not long after completion of Poltergeist II The other side, of more natural causes. Beck from stomach cancer and Sampson from a heart-lung transplant which at that time had a very slim survival rate.
The author of the Biography piece, Micah White writes;
Cast deaths were not the only agents of the curse’s proliferation, as other peculiar and creepy legends surround the film franchise. JoBeth Williams, who played mom Diane Freeling in the first two films, claimed that director Spielberg insisted on using actual human skeletons as props in an attempt to save money (at the time, they were cheaper than plastic skeletons). Williams’ claim has never been verified, but it persists to this day in the lore surrounding the films’ curse.
Perhaps you remember the scene in which Williams falls into the swimming pool full of skeletons, as I recall, those skeletons looked very real to me.
If the use of real skeletons wasn’t bad enough Sampson, who in real life was a Native Spiritual leader and who passed away due to circumstances mentioned previously, performed an authentic exorcism one night after shooting wrapped up.
Other cast members have had close calls with death over the years, some such as Lou Perrymen who played the small role of Pugsley in the original film, were not so fortunate. Perrymen was 67 years old when a recently released ex-convict killed him in his own home with an ax.
So who knows, perhaps Speilberg felt he had pushed his luck a bit far enough with his previous work. So we have to ask is it possible that a fear of what might happen, should he take part in Paranormal Activity, was this underlying fear and apprehension so great that he turned down a project that could have made him millions?
Moving on to our next topic, in Close Encounters of the Paranormal Kind we reported about the ex New York City Police Officer who gave up his badge and gun to fight—not human criminals—but criminals of the demonic variety. Chris DeFlorio, a 19-year-vet of NYPD continues to make headlines.
Alex Mitchell writing for the New York Post in an article dated 13 July of this year, reports DeFlorio expresses his concern that something sinister is going on. The ex-cop turned demonologist told reporters:
“There are just too many coincidences of identical incidents from different towns across the country … The claims must be seen as credible until proven otherwise, It doesn’t get more serious than this — when children are the targets.”
James Liddell, the US Audience Writer for the British publication, The Star, reported on 8 Jun of this year that while DeFlorio was serving as a law enforcement officer in New York City, he was also doing Christian ministry work in Africa where he first met a man he thought was demonically possessed.
Liddell reports that DeFlorio told the following hair raising story:
The Man was slithering around the floor like a snake making unusual noises. We locked eyes, and I saw what I perceived to be pure evil. It was an evil that even with all my years in law enforcement, I had never seen this sort of evil before. I saw a battle between God and the devil, good and evil.”
DeFlorio then recalled another memorable case:
This case in Connecticut involved an elderly woman and her four-year-old granddaughter when they moved into their “dream house”. Little did they know, the property was previously owned by a “satanic witch”, DeFlorio said.
The grandmother could hear walking and banging in the middle of the night, waking up to “markings” and “bloody hand prints” all over the walls – along with “animal skulls” nailed around in a ceremonious circle.
DeFlorio discovered that the child had a “relationship” with the creature, which she could draw and even mimic the sounds it made. After using his cop skills to investigate the property, they went to the attic to perform a Catholic ritual. In the Attic they “recorded some horrific activity”. DeFlorio said
“There was a smell coming up from the ground as I was reading and the family recorded downstairs a growling, roaring sound around the entire house. At the same time as the ritual, while fighting against this demon who she called her friend, the little girl was apparently giving a play-by-play of what was happening.”
Believe it or not, what DeFlorio claims to happen during an Exorcism of a locale, is not that unusual. This sort of paranormal phenomenon, at times, is routine to those experienced in demonic warfare.
Another topic we covered in Close Encounters of the Paranormal Kind is that of the seemingly total reversal of the media and powers that be, who have now embraced those who they castigated not so very long ago.
The media now seems anxious to flock to individuals who claim to have witnessed unidentified aerial phenomena, or UAPs, that phenomena that most of us think of as UFOs. Those who once were social outcasts are now the favorite cause célèbre as the media flock to anyone willing to be interviewed as they tell their out of this world story.
Almost on a daily basis, we see yet another report of a whistle blower stepping forward to say he or she has knowledge of information that the authorities—diverse government agencies—who have colluded with each other to cover up the information that the public demands to be released.
Ironically, when most of these so called whistle blowers are vetted, we find that they have no first hand or even second hand information but rather they only contribute hearsay that can not be confirmed.
Mark Gollom, published a piece on July 30 at the CBC news site, titled So, about that UFO testimony … how seriously is Congress taking it? And should we? [5] Gollom wrote:
When renowned skeptic Michael Shermer watched the recent U.S. Congressional House committee hearing — which included shocking testimony about UFOs, alien spacecraft and alien remains — he was, perhaps not surprisingly, unimpressed.
Indeed, what was more amazing to Shermer, publisher of Skeptic magazine, was the fact that such a hearing was even taking place.
“It’s astonishing it’s come this far without any real evidence, without anybody in the scientific community making an appearance,” said Shermer, publisher of Skeptic magazine. “We are still seeing not a shred of physical evidence.”
Likewise, the Kansas City Star ran the headline on 26 July which read;
‘Have you seen alien bodies?’ Missouri lawmaker wasn’t convinced after hearing on UAPs
The KC Star reports:
In a congressional hearing about the existence of unidentified anomalous phenomenon — the most recent term for what have long been called UFOs — Rep. Eric Burlison passed on a question for a witness from a Missouri constituent.
“Have you seen alien bodies?” asked Burlison, a freshman Missouri Republican.
The witness, David Grusch, was a former intelligence officer in the U.S. Air Force who worked as an intelligence officer and worked with the Department of Defense office in charge of investigating UAPs, called the All Domain Anomaly Resolution Office. He has claimed the government is covering up their knowledge about “non-human aircraft” and “pilot bodies.”
“That is something I have not witnessed myself,” Grusch responded. He also said he couldn’t reveal any non-human aircraft he’s personally witnessed in a non-classified setting.
[…]
“I’m pretty skeptical about this,” Burlison said. “As I said before, I think the idea that an alien race would travel hundreds of light years, or thousands, or whatever it takes to get here, and is capable of traveling at that speed, and get here is not capable of surviving our atmosphere and surviving this planet. It just doesn’t make any sense.”
The honorable gentleman from Missouri has a point, how could such an advance alien race arrice here only to crash land?
Newsweek opted to roll out a scientist for his observation:
Leading scientists have reacted with skepticism to claims espoused in a special hearing that alien life not only exists, but has traveled to Earth and specimens are held by the U.S. government.
In a session of the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday, part of an investigation of claims regarding UFOs, witnesses testified that the government had been aware of non-human activity since the 1930s.
“I watched a few clips and saw some people who seemed to believe stuff saying extraordinary things without presenting extraordinary evidence,” reacted physicist and broadcaster Brian Cox on Twitter. [6]
If you care to peruse the diverse publications distributed by the various groups and agencies who want nothing more than to find the truth about UFOs and UAPs, true believers if you will, you will find that a surprisingly large number of people in those groups are as equally skeptical of the testimony given at these congressional hearings.
We are even seeing on TikTok and other media popular with younger people, an emerging trend in which the creators of the video presentation rhetorically ask;
“Aren’t there more important issues for Congress to investigate, like the economy, government corruption, etc etc etc?”
Others are wondering if these hearings are nothing more than a distraction, a shell game so to speak in which their intention is to get us to watch what they want us to see and not what they don’t want us to see.
However, if the report by Art Levine published by the Washington Spectator is in fact credible, the real reason for these so called whistle blowers to step forward and claim knowledge of secret government activities, may be nothing more than the hopes of hucksters seeking to defraud the taxpayer of even more money.
Levine’s work titled Spaceship of Fools [7] appears to connect the proverbial dots between purveyors of paranormal snake oil and the fleecing of the Treasury. Levine writes:
Behind every conspiracy theory lies a golden opportunity for companies and hucksters to make money. UFOs are no exception. That’s becoming clear once again as a former intelligence agency official, and self-identified “whistleblower,” David Grusch, came forward last month with startling and increasingly bizarre new claims.
Buoyed by largely uncritical media hype, he’s asserted that the government has been hiding a secret alien crash retrieval program; the pope tipped off the United States to a UFO retrieved by Mussolini (a long discredited hoax); alien corpses have been recovered by U.S. officials; and humans have been killed by aliens. Grusch’s UFO craft recovery tales spurred calls for yet more congressional hearings on UFOs, with the next one scheduled before a House Oversight subcommittee on July 26. Expect documentary films, a book deal, and lucrative offers on the lecture circuit to follow.
We’ve been here before. Two former Defense Department officials, Luis “Lue” Elizondo and Christopher Mellon, came forward a few years ago to expose what they deemed a government cover-up of UFOs.
Now the Securities and Exchange Commission is apparently poised to initiate a fraud investigation of the company they helped launch in 2017, To the Stars Academy of Arts and Sciences (TTSA), following its multimillion-dollar pleas for investment. The potential for an investigation is also driven by concerns raised in an extensive whistleblower complaint by a skeptic, as well as the substance of a previous SEC lawsuit against the company that was aborted in 2019. (Documents relating to this lawsuit have been obtained by The Washington Spectator.)
TTSA made a host of pseudoscientific claims following its public launch with a news conference in October 2017—while seeking $50 million in investment. Among them: executives promised to build a Star Trek–style spaceship to travel “instantly” through the cosmos. This project was based in part, they claimed in solicitations to investors, on (nonexistent) warp-drive technology—“reverse-engineered” from likely alien materials recovered from crashed UFOs. The company’s CEO, Blink-182 guitarist Tom DeLonge, even declared: “I have alien artifacts.”
Prominent among the proponents of such far-fetched claims were those former influential DOD officials, Elizondo and Mellon, both of whom had joined DeLonge’s company. These same individuals laid the groundwork for the UFO media firestorm that began at the end of 2017, new defense legislation that was passed in December 2021, and Senate hearings held this past April. These developments in turn effectively nurtured the bonanza of publicity and congressional interest that have greeted David Grusch’s purported revelations.
Could these skeptics be correct in their supposition that all the out of this world hype and bluster, insinuations that aliens who have traveled millions of light-years across space have crashed here and their fantastic space ships routinely harass our most advanced military aircraft, could it be that all this is nothing more than an elaborate set-up, a means to get Congress to appropriate millions, if not billions of dollars on a fools mission?
On that note, I leave you with the following question;
“What do you think, are the hearings productive—revealing the truth of UFO phenomenon—or are they simply an engineered distraction designed to take our attention away from the real truth, while hucksters defraud the American people out of even more money?”
Watch Close Encounters of the Paranormal Kind on YouTube
Listen to the Podcast on Spotify, or read it below
Throughout his career, Steven Spielberg has been a prolific writer, director, and producer bringing to the world a multitude of work, entertaining both old and young alike in the process.
In 1977, Spielberg wrote and directed one of the many movies he is known for, a movie that now has a cult following, a Science fiction movie that is considered to be in the realm of the paranormal.
Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a fictional story of a rather plain everyday kind of guy who, during a close encounter with an alien intelligence, is gifted with a vision that he can not quite discern the nature thereof.
Of course we all know that Roy Neary, the character played by Richard Dreyfuss, later Continue reading →
Remember the public service advertisement on TV years ago that used an egg being fried so as to encourage the viewer to give up illicit drugs? The insinuation was that drug use fired your brain. Well check out this Political Cartoon from TownHall.com
by Tom Stiglich – Mon, Jun 19, 2023
Everyone presumes that the increasing number of gaffs and seemingly incoherent statements made by Biden, are a result of dementia and not drugs. None the less, the brain of mister LOL81millionvotes seems to be fried.
On the surface, this post doesn’t seem to be related to the topics normally covered by this journal, but when you think about it, having someone who is apparently senile as President, is a bit terrifying.
On the day of his scheduled execution, a convicted serial killer gets a last minute court-ordered psychiatric evaluation. The killer surprises the psychiatrist with his claim that instead of trying to avoid his fate, he is in fact a demon who wants the execution to go forward… and further claims that before their brief time together is over, the doctor will commit three murders of his own.
If—at the time of this essay—you were looking for a movie to see at a theater near you, the preceding synopsis was prominently displayed following the motion picture titled: Nefarious.
This most recent project of filmmakers Cary Solomon and Chuck Konzelman, takes on Continue reading →
Read this essay below, watch it on You Tube, or click on the player below for the audio version!
When one explores the vast trove of literature related to the subject of Demonic possession, the student will eventually come across a quote originating in the mid-nineteenth century, a statement that is only a brief observation but one of questionable provenance. With that said, many researchers of such trivia agree that, most likely, the quote can be attributed to one man in particular. A man who in his day enjoyed a reputation of being the epitome of evil, due to his writings that scandalized the polite gentry. His literary themes—in our modern world would hardly raise an eyebrow or attract undue attention—but in the early eighteen hundreds, his poetry was considered pornographic, so much so that he was even brought to trial. So who was this French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic and translator? His name was Charles Baudelaire and as previously noted, many credit Baudelaire with a statement that has been widely quoted:
“The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist”
Many writers including yours truly, have fallen back on this quote in attempts to Continue reading →
Saint Michael’s Journal: The Journal of Exorcism, now has a YouTube channel. Follow the link to view the first episode, a editorial regarding the major motion picture; NEFARIOUS
Saint Michael's Journal 