St. Joseph： Terror of Demons—Battles During Exorcisms
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Summary
In this episode of the John Henry Weston Show, host J. Henry Weston sits down with author and author Charles Brownie to discuss demons and how to cast them out of your life. Dr. Brownie is the author of The Most Powerful Saints for Exorcisms and The Rise of the Occult. In this episode, we discuss the role of demons in our lives, how to deal with them, and what exorcism actually is.
Transcript
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To be afraid of a demon, if you are a faithful Christian, is betraying your faith, because
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If you are bound to him, demons are afraid of you.
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Well, my friends, welcome to the John Henry Weston Show.
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You know, there's a lot of demonic activity going on around us.
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And that's why we've talked to a bunch of exorcists on how to fight this.
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And the book is actually called The Most Powerful Saints for Exorcisms.
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You know, in every day, or every day if you're saying your rosary anyway, you pray the creed.
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And in the creed, we talk about the communion of saints.
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But how many people actually think about what that means?
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We've got the author with us today, Charles Brownie.
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Let's begin, as you always do, with the sign of the cross.
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In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
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So Charles, a very interesting book. You had an earlier book on exorcisms that was a great success. Tell us about that one.
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Yeah, yeah, thank you. So the first one that really got me started, I'm doing this full time now with my own company, Slaying Dragons Press.
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So this one, Slaying Dragons, is a compilation of the teachings of modern exorcists,
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doctors of the church, kind of everything you need to know in spiritual warfare
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Yeah, that launched everything that I'm doing with this whole research
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on what exorcists teach and how practical it is.
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I love the headline of what they want you to know.
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That was great. So we're in this situation of a real battle, and there's going to be a lot of
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people right off the bat who, particularly coming from a Protestant perspective, which is very
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common in America, of, yeah, you know, we're all called to cast out the demons, and we know how to
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do that from the Bible. What's your advice there? What's the real theological background to all of
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this. Yeah. So when it comes to exorcism, Jesus was the first exorcist. He is the great exorcist.
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That's one of his principal ministries. If you look at the Gospels, it's not a sacrament,
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which I always think is very fascinating. It's a sacramental. And the early church up to like the,
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I don't know, Trent or sometime really discerned, like, where is the line between sacrament and
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sacramental? That's kind of a different topic. But casting out demons was central to the Gospels
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proclamation. And so you see holiness often accompany the casting out of demons. There are
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great saints, which you can talk about who not being exorcists drove demons out of people because
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of their holiness. So, but there is an authority. So there's a holiness, a fidelity to Christ is how
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you achieve that holiness only through the church. And then you also have priests who only through
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the church with permission of their bishops can cast out demons through exorcisms, through the
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actual right. So it's not something open to everybody in the sense of the authority. You
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have to be a priest delegated but spiritual combat is something we all enter into if we are holy you
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know we're all in it whether we're holy or not we're just suffering from it if we're not holy
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but if we're holy we can actually be you know beneficial to people now we've had a an exorcist
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on before and they were talking about the authority structure about how especially
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the husbands of a household can actually sort of cast out, if you will, demons because they're
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in authority over their families and stuff like that. Does that figure into your study as well?
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Yeah, that did come up in Slaying Dragons in this book. And then I wrote two books on the occult
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after that, The Rise of the Occult and The Occult Among Us, Exposing the Occult. And those have
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been endorsed by bishops and exorcists too so take a look there so the the corruption of the family
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is a big deal so the demon does like to go after that authority structure this the stability
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structure and the father is the head of the family this is a biblical and church church taught
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reality the father is the head of the family and as pope one of the pope pious is a camera which
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one said that the mother is the heart the father is the head the mother is the heart and together
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they form a dynamic unity, but without crossing those boundaries, you know, the heart should make
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the head very loving and charitable, but he remains the head. And there is the spiritual authority,
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Pope Pius XII, I want to say, they're all great. All the Pope Piuses of the 20th century are great.
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One of them said that the father's role is Episcopal. He uses that term Episcopal. He's
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an Episcopal authority in the family. Like that really needs to be unpacked. And I think one way
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it's being unpacked nowadays is through the teachings of exorcists. There's this practical
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application where, like St. Joseph, fathers can step in and defend their bride and their children.
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Absolutely beautiful. So, you know, in the church, it's true, every day in the creed, we say,
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you know, we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints,
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the forgiveness of sins. But I think most people are like really skimming over that,
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the communion of saints bit. And if they are saying that, they're kind of thinking, well,
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it's like, yeah, we're talking to our fellow Christians, just like it says in the Bible.
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You know, it's the saints at Ephesus and the saints here and there. They're really our fellow
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Christians. But tell us about the communion of saints and what it really is, what it really means.
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Yeah. So the church is not divided at all, but as is explained to be in three different stages
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or phases the church militant the church suffering so the church militant is on earth the church
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suffering is in purgatory and the church triumphant is in heaven so those are the ones who have
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lived gloriously you know also the ones who have finished purgatory however long that really takes
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so well we know the one the communion of saints the the church triumphant is those saints those
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christian men and women who have lived heroically here have suffered have been martyred have been
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great preachers, just lived the heroic virtue and have achieved the crown. They have run the race.
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They have finished it. They have been pleasing to God. They've died in his favor, died as his
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friends, and have been taken to eternal glory. And that eternal glory is they are reigning with
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Christ. This is something St. Paul talks about in the second letter of Timothy. They reign with
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Christ. We can reign with Christ in heaven if we stay faithful. So that reigning is a real power.
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It's a real efficacy, the communion of saints and that communion.
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So they're the saints and there's this communion among the church in all three phases.
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So we can receive the benefits of their victories.
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And this is like indulgences, just general graces, intercession, patron saints, all that
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stuff is them interceding for us based on what they merited by the holiness of the lives
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We're all called to be co-redeemers, members of the mystical body of Christ.
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And if you look at the church's calendar, liturgical calendar, as I was mentioning before the interview,
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I used to kind of overlook this until I started doing all this research.
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The liturgical calendar revolves around their feast days.
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I mean, that's just not, you know, we're just going to remember, what do we do on these days?
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The church depends on these great giants, these great champions to help us.
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So how does that, though, figure into exorcism?
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Yeah, so this is something, again, with slaying dragons, my first book where I really got into this, I overlooked this little detail.
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It's a little detail. So the back of the book, this is the book we're talking about now, The Most Powerful Saints and Exorcisms.
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It's chock full of information. Like I like to have all my books.
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And I'm a co-author, too. Patrick O'Hearn, a great author, writes about the saints all the time.
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We wrote it together. We became friends. God's providence. We're in the same town.
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so the saints they if you listen to exorcist talk they talk about saints showing up you're like oh
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you know so they kind of just mention it casually among all the other things that are really
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practical like well saints show up wait a second what does it mean they showed up like and so he
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really dove into that issue and in the very beginning so the back of the book i have an
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overview of the rite of exorcism like two pages long one of the first things the priest does he
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has everybody as himself the possessed person all the people helping the priest he makes a sign of
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the cross and the foreheads of all the people sprinkles holy water on the possessed and then
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he kneels and says the litany of the saints one of the first prayers before the exorcism gets
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started is it's long the litany of the saints is in the back of the book too it's a it's a great
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it's not just pray for us pray for us pray for us there are all these invocations all these saints
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categories mentioned the holy innocents the martyrs the bishops the doctors all that's mentioned to
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rally you're rallying the troops you're rallying the church triumphant say all right we're doing
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this powerful sacramental to drive out the devil. We need everybody to step in. So that's where it
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begins, and then there's more. Once the exorcism starts kind of playing out, that's when some of
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If you value LifeSite News' mission, please donate at the link below this video. U.S. residents can
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also donate by texting LifeSiteNews to 50155. May God bless you. So give us an example of
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how a saint helps in an exorcism because it it did how is this working though yeah so i had i
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had some of those questions like they show up they appear like what does this mean you know so
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that's one of the first questions i asked like i explained what are they doing are you seeing them
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who's seeing them um so heaven is interceding so the church is supplied with grace from heaven
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from christ from the treasury of merits from christ our lady and the saints so all this grace
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is pouring into the sacramental of the rite of exorcism. So as it starts to unfold, the purpose
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of the exorcism is to agitate the demon, to irritate him, to blame him for all of his sins,
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make him feel awful, basically, to make him leave and command him in the name of Christ to leave,
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to just break his hold on this person. So the exorcist will go through all the prayers of the
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rite of exorcism, will do the litany of the saints, but they'll also be watching. When they name all
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those saints in the litany of the saints often there's a reaction from the demon there's there's
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like they'll like jump or twitch or just get all angry or maybe some kind of like eye-rolling thing
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some kind of real manifestation changes when like saint bartholomew is named and they're like okay
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so the bystanders the priest is still saying the prayer people are watching they're making a note
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they tell father later like when you said saint bartholomew the demon really jerked or did
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something or got angry it made this face at you so let's let's play on that so after they go through
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the rite of exorcism, they'll come back and say, St. Bartholomew, pray for us. St. Bartholomew,
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drive out this demon, whichever saint it is. Sometimes it's based on the relic. They'll
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have relics. So it's like the relic of St. Gemma Gaugana, so the Gaugani. So they'll put the relic
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on and invoke her by name. And then they'll look for reactions. Sometimes nothing happens,
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but then there's this one, one saint sometimes or several saints. And sometimes the demon is
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usually the demon who will see it. Sometimes the possessed person will have a little vision of
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some sort and see the saint as well. But the demon will say, oh, that one in white is here
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and make her go away. She's giving me this look. She's telling me I have to leave or the bearded
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one or whatever it is. So they show up in various stages, sometimes towards the end. I think Father
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Rupert said it was like the fifth of six stages, somewhere towards the end, the fourth or fifth
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of the six stages that he has observed, that they'll show up. And then, of course, we can
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talk about our lady. She comes in towards the end. Unbelievable. So give us an example of one
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of the saints that you've heard of? Give us one of the anecdotes of what's happened during an
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exorcism with one of the saints. Yeah. So among the ones that have been said to, so a lot of
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saints will exert their influence and it's kind of mysterious. Some have been said to appear like
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St. John the Baptist, St. Therese, St. Jimigalgani, St. Padre Pio, St. John Paul II, St. Joan of Arc
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have all been said to appear. So like there's this apparition named by the demon that they're
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appearing. There's one that I always like to bring up. Well, let's say there's two. There's
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St. Mary of Jesus Crucified, and there's a big story there with her relics.
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So her relic was applied to a case, and then the demon just started to go ballistic.
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That's one of the terms you hear these exorcists use.
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And the demon started saying, no, no, no, it's that nun, that nun, that nun.
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She's saving people, saving souls in the Middle East before we can get to them.
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They're dying well is one of the things that a demon said.
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So there's that great story because Islam is really becoming an issue right now,
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especially in Europe. But then St. Joseph, that's a great story. Not everybody sees St. Joseph. Not
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all the exorcists see his presence. His presence really felt. But one exorcist did, I believe it
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was Father Ripperker. We excerpted his testimony into the book that St. Joseph appeared with his
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staff. This was just a great image. Walking around the room or around the possessed person,
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just slamming his staff down on the ground over and over again. Every time he hit the ground with
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staff, this shudder of terror went into the demon and the possessed person felt it and told the
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exorcist that every time that St. Joseph smashes the staff on the ground, the demon just cries out
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in pain. And I'm like, that's great. Because we were looking for stories from St. Joseph about
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him, of course. One exorcist said, well, several of them said, we can't control who shows up. It's
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God. God decides what saint intercedes and what exorcism. But it'd be nice if St. Joseph would
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always show up, of course. That reminds me of that, the prayer of the St. Joseph's Terror of
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Demons Prayer, because it's about, come with thy staff and smite the demons as they flee from thee.
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So that's really something. Okay, so tell us about this. You mentioned something about
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the particulars of certain saints and how that matches up to the particular
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affliction that the possessed person's under perhaps the way in which they gave in to
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temptation that got them possessed how does that work yeah so there's some kind again some kind of
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mysterious relationship between between the saint and the and the demon there's this this nemesis
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concept and we've heard a lot of exorcists talk about the issue of a nemesis and i had the privilege
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of republishing and i quote this book in the most powerful saints this book it's called the scourge
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of Demons by Father Gerolama, if that's how you pronounce his name, Father Menji from the 16th
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century. It was the most popular spiritual warfare manual, Emmanuel for exorcists in the 16th century.
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It was popular for like 300 years with Catholics and Protestants, everybody all over Europe. And I
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got to publish the English translation, a new English translation from the Latin. But he talks
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about, so this is 500 years ago. He talks about this issue of the nemesis, that there are certain
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saints that are pitted against certain demons and the demons know that they have this kind of
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arch enemy and the priest is permitted to ask the demon who is the saint that you fear the most
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tell us his name because then we're going to bring him into the battle and i think that's great that
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500 years ago we have documentation at least back till then this was before the roman ritual was put
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together in 1614 after the council of trent so that was there probably goes back 500 more years
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maybe a thousand more years maybe back to the beginning you know this documentation of this
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happening so however it works it seems to be the victory you know you have a patron saint someone
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who's established by the authority of the church to intercede on certain issues or with certain
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struggles with vices so demons like to master a certain vice they like to encourage sin in us
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they have to corrupt us and often people get possessed by one specific sin often it's you
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Sexual sins, that's a big thing nowadays with pornography and all the other deviations we have to deal with.
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So St. Mary Magdalene has been one that exorcists have called on because of this proliferation of impurity.
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And she mastered that demon with our Lord's help, of course, because she was a victim of that sin and she conquered it.
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And now she's one of the greatest saints in the history of the church, apostle to the apostles.
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So there is this, the patron saints we need to take seriously.
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there's this arch nemesis, I think one, one saint. So sometimes demons will instigate the
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persecution of a saint and even the martyrdom of that saint. And these demons have been around for,
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you know, ever since the beginning. So exorcists are running into the same demon that Father Minji
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500 years ago ran into now, same demon, because they don't die. So there may be a demon in the
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past that instigated the murder of a saint. And then you bring that relic, the relic of that
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saint into the exorcism case, possession case with that demon. And then there's this confrontation,
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this epic battle, and the demon loses because his arch enemy, the one who beat him by being
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martyred, conquered him. So there's this great interplay between the saints against the demons.
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It's a funny concept because what we heard from our teaching was that the demons are
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smarter than humans they are stronger than than any man um you know it's ridiculous for uh people
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to try and say oh i'm gonna best the demon i'm going to do whatever um they might like you to
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think so but that's not going to go very well for you is it that's right yeah um and that's one of
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the things in uh as we mentioned in the beginning the the slaying dragons book this this was an
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inspiration for me studying the the teachings of these exorcists because one of the aha moments was
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this idea that that we must not fear the demons so that i thought well demons are demons we should
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be terrified of them i mean they're demons it just makes sense but that's that's almost superstitious
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to think a demon to be afraid of a demon if you are a faithful christian is betraying your faith
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because christ destroyed all of their power if you are bound to him demons are afraid of you
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and you should let them be afraid of you and you know with humility because they're not afraid of
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you. They're afraid of your union with Christ. They see Christ in you. And that's like with
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exorcists. The exorcists will say that the demon is not afraid of them. The demon is afraid of
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Jesus standing in them and behind them. They see that power flowing through them.
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So yeah, back to that. That's a really important point people need to realize is that we must be
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prudent, humble, prayerful, devout, penitential, deep in our union with Christ, but fear no,
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fear no demons despite how obvious it seems that we we should and here in practice then with the
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with the saints in glory um it's sort of no contest the other way right exactly because
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when the saints step in like it's not over and that's our lady when our lady steps in
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it's just over demons demons cannot resist heaven cannot resist like our guardian angels so
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So the teaching of the guardian angels, they come from the lower level of the nine choirs of angels, nine choirs of spirits.
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So two up, you know, second from the last realm.
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Like he was the one that was really loved our Lord, loved our Lord with a special love and yelled out who is like God challenged Satan.
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And God saw it, honored it and elevated him, gave him power over Satan and made him the chief of the of all the head, the head of the heavenly hosts.
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though he was an archangel so our angels are the lowest level now that's a great dignity and but
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now because they are glorified because they said yes to god they are stronger than satan so the
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lowest level angel is stronger than the highest level demon and we participate you know we're
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gonna be placed among the angels the hierarchy in heaven based on the the merit of our good deeds
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and our love and our sacrifices here we will be placed among those angels in all nine realms all
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nine choirs and have a certain degree of power against the demons. St. Paul even says that,
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he says, know ye not that you will one day judge angels, meaning demons, like you will participate
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in the condemnation of the demons at the end of time. He doesn't go into detail, but that's just,
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that says it right there. What did, what did this do for you, for your family in terms of
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your understanding of this and your relationship with the saint? Yeah. So, and that's such a,
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it's a good question because along the way, uh, there's an eighth chapter. And now, um, so most
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of the books that I have written, I've published myself with Slaying Dragons Press. This is the
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first book that was published by Sophia Institute Press. They took the idea, they loved it and they
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ran with it. Um, so we pitched to them. I've never had to pitch a book, you know, I've always just
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written my own. So we pitched the book with a table of contents. And I don't think the final
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chapter that's in this published book, I don't think the final chapter was there. The final
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chapter is called a renewed devotion to the saints. And that chapter just kind of begged to
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be written, you know, along the way, there was the spirit of, we need to call upon these saints
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more. Like we're missing out on so much stuff. Like we've overlooked so much stuff. The exorcists
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were so emphatic about the power of the saints, like their lives were changed by realizing how
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much help they had from these heavenly patrons. So we wrote the chapter, a renewed devotion to
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the saints encouraging people to like who who's your patron saint who are you named after what
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day were you born what day were you baptized like when are these big feast days what relics do you
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have in your house like do you have any saints in your family and to rely on the feast days because
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it read the opening prayers read the prayers for all the feast days it's powerful the saints can
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help us so in my work my work is always evolving it's not just spiritual warfare because it was
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Slaying Dragons, the first book, incorporates spiritual warfare, sacramentals, sacraments,
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And I think that's where Slaying Dragons Press, my own work, is going because I'm working
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on a lot of books related to the saints now because I'm really seeing that this is one
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So many, as you know, have been lost in the last 60, 70 years.
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So I think the natural love is kind of emerging.
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And I can hand that on to my kids, as you were mentioning.
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The natural love for the saints, just that they are here.
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This is not some strange devotion or an optional devotion like the Rosary, Divine Mercy Chaplet, Scapula, all these other things.
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The saints are part of the life of Christians, as these great sacramentals should be.
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And every day, when you do your prayer, end it with, you know, St. Augustine, pray for me.
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Indeed it does. Charles, thank you so much for joining us.
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My friends, the most powerful saints in exorcism,
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what exorcists want you to know from Sophia Press.
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And God bless all of you. And we'll see you next time.
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Aloha, everyone. This is Jason Jones for LifeSide News.
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