The John-Henry Westen Show - August 16, 2023


The Rise Of The Occult: What Exorcists & Former Occultists Want You To Know


Episode Stats


Length

37 minutes

Words per minute

174.46367

Word count

6,617

Sentence count

470

Harmful content

Misogyny

6

sentences flagged

Toxicity

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

18

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode of The John Hunter Weston Show, John talks with author and exorcist, Charles Frani, about his new book, "The Danger of the Occult." They discuss the Catholic Church s relationship with the occult, and what it means to be an exorcist.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Former occultists, almost all of the ones I interviewed, which is a small sample population,
00:00:04.160 but I pulled from a lot of different references of people who were sending these people to me,
00:00:09.100 they gravitated to the traditional Latin mass. They gravitated to the traditional Roman ritual,
00:00:14.100 to all the traditions, ember days, processions, sacramentals. They love it. They want it. They
00:00:19.640 want a rich spiritual life. And that's what the traditional church provides.
00:00:30.000 Hey, my friends, do you ever wonder what's going on in the Vatican? Remember years ago,
00:00:36.700 we had the light show on the Vatican, and there was all sorts of weird occult type images.
00:00:44.220 Remember, too, the Pachamama ceremony? What was all that? First, we were told it was statues just
00:00:49.680 of Mary and Elizabeth, and then we found it later. No, it's Pachamama. And there's some weird kind of
00:00:54.780 occult thing going on. Because remember, they had heads bowed to the ground, adoring this thing,
00:01:01.280 whatever it was. It was processed on a canoe, believe it or not, into St. Peter's Basilica.
00:01:05.840 So all sorts of strange stuff. But then remember when the Pope came to Canada, he was doing that
00:01:10.220 thing with the shaman blowing a bone whistle, and he had his hand on his chest, eyes closed,
00:01:15.200 as did the other cardinals who were there. And then he, the shaman, that is, prayed to the
00:01:20.060 Western grandmother, to open the circle of spirits, to have them come and join there.
00:01:26.500 What is all of this stuff? And why is it in the Catholic Church, or trying to be put into the
00:01:33.200 Catholic Church? We're going to speak with someone today who has just written a book on the occult,
00:01:38.380 and I thought that would be a very good person to ask all of these strange questions.
00:01:42.900 This is the John Hunter Weston Show. Stay tuned.
00:01:48.560 You know that here on LifeSite, we love to tell amazing stories. There are a few so heroic and
00:01:55.720 amazing as the story we're about to tell you that's coming soon. You got to watch this.
00:02:00.940 When I was in seminary, I was reading a book by Henry Nowen. He talked about a nuclear man,
00:02:09.520 you know, and people who grew up in the 1980s were kind of formed by that immediate and constant
00:02:15.580 threat of nuclear annihilation. My generation has grown up, you know, under the specter of priestly
00:02:24.620 sexual abuse. I think that for many of us, that has also been all-encompassing. You know, I mean,
00:02:35.560 I entered the seminary in January of 2004, and it's basically been there for me from in the beginning.
00:02:45.460 One priest's sacrifice for many priestly sins. The story of Father John Hallowell.
00:02:55.620 Coming soon from LifeSite News.
00:03:00.480 Charles Frani, welcome to the program.
00:03:02.600 Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.
00:03:04.800 All right. Let's begin, as we always do, with the sign of the cross.
00:03:07.460 In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
00:03:13.260 So, you've just released this book called The Danger of the Occult.
00:03:17.060 Maybe you can tell us, Charles, first of all, what is the occult anyway? And what significance
00:03:24.120 does it have to today?
00:03:26.740 Sure. Yeah, this is the book, The Rise of the Occult, is a sequel to Slaying Dragons. I kind
00:03:32.720 of spin it as Slaying Dragons 2. But so the occult is something that came up in my research
00:03:38.540 for Slaying Dragons, which was a compilation of the teachings of modern exorcists in the context
00:03:42.820 of church teaching and historical teachings on diabolical issues. So the occult is a term that
00:03:48.900 means hidden, secret, concealed, kind of in the shadows. And it's become, it's not necessarily a
00:03:55.120 bad term in itself. It's just a Latin word. But now it's been used, and I use it in my book,
00:04:00.120 to label all of these kind of spiritually fringy, secret, esoteric rituals, new age concepts,
00:04:10.060 kind of do-it-yourself religious movements that are emerging, and are tapping into diabolical
00:04:15.100 powers, or mysterious, fantastic energies that dwell, supposedly dwell, you know, in nature. Like
00:04:21.200 you were talking about in the intro with these indigenous religious rituals, such as sage. Sage
00:04:27.080 smudging is a big thing we can talk about. So the occult is basically seeking hidden powers,
00:04:33.920 powers that dwell in the darkness, that are only accessible through secret rituals, unapproved
00:04:38.340 rituals, often involving sin, sacrifice, unsavory behaviors, and people that you're associating with,
00:04:46.120 and some things that just don't make any sense, just rituals that are contrived by man, obviously,
00:04:51.000 to try to conjure powers to yourself. And the ultimate goal of the occult, all forms, is one of the
00:04:56.020 things I saw, is to become a god. And it's very much a counterfeit of the true faith, which is why 0.94
00:05:01.740 its presence among members of the church is extremely alarming. Okay. So basically, considering
00:05:09.680 that there are no powers outside of the god, the angelic powers, and then the demonic powers,
00:05:18.420 there's, other than that, there's just the power of man, we're talking accessing, really, if there's
00:05:23.420 accessing anything this way, it's demonic powers. Is that right?
00:05:27.380 Correct. Correct. Some things, it, it seems just like it's silly. You know, one person,
00:05:32.300 one former, former occultist that I talked to said, being in the occult takes you outside of reason
00:05:36.720 into a realm of fantasy, where you think you're doing all these things, and it's really just a
00:05:41.100 big show. So the demons don't always respond to occultists. Often they do, because by practicing the
00:05:47.040 occult, you're breaking the first commandment. So you're opening yourself up to diabolical,
00:05:50.700 strong, diabolical influence. So some things is just silly. But even if you're seeking to pull 0.98
00:05:57.340 energy from the ground or from crystals, you're opening yourself up to a demon hiding himself as
00:06:04.200 this energy, and giving you, presenting himself to you as energy, or as a mysterious thing that came
00:06:09.820 with the energy. So even if it's just silly, it's still very diabolically dangerous.
00:06:14.240 Yes. So a lot of us have heard in the past about Ouija boards, and I think there's a good part of
00:06:21.840 the population that thinks, what does it hurt? It's not, that's not really that bad. It's really
00:06:26.420 nothing. It's a game. It's toys for kids. What is it really?
00:06:31.280 You know, the Ouija board. One thing that I learned about the Ouija board is that a lot of witches, 1.00
00:06:36.840 I don't know, probably not all, because there's no uniformity among their doctrine, but a lot of
00:06:41.160 witches won't go near the Ouija board, because they see it as dangerous. It taps into a demon, 0.51
00:06:47.300 to a power, to something that's uncontrollable. I actually spoke to a priest, he's a very traditional
00:06:52.140 priest now, who in college knew a guy who had some kind of power over the Ouija board, and people
00:06:59.020 would flock to him in his college. It was a secular college. And whenever he touched it, it would respond
00:07:04.240 the same way every time, like the thing will be moving on its own. So there's, it's a powerful tool.
00:07:10.560 So if you look at it, it's just, you know, cardboard, ink, and plastic on its own. It's
00:07:15.620 nothing. But what it does is it, it, it pushes you, calls you essentially to do something superstitious,
00:07:22.200 to try to summon secret powers, summon the spirit world, tap into the spirit world. And that's when
00:07:28.960 a demon can respond and start to manipulate the item you're holding. For some reason, a Ouija board
00:07:34.180 caught on. It's been around, it's been called a talking board. It's been around since like the late
00:07:38.020 1800s, but was popularized, I think around the 50s or 60s. And now it's everywhere in
00:07:42.920 every like, toy store, it's regarded as a toy. But everybody knows how you play with
00:07:48.080 the toy is dangerous. Well, they don't think it's dangerous, but they know it's a spiritual
00:07:52.260 activity. So it's, it's a prime form of conjuring spirit. So that's in it. The famous movie,
00:07:59.180 The Exorcist, the true story involved a boy who was using a Ouija board, and that's how he got
00:08:04.080 possessed. So it's, it's a real, real dangerous tool.
00:08:08.980 Okay. So what do you make of what's gone on in the church? For the last decade or so, we've
00:08:14.740 seen some very strange things. At first, when they had this light show on the Vatican, it
00:08:22.980 was weird. I don't know if you recall it, but in addition to animals and all sorts of wildlife
00:08:28.620 and whatever, there was these weird images. And a lot of people at the time said that they were
00:08:34.440 occult images. In fact, I had a new age expert on the show who said, no, these are definitely 0.90
00:08:40.540 new age images that are being portrayed here on the wall of St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican.
00:08:47.520 What do you make of that?
00:08:49.680 Yeah, I never, I remember seeing it and the whole thing was just creepy. I think it happened on the
00:08:55.200 solemnity of the Immaculate Conception. It did indeed. Where the church went dark and then was
00:08:59.820 hit by all of these images, creepy images of nature or other like occultic images. I never
00:09:05.600 did the research. I should go back and see about those occultic images. But
00:09:09.740 it, so the answer, I don't have the answer as to why that's happening, because a lot of things going
00:09:17.420 on in the hierarchy now from doctrine to morals to occultic imagery is extremely alarming. But one of the
00:09:23.420 things that the occult is doing that is intrinsic to the occult is it's a facade. It's a, it's a
00:09:29.360 charade. It's a counterfeit. It's intended to deceive. It puts up a front of being pleasant,
00:09:35.160 of being something else, of being ethereal, mystical, seeking your true self, even like
00:09:41.000 emphasizing nature. Wicca is a big one. Of course, they emphasize nature and nature's okay in itself.
00:09:47.000 But if you use it for evil purposes, then it becomes a tool of evil. So when they're mixing 1.00
00:09:53.060 in all these strange images, the real red flag should go up because of when they're doing it
00:09:59.120 and what they're doing it on. And then to find occultic images buried in those images should be
00:10:03.200 expected because they're desecrating a sacred temple on a sacred beast. So they're not going to
00:10:11.740 be putting up anything pleasant at that point because that's not how you celebrate our faith.
00:10:18.000 Right. So have you seen much of what's gone on with regard to the Pachamama thing? Can you tell us
00:10:25.320 about that in detail? Was that occultic practice? You know, at first, the way this rolled out was so
00:10:32.680 weird. All sorts of apologists were about, oh no, it's, it's statues of Mary and Elizabeth,
00:10:38.480 which I thought, well, that's really weird. Cause then you have a nude Mary and Elizabeth together,
00:10:44.040 which would have been all sorts of offensive all by itself. Still didn't explain why people in the
00:10:50.440 Vatican gardens, including a priest, by the way, all in the sight of the Pope were bowing down heads
00:10:56.100 to the ground, kneeling, totally prostrate before these two, what appeared to everyone to be idols
00:11:03.620 lying on a blanket, if you will. What did you make of that?
00:11:09.260 Yeah. One of the priests I spoke to, I believe it's in this, this edition, the rise of the occult.
00:11:14.980 He said, seeing a Franciscan in full habit, bowing before a statue is the stuff of nightmares.
00:11:20.460 And he's a very reasonable, grounded, rational, very smart priest. So yeah, I remember everybody
00:11:27.720 trying to explain away this thing, but it's an idol, like just like black and white. This is,
00:11:33.360 this is a carved, disturbing, strange image that resembles an earth deity. And it's being paraded
00:11:39.140 and celebrated in the Vatican. And even that bowl, there was some kind of bowl with some ornate
00:11:44.420 drawings on it, placed on the altar at St. Peter's with a plant growing out of it. And there's some
00:11:48.480 true occult symbolism there and some mystery about what's actually in the bowl. And that doesn't belong
00:11:53.980 on the altar anyway, but in the context, it's even more, you know, what are you doing? But then when
00:11:58.940 the, when the defense tried to come up, they kept doubling down on it. Like, yes, this is Pachamama.
00:12:05.140 And they even printed a Pachamama coin. And then you had, I think Bishop Athanasius Schneider wrote an
00:12:11.820 article, maybe on LifeSite News, I can't remember, collecting statements from South American cardinals
00:12:17.160 and bishops who were just livid about this. Like, yes, this is a demon. This is an earth worshiping thing.
00:12:22.620 This is destroying the people down here. And there's something called Pachamama Day.
00:12:27.340 I think it was in Peru. I can't remember what countries in South America where they offer
00:12:31.860 sacrifices to this deity. And one of the sacrifices that was offered, it made the news
00:12:36.320 quite far and wide of some man who was drugged at one of these festivals honoring Pachamama.
00:12:41.920 And they buried him alive. And thankfully he woke up, unearthed himself and went to the news.
00:12:47.460 And he was bloodied and dirty. And he said, he told people what happened. So Pachamama is a, 0.88
00:12:52.680 one of the exorcists I spoke to said, whenever you have a demon of fertility,
00:12:56.520 which is what Pachamama is, you have a demon of death as well that goes with it.
00:13:01.940 And the repercussions are clear. Like my book, Slaying Dragons, came out a week before that senate in 2019.
00:13:10.460 2019. And I didn't, that senate was not even on my radar. The timing was God's timing. But then you
00:13:16.760 had the exorcist come out a couple of weeks after it happened. And you had Cardinal Burke come out.
00:13:20.880 All these cardinals come out and say, this is idolatry. This was bad. This was evil. And the
00:13:25.020 exorcists were saying it essentially offered some kind of sacrifice to a demon and allowed a demon to
00:13:32.640 have more power to work against the church. And of course, a couple of months later, you also had
00:13:37.040 COVID, where all the churches throughout the world shut down. And even holy water,
00:13:42.160 the blessing on which it possesses is supposed to be for healing. Holy water became dangerous.
00:13:47.640 Don't go near holy water and put the COVID thing in it. So the whole thing together shows you this was
00:13:53.480 not just some indigenous statue of Our Lady. Even looking at it, it's disrespectful if that's what
00:13:58.720 it was. But the fruit, you will know the tree by its fruit. And I think the fruit is clear.
00:14:04.480 The reason why this story changed, actually, is because Pope Francis himself was caught on a hot
00:14:09.600 mic saying that it was the Pachamama. So that's how the story changed as it unfolded.
00:14:15.460 Yeah.
00:14:15.900 Yeah. Incredible days. One of the things that then happened later, Pope Francis came to Canada.
00:14:22.060 Canada. And this is 2022. And he was there visiting Canada. And they had an indigenous ceremony led by
00:14:34.880 a shaman. Now, very strange stuff, as I said in the intro. We'll play a little clip of it.
00:14:40.900 I will ask the east direction to open its door. I will ask the southern direction to open its door as
00:14:52.460 well, to have access to that direction. I will ask the western direction to open that door,
00:15:00.620 the grandmother door, honor the northern direction, the direction of grandfathers. I'll open the four
00:15:11.800 directions. I will whistle four times. Before I do that, I'd like for you to put your hands on your
00:15:19.600 heart, each one of you. The heart can be like a talking stick. But that's where the creator put wisdom
00:15:30.880 in humans. And we often need to remind ourselves of this. It's an important gesture to connect
00:15:40.160 ourselves with that wisdom.
00:16:10.160 I ask the western grandmother to give us access to the sacred circle of spirits.
00:16:26.100 You know, as you can see, their hands on their chests, eyes closed at the shaman's bidding. He's,
00:16:32.820 you know, blowing the bone whistle first, then giving this incantation or whatever it is,
00:16:37.400 calling on the western grandmother to open the circle of spirits to come and join them there. So
00:16:42.940 what do we say to this? Is this just, you know, is this just another religion and we're sort of
00:16:50.340 participating in it? Is that okay? Or what in the world is this? Yeah, I think as you were talking,
00:16:57.120 I had a new image in my mind. You know, Vatican II, I think it was Nostra Tate, it confused everybody
00:17:02.300 about how we look at other religions. And then post-Vatican II, that confusion just skyrocketed.
00:17:08.240 Then you had the Assisi Peace thing from JP II in the 80s. I don't know if Benedict did that as well,
00:17:14.120 I can't remember. But it's like you had this error creep in post-Vatican II. And even Paul VI
00:17:20.120 admitted that some preternatural force had come into the church, against the church, post-council.
00:17:26.440 Like I have that in my book, one of his quotes. So this error creeps in, and then it just grows
00:17:32.200 in this age where the faith is diminishing. The belief in the real presence is diminishing.
00:17:38.380 Going to confession is diminishing. Everything's diminishing. The practice of the faith is going
00:17:41.780 down. You have this error, this very dangerous error that has crept in, and people are celebrating
00:17:46.520 it more and more and more and more. So the more you celebrate the error that all the other religions 1.00
00:17:51.860 have something to offer, the more you're going to let them speak. You're going to join with them.
00:17:55.740 You're going to mix rituals into the mass, which we see all over the world happening.
00:17:59.420 Indigenous rituals are welcomed, and not everywhere, of course, because that would be 1.00
00:18:02.760 just total apostasy. But you have apostasy, and cardinals have called this out. And this is one
00:18:09.060 form of it, because these are false religions, pagan religions. We know that all the deities of these 0.96
00:18:14.720 other religions, all the energies they call upon, are demons. It's not the true faith. It's not the true 1.00
00:18:19.720 God. It's extremely dangerous. So why they're doing it is the mystery, maybe the mystery
00:18:25.620 of iniquity, why it's happening, is extremely disturbing. It's not okay. And exorcists,
00:18:34.080 you know, despite what Francis and the other cardinals were doing, exorcists are coming out
00:18:37.720 and say, look, sage smudging, which is what that Canadian elder was doing, burning sage,
00:18:42.420 calling upon all these spirits, is getting people possessed, oppressed, afflicted by demons.
00:18:47.960 It's dangerous. I have a story in the second volume of this book coming up where someone
00:18:51.860 had somebody burned sage in their home without their permission, and the home became infested.
00:18:56.920 But because they were practicing their faith well, the demon left with a little bit of show,
00:19:02.400 but the demon left. But you have other Catholic kids in Australia, where they have a lot of Catholics 0.97
00:19:06.800 going to aboriginal sage smudging events who are having nightmares, like diabolically inspired
00:19:12.860 nightmares, sleep troubles, depression, that exorcists have had to work with. So this is evil,
00:19:18.920 plain and simple. But what our Lord is allowing, why it's happening in the church right now,
00:19:24.240 what the ultimate goal is, where this is headed, is the big question.
00:19:29.620 Indeed. So what have you seen of this in popular culture right now? And what do you warn people,
00:19:38.080 parents particularly, about when their kids are watching TV or on the internet?
00:19:42.400 Oh, yeah. Don't watch TV. Don't let your kids watch TV at all. It's literally everywhere. So I
00:19:51.900 interviewed 40 people for, I'll just hold up the book so people can get a picture of it. 40 people
00:19:57.520 for this book, 16 former occultists, all kinds of occultists, from New Age to, I didn't interview
00:20:04.300 any former Satanists, but people who were related to former Satanists, a witch who was married to a
00:20:08.840 Satanist. He never converted, but she did. So 16 former occultists, eight exorcists, seven parish 0.66
00:20:15.420 priests, six families who have dealt with the occult, either from the parents being in it or the
00:20:19.560 kids going off into it. And then a lot of other people sharing stories of run-ins with the occult.
00:20:25.160 So the internet is one of the big culprits. There was one story where the kid was raised Catholic,
00:20:30.960 good kid, went to college and accumulated some kind of wound. And this is the key. And this is
00:20:36.760 in slaying dragons as well. Exorcists talk about our wounds are things that demons will latch onto
00:20:42.040 and pour salt on, essentially, and pull us away from God, make us despair, make us do more evil
00:20:47.900 things. So she went off to college, accumulated this grave wound, and then flipped. And part of the
00:20:52.700 flip, she went towards mindfulness as a cure, and then deep into witchcraft and all kinds of 0.72
00:20:57.880 disgusting things, and is essentially a whole different person now. But she would stay, her mom 0.97
00:21:03.700 blame the internet, because most witch covens, I've learned, are virtual. There are some that
00:21:08.880 meet in person, but so much of it is online. You look at which YouTube influencers, and they have
00:21:15.500 200,000, 400,000 very engaged subscribers. You can look at their, I've watched some of those videos
00:21:21.540 just to get some insights. You can look at the comments under those videos. It's very disturbing how
00:21:26.640 active the witch community is, literature. So the phone, this girl I was talking about would stay up all 0.99
00:21:32.340 night on her phone, because she shared a room with her sister, they were both home temporarily.
00:21:36.880 And she would see the glow, and she's just like talking to her friends and this witch community. 0.99
00:21:41.520 And then if you look at TikTok, TikTok is overrun with witchcraft, like the hashtag witch talk,
00:21:47.920 hashtag witches for BLM, all these different things, got billions of shares or views or however it works
00:21:55.240 on TikTok. You could just call it witch talk, essentially the same thing. If you look at some
00:22:00.580 studies on TikTok, it's so destructive to the youth. And then you infuse it with the occult,
00:22:06.660 it's just an absolute disaster. And then the culture, as far back as, I don't know, the 60s,
00:22:12.100 if not further, has always had this fascination with the occult. And you see it more and more and
00:22:16.400 more happening now. And you have the Harry Potter thing, which can be debated the merits of it.
00:22:21.440 But the point I always make, which I think is objective, which is clearly a problem, is that
00:22:26.920 Harry Potter is a pro-witchcraft novel that was introduced to a post-Christian world where people 1.00
00:22:32.720 are craving spirituality, but they're not getting it from the church. So like if I had been introduced
00:22:37.720 to Harry Potter as a kid, it would have been a disaster because I was a nominal Catholic, didn't 0.99
00:22:42.160 pray, didn't understand that, was curious about the occult. So the culture, TV, internet, it's set up
00:22:50.060 against our kids. So they really need to be shepherded, guided, pull the plug on the TV, trim the internet
00:22:57.400 as much as you can. It's really a diabolical ploy, kind of a mark of the beast thing that we need the internet
00:23:04.320 so much, or we feel we do so much because it's so tainted. And it's an uphill battle. It's a tremendous
00:23:11.260 cross families and youth have to carry.
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00:24:32.040 And now, back to the program.
00:24:37.220 So, what are your best solutions, best tips for parents, for families, for anyone struggling
00:24:44.520 with this, you know, confronted with it, have it in their past, wondering now, after hearing this,
00:24:49.600 ooh, what do I do? I've used a Ouija board before. What does that mean for me?
00:24:54.140 Yeah, so, one of the things I learned, because I talked to some of the exorcists, and for both books,
00:24:59.460 you know, slaying dragons and now the rise of the occult, is that the emphasis is placed on the power
00:25:03.820 of grace. And grace, so grace can cure all of our wounds, spiritually speaking, even some of our
00:25:11.860 physical wounds. But we need to remove the obstacles. So, there's two things. We need to tap into grace
00:25:17.620 as God has willed for it to flow through the Catholic Church, through the sacraments, and through
00:25:22.040 the sacramentals, through the life of prayer and humility. But we also need to remove the obstacles.
00:25:27.080 So, if we've done, played with Ouija boards, or we're into Wicca or something as a kid,
00:25:32.280 you need to repent for that. You need to take those things to confession, because those are mortal
00:25:36.760 sins. And perhaps you've moved on from it. This is one of the things a former occultist said. He
00:25:40.960 strongly rejected and flipped and became Catholic, rejected the occult and flipped. But a lot of people
00:25:46.340 that he was with just stopped practicing, never rejected the occult. And he said their lives are still
00:25:52.080 ruined, because they've never made a break from the occult. So, we have to think back, like, have I
00:25:57.360 ever gone to a psychic, because I lost my kid, and I was so despairing, and I wanted to talk to him.
00:26:03.140 And then I forgot about it. You know, that was decades ago. I heard that from a priest who was
00:26:07.760 teaching in RCIA, and there were some Catholics there. And the Catholics heard him talking about
00:26:11.280 psychics. They're like, whoa, wait a second. We did that about 10 years ago when our son died.
00:26:14.980 So, they had to go to confession. So, that's the key. Dig up from your past these evil things you've
00:26:21.460 done, remember them, and take them to confession. Then, make sure none of these occultic mindsets are
00:26:27.120 still lingering. A lot of times, we keep with us superstitious ways of thinking. We don't even
00:26:31.440 realize it, because our faith is not deep enough. We don't trust God completely. We trust ourselves more.
00:26:37.980 We trust the material world too much. We're too materialistic. That's one of the curses on,
00:26:42.800 you know, this country, the first world as a whole. So, that's the beginning advice I would give.
00:26:51.140 If you can, Charles, give us an example of that, which you were just talking about.
00:26:54.720 Yeah. So, superstition is, there are different kinds of superstition. One kind of superstition
00:26:59.860 is like a rabbit's foot. It has no power. It's just silly. Another kind of superstition is
00:27:05.380 the corruption of right worship. So, the misuse of holy water, or the misuse of the scapular,
00:27:12.300 that's a big one, that people think, if I keep the scapular on me at all times, I'm going to be
00:27:16.340 fine. I'll go to heaven. But all the while, they sin. So, it's a corruption of what God has revealed,
00:27:21.460 or is seeking something that God has not revealed. But also, occultic ways of thinking is like,
00:27:29.000 if you think, one of the goals of the occult is to deify ourselves. So, if we think, if we think of
00:27:37.220 pride, so pride is kind of an occultic way of thinking. If I think, I can will, I can make
00:27:41.780 something happen. I can make my life better without God's help, which spins over into what's
00:27:46.540 called manifesting. So, manifesting is this extremely widespread practice where it's essentially the
00:27:52.900 deification of the will. You can will things to change in the world. You manifest the change you
00:28:00.520 want to see. And it somehow deals with energy and the universe contriving with you. But there are also
00:28:05.820 certain kinds of corruptions of Christian practice that Protestants get into a lot, Catholics too,
00:28:11.620 where you, they misunderstand what our Lord says. Like, if you had the faith the size of a mustard
00:28:16.140 seed, you could say to this mountain, move. And then they essentially think that they can control
00:28:21.000 God by telling God you want something, believing it enough, then he's going to do it. And you're going
00:28:28.540 to almost mix that with manifesting. Like, my faith is going to cause it separate from God's action.
00:28:35.820 So, an antidote is humility. Everything's about humility. That's why Our Lady is humble and Satan 0.91
00:28:42.200 is proud and they clash and Our Lady always wins. Because if we're humbly accepting what God wants to
00:28:47.420 send us, crosses or blessings, then we will avoid control, which feeds into these occultic
00:28:53.340 mentalities that, that are out there.
00:28:56.640 What, in terms of feedback, I wanted to mention, first of all, your book is endorsed by both Bishop
00:29:03.600 Schneider and Bishop Strickland. I can't think of better endorsements for anything in my life. But
00:29:08.540 anyway, I wanted to hear from you what some of the feedback that you've received, what have people
00:29:16.480 appreciated your books for?
00:29:19.860 Yeah, so, both of them. So, I'll just hold up the other one. Since I held up. So, Slaying Dragons and
00:29:27.180 The Rise of the Occult are getting very similar reactions. Of course, the Slaying Dragons has been
00:29:30.860 out for over three years now. It's spread internationally. If you go on Amazon, it has over
00:29:35.820 a thousand, mainly five-star reviews, which is great. It's three Bishop endorsements.
00:29:39.840 But one of the things people are benefiting from these books is, what I've benefited from,
00:29:45.280 especially with Slaying Dragons, is so much essential wisdom is hidden from us. But the
00:29:51.540 exorcists, they're the go-tos. And everybody sees that more and more and more now, if you look. Like, 0.99
00:29:56.260 it's not just me. I'm not the only one who sees. The exorcists are the ones to go to, because
00:29:59.780 in their ministry, they are taking the power of the sacraments, all of them, and the sacramentals,
00:30:05.680 and channeling them by counsel and by practice into the lives of the people who are afflicted
00:30:12.300 and against demons. And they see, they see the reaction. So, I like to say exorcists see behind
00:30:17.900 the veil. When they start an exorcism, the demon has to respond to the power of Christ flowing
00:30:23.460 through the exorcist, flowing through the church by the name of Jesus against holy water, stoles, 0.52
00:30:28.920 crucifixes, invocation of the saints. And the exorcists see it. And then they go on camera,
00:30:33.580 and they're like, you guys, this is real. This really works. This really helps. So, people are,
00:30:39.860 this is the light bulb moment, I think, for the church, for the church militant. We're finally
00:30:43.860 clued in based on their teachings. They're alerting us. But it's also requiring people to dig,
00:30:49.980 to dig and find these hidden treasures, because the church has allowed so much of this sacred wisdom,
00:30:55.480 sacred teachings, grace to be hidden, to be lost. So, as people uncover it, they're experiencing
00:31:00.980 healing. They're experiencing understanding, power. Like, I experienced the same thing. It's just a
00:31:06.760 transformation of my spiritual life by really practicing spiritual warfare the way the church
00:31:11.640 has always taught it. Now, of course, with the rise of the occult. So, the end of Slaying Dragons
00:31:17.140 mentioned the occult briefly. And then I pick up with that in the second book, Slaying Dragons 2,
00:31:23.800 the rise of the occult. Because it's here, and we can fight it. And one of the things that's great
00:31:28.660 about the book, about the rise of the occult, is that former occultists, almost all of the ones I
00:31:34.260 interviewed, which is a small sample population, but I pulled from a lot of different references
00:31:38.280 of people who were sending these people to me, they gravitated to the traditional Latin mass.
00:31:43.480 They gravitated to the traditional Roman ritual, to all the traditions, ember days, processions,
00:31:48.840 sacramentals. They love it. They want it. They want a rich spiritual life. And that's what the
00:31:54.160 traditional church provides. And that's where the power, and exorcists, like, yes, I agree. Even
00:31:59.200 exorcists that aren't, was one I spoke to who does not do the traditional Latin mass. He goes,
00:32:03.860 I get it. I know exactly why they gravitate to the traditional Latin mass. And he doesn't even offer
00:32:08.640 it himself. So, it's all of this, this power is just kind of latent. It's here. And it's being
00:32:15.360 covered over by this occultic curiosity that's crept into the, crept into the whole world and into
00:32:21.380 the church. So, you have right now this mysterious crushing of the traditional Latin mass, the 0.88
00:32:26.760 traditional Roman ritual. So, the same time, so there's this, this war that we are really in, but we
00:32:34.180 do have weapons. Like, I end the book, The Rise of the Occult, on the church is the great liberator,
00:32:39.800 how Catholics can help, and the power of God. Like, those are some of the names of the last chapters
00:32:45.840 of that book, because I see it. I saw it in the lives of these former occultists, just grace really
00:32:51.100 changing them, God reaching them. And we need that too, because we're only one step away. You know,
00:32:56.380 we're, we have a fallen nature. We're sinful. We're only a couple steps away from abandoning Christ
00:33:01.760 ourselves if we're not careful. So, we have to be careful and humble and prudent, and then we will,
00:33:08.040 we will have the peace we're all looking for, and occultists will find it as well through the church.
00:33:12.080 Hello, friends. To celebrate the momentous overturning of Roe v. Wade, we at LifeSite have
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00:33:59.700 Charles, last question for you. A lot of people are now getting more into, I think it's largely
00:34:05.860 because of Father Ripperger's work. But these prayers of deliverance for the laity. What do you
00:34:14.500 make of those? There are some traditional Catholics, I think, particularly, who are kind of wary of that
00:34:20.740 because they've not heard it before. And is this some newfangled thing? Or what is this? What's your
00:34:28.800 take? Yeah, that's a good question. So, that's Father Ripperger's deliverance prayers for use by
00:34:34.740 the laity. And so, first about Father Ripperger, he was the first exorcist I was told about back in 2017
00:34:41.880 when I started this process of spiritual renewal. I was trying to figure out something was missing in
00:34:46.960 my life. I didn't know what it was. They pointed me towards exorcists. So, I watched his videos first,
00:34:51.280 and that really was the spark. But there are a lot of things. There are a lot of things. So, one of the
00:34:55.560 things about this prayer book, I have a copy. I sell it on my website, slagdragonspress.com. When I
00:35:01.020 go to conferences, I have a small batch that I try to sell to. But I've never really explored it to
00:35:07.260 the full book. And I've heard the criticisms, too, the wariness, like, what is this? And a lot of
00:35:12.540 things I've heard about those prayers that I don't understand. So, what I've decided to do is just
00:35:17.860 take the good and ignore the questionable because, you know, there are limitations to my intellect and to
00:35:25.000 my knowledge of history. So, I'm just going to leave those there. They're not dangerous.
00:35:28.480 I'm not going to focus on them. I'm not going to do those prayers. I'm going to do the ones that
00:35:31.500 make sense, like the Litany of the Precious Blood, St. Michael, all the traditional devotions,
00:35:36.900 the breastplate of St. Patrick, and simple binding prayers because those work. Binding prayers have
00:35:42.860 worked for me. I've seen it. They've worked for other people. So, I would, like, if it doesn't make
00:35:47.160 sense to you, if it's not appealing to you or to a Catholic who's listening to this, then just don't
00:35:51.440 go after it. Don't burden yourself. One exorcist said that some people who go after that book and
00:35:58.060 those prayers can get into a little bit of OCD. I'm like, I can see that, you know, like praying
00:36:03.620 about every single thing that might come up and just getting a little bit obsessive instead of
00:36:07.500 relaxing in the power of God's grace. And that's one of the things we need to realize, that God's
00:36:11.460 grace is easy for a devout Catholic to tap into, and it will flow. And he knows what we want before we
00:36:17.460 even ask him. So, we need to rest, rest assured in the power of the church triumphant working
00:36:23.240 through us, the power of the church, grace flowing through the sacraments, and not get too hung up on
00:36:29.740 it, I guess, is what I would say. So, I don't heavily recommend the book and all these prayers,
00:36:34.400 but I understand why they are helpful to people.
00:36:38.120 Excellent. Charles Frowney, thank you for joining us. Tell us, where can we find your books?
00:36:41.660 Yeah. So, my website is slayingdragonspress.com, and you can find all my books. I have five. I have
00:36:49.520 a couple others. So, if you go there, you'll see those, but it's also on Amazon. Slaying Dragons
00:36:53.900 is pretty much everywhere now. It's a pretty widespread in distribution. The Rise of the
00:36:59.900 Occult is on Amazon and on my website mainly right now, because it's only been out since March 25th,
00:37:06.340 but slayingdragonspress.com. Awesome. Charles Frowney, thank you so much for joining us and
00:37:12.980 doing the hard work of digging so that you can warn your fellow Christians, your fellow Catholics, 0.89
00:37:18.440 about the reality of spiritual warfare. God bless you. Thank you. God bless you.
00:37:23.060 And God bless all of you. And we'll see you next time.
00:37:36.340 Hi, everyone. This is John Henry Weston. We hope you enjoyed this program. To see more like it,
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