The Exorcist Files - Interview with The Holder

Episode Date: October 16, 2024

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Do you crave more Exorcist Files content? Do you want to go deeper into theology and spiritual warfare? Well, you're going to want to subscribe to The Vault, our new premium subscriber program. The Vault is our way of ensuring we bring you content all year long. Subscribers will get access to exclusive once a month, Ask Me Anything episodes with Father Martins, where you can submit questions and vote on the ones you want him to answer most. You'll also get access to a very special case behind the case series,

where we relisten to past episodes and cases, and Father reflects back on insights and anecdotes he just didn't have time to get into in the podcast. To subscribe, head on over to Exorcistfiles.tv and sign up, or just click the link in the show notes. Again, that's Exorcistfiles.tv to get access to The Vault. Hey, everyone. Father Martins here. Greetings on this fine October day.

I'm still on tour with the major relics of St. Jude, but wanted to touch base and update you. First, I hope you're enjoying the bonus episodes. We're hard at work on a new case file that will be released in a couple of weeks. It's unlike anything you've ever heard before, and I think you'll love it. As I've shared before, my travel schedule leaves me with precious little time to write and record with the team. So in the meantime, we're delivering you these interviews with amazing people that I'm privileged to know. Today, Ryan interviews a dear friend, Dave Van Vickle, an extraordinarily gifted layman who started serving as a holder during exorcisms from the time he was 16.

Today, at 41, he continues serving in this capacity, but is also widely known as an expert and sought-after speaker on demonology, exorcism, and spiritual warfare. He travels widely, teaching about the victory of Jesus Christ and his church over the Kingdom of Darkness. Dave's an amazing man of faith, and has witnessed Jesus do incredible things in the many exorcisms in which he's participated. Secondly, my new book is coming out next month, so if you'd like to pre-order a copy, head over to Father Carlos Martens.com. That's Father spelled out, F-A-T-H-E-R-Carlosmartins.com. In the book, I explore new cases and go deeper into existing ones. You can also click on the link in the show notes. Again, thanks for your patience. Each case file takes over 200 hours to make. And as you know, we have a small team and my ministry puts great demands on my time.

Enjoy this amazing conversation with my good friend, Dave and Vickle. I mean, like, imagine eight guys holding someone over a holy water font trying to get them down for baptism and they're, they cannot get them down to the font. Like, I mean, full on levitation. Like, you could take your arm and put it under them. Like, it's not. Or, like, maybe not levitation, but like several times I've seen like where they crawl up a wall. And, and Ryan, I mean, you cut out what you want to cut out. But like, when I talk about this stuff, like, I get nervous because I just want to make sure, like, everyone realized, like, I've never walked away being like, well, the devil's, like, power is amazing.

I've always walked away thinking the power of the priest is incredible. You know, the power of God is incredible. So I just want to throw that out there, you know. Hello, Exorcist Files fans. Welcome back to another incredible episode. Let's be honest, they're all incredible. Today may be one of the more interesting conversations we've ever had. Now, of course, we've talked with Exorcists, we've talked with priests,

we've talked with deliverance ministers, we've talked with neuroscientists. But today marks an unprecedented beginning for us as we, speak with our first actual holder. That's right. Someone who has been in the room who is going to hold our attention spans captive as he regales us with whatever stories he's willing to share. Please welcome to the Exorcist Files podcast Holder. I don't even know the proper superlative, but his royal holding, his royal holder, Dave Van Vickle. Thanks for being here, Dave. Oh yeah, no, thanks for having me on. It's what, you know, when you said holder, I like I had to think for a minute like what is that what is that term that you're talking about like I all of a sudden I realize what you're talking about because it's like yeah that's that's what we do but I've never really thought about it that way you know I know and I'm like what I mean in in in Hollywood obviously we have grips right so I don't know if there's other vernacular that's crept in the holder that's like oh he's a whole it does sound like a royal order right like oh he is a he is a holder in the order to the throne or something right that's right the knights grippis right so

Anyways, well, Dave, thanks for being here and obviously serious subject. We do like to laugh a little bit. But could you tell us how you came to be on the show? How do you know Father Carlos and to give us a little bit of your backstory there? Sure. First, let me apologize for my voice. This is my busy season right now. So I'm speaking every night like on right now on this topic, actually.

So my voice is a little bit. Hopefully we'll make it through. But yeah, I've been involved with, assisting priests with their ministries of exorcism since I was about 16 years old, actually, which is crazy to think, but it's been a very long time. And, you know, I mean, you know now from doing the podcast. It's a small, tight-knit group, really, exorcists. And so I've been attending the conferences for years, and that's how I got to know Father Carlos

and have called him many times asking him about cases and things like that. because I've had a lot of different roles within this ministry. You know, I do a lot of intakes for diocese, like to figure out who should see an exorcist and who shouldn't. And, you know, a lot of times I'll call Father Carlos for help and stuff. And when he comes in the area, we always try to see him and everything. So he's kind of a celebrity amongst my kids. It is.

Exorcism is a tight-knit community. It sounds like you've been holding and doing deliverance ministry for quite a while now. Yeah, I'm 41. I have been doing it ever since I was, yeah, about 16, 17 years old. And I would say, like, I don't really do deliverance ministry, to be honest with you. Like, I don't, I don't practice outside of exorcism. I speak on it a lot. But other than that, like I don't, yeah, I'm not, I'm not doing deliverance ministry on my own or anything. I'm pretty much just assisting exorcists or diocese. Well, let's get right to the sizzle because I know a lot of people want to know right off the bat. So to the skeptic, to anyone who's watching this, who says, you know what, this is a bunch of hooey.

There's no videotapes. We only see it in Hollywood. This is ridiculous. You know, Jesus never had holders for his demoniacs. So can you tell, just address, like, is this stuff real? What have you, have you seen in the room of stuff that would convince you this is absolutely real? Oh, yeah. In fact, I would say, I mean, it's an angst that I feel.

feel too that other people feel, right? Like I wish, I wish more people could see what I've seen because I feel like it's a grace. You know, there are things that I've seen, that exorcists have seen that you just, there's not any other way to describe it than something preter natural. And I would say like to those people who demand the videos and the proof and things like that, like exorcism is an intimate ministry, right? I mean, these people are suffering deeply. And so if you were to see one, you would not be thinking, I should take a video here and show everyone what's going on. You just feel terrible for these people. But yeah, certainly, I mean, honestly, Ryan, in the first case I was ever a part of, I saw all the things you would think of like from the movies, you know.

At least the things that actually happened. And so I was just like in awe, not so much of the devil, but in the power of the church, really, you know. Okay, well, I'm going to obviously have to follow up there. Senator, could you please outline the descriptions of the said events that have happened that you have witnessed? Sure. Well, you know, I mean, I'm sure you've talked about this extensively, like the four signs of possession, be like clairvoyance, preternatural physical abilities, knowledge of unlearned languages, and aversion to the sacred. And in that first case, I saw all of those things. In fact, the reason I knew something was actually going on is it was just during a priest was praying for a woman for healing.

She was probably like 70 years old. She couldn't have been more than 110 pounds. And she ran up onto the altar and pulled this brass candle stick and just bent it into a horseshoe like it was nothing, you know? And it was like, oh, okay, well, that's not normal, right? Like that this isn't happening. And I mean, I would even say like, like, I'm a. big guy I've worked in security my whole life I've worked as a bouncer like I've seen people on PCP and stuff like that this was nothing like that you know like this lady it was like it was paper

you know it was nothing and uh it was just a shocking thing to witness but so paint give us a lot so this you said this is your first case and so this sounds like um was this an actual major like solemn exorcism or was this just a woman getting prayed for and you happen to be there give us a little bit of the backstory here for your origin every Good superhero has a origin. Marbles the holder. So I want to hear of your origin story. So I didn't know it at the time, but the priest who I was assisting at this mass, it was a healing mass. People were coming to pray for healing. And I didn't know he was an exorcist. I had no idea. There were two exorcists in the diocese. And this was back way back. Right. And like there were probably only nine practicing exorcists in all of North America at this time. Like it was almost almost totally out of practice. And so I just kind of assumed it would be kind of a normal church thing. But when this woman came up, I could tell something was different about her.

And the priest knew right away. When he saw her, he knew right away that she was exhibiting symptoms that he wasn't comfortable with. And when he blessed her, we could see this massive change of character. Well, at this time, it wasn't, there wasn't like the processes and procedures that you have today. Like, you know, this was before we were worried about legal stings and stuff like that. And so basically, this priest had it set up that anytime he knew he needed to use the ritual, he could use it. And so that night, he actually performed the exorcism. We saw enough, enough of evidence of possession that he was like, we're going to do it tonight.

So she got blessed. And then you guys left and later, like, got back together? she got blessed and and she started to just scream horribly scream the F word and she ran up onto the altar bent that candlestick and there was like 700 people there so it was like terrifying and um the priest said take her into the sacristy and i was like you take her to the sacristy i'm not touching that lady you know like and he's like no seriously take her into the sacriaccy so i so i kind of just walked her in she wanted to leave she wanted to get out of there so i took her into the sacristy and he continued doing his blessings and I sat with her for a long time.

It was, it was terrifying. You know, I was, I was only 16. I was, I was scared, but I knew what was going on. And he came after about maybe 45 minutes and he said, we're going to pray. And then he went right into the formal ritual. Did you have to forcefully? So I'm picturing this woman running up, bending a candlestick. Did you have to chase her and forcibly drag her in there or were there fleeting moments?

moments of free agency. Like, go walk us through. Absolutely. Absolutely. So they were free. As soon as I walked up to her, I said, you have to leave. And I saw her eyes kind of flash forward. A lot of times you just see the whites of their eyes, right? And her eyes flashed forward. And she was like, yeah, get me out of here. Get me out of here. And so she started to walk. And then as soon as she got into the sacristy, she just bursted in, like she wanted out of this place, you know, out of the church sanctuary. So, and she especially wanted to get away from the priest. Yeah. And so, and So, yeah, so that was my first experience. I mean, it was bizarre, you know.

Wow, thus a holder was born. Okay. And so walk us through. So from holding, so you got to, it sounds like you got the beginning level. You started off with a 110 pound old lady. And then sometimes you would graduate up to perhaps fiercer, you know, victim, et cetera. But how did, how did your journey towards this ministry continue after that? Yeah.

Well, the next day, actually, the priest called me and said, hey, you know, I don't, I don't have any help in this. Like, would you be willing to help with another case? And I don't know. I mean, to defend the priest a little bit, right? Because a 16 year old shouldn't be doing exorcism, like, shouldn't be involved in this. But he was my spiritual director. I had a serious relationship with the Lord at the time. Like, I was very serious about my prayer life and everything. And he knew me pretty well. Like, so I would say it might have been, it might have been okay. I would never let my 16. year old do that but but it might have been okay and what i would say is like yeah he asked me for another case and and i started to help him and then i started to assist like the other guy who was the main exorcist in the diocese and i kind of got to know people there were like two pretty famous exorcists at the time that a lot of people knew one guy from new york one guy who was like the uh the consultant on the movie the exorcist and they came in on cases that we were working on

and I got to meet them. And then all of a sudden, in 1998, I think it was, Pope John Paul said, like, look, every diocese needs to appoint an exorcist. Like, we can't handle the volume. And so no one knew how to do it. You know, there were no conferences that you pretty much had to go to Rome to learn. And so every time I'd moved to a new diocese, like, they would just ask me to help because no one knew what was going on at the time. So perhaps you go to, you know, I know when, so. the holder in one hand is a physical job and your father describes it as grueling and especially if

you were holding someone even if it's not supernatural just you have someone who's on drugs or whatever and holding someone it's like wrestling for hours and it's absolutely exhausting but it also it sounds like it's more than that it's not just it's because it's a ministry so talk maybe you can dispel some of the myths about a holder and then walk people through what you actually do sure yeah well i think a lot of people think I would love a chance to do that, you know, like, like that this would be cool to see Jesus beat up the devil for a little bit or something like that. But I don't think anyone who's been in an exorcism feels that way at all. I think most people think like, what did I get myself into here, you know? But what I would say is like, yeah, I mean,

it's a serious situation, right? Because, and I'm sure you've talked about this before, but like, demons will target you. They'll target you at your lowest. And, at your weakest. And so you don't just have to be like spiritually ready, but you need to be like mentally healthy, emotionally healthy because they'll come after you. I made the mistake. I don't know, Father Carlos told you this, but probably like three months after my wife passed away. Someone asked, can you come and help with a case down south? And I said, sure. And, you know, it's been part of my life for so long. I didn't really even think about it. And it was such a stupid idea. because as soon as this case started, it was like they knew, like, he just lost his wife.

Let's go after him. And I had to just like, after 20 minutes, be like, this was a mistake. I should not have come on to help and just leave the room because they'll mess with you really bad, you know, and they can really turn the screws on you. What did that look like? What was that kind of psychological warfare? Was it insults? Was it going out?

Was it saying, hey, like, you know, I know. We caused this. We were there. We were laughing. We caused that. Yeah. stuff that obviously wasn't true. And fortunately, I know, I know them well enough to, to, I could laugh it off at least. Like, like, that's, you know, you don't have that kind of power.

But it was like, it kind of pointed out like, yeah, maybe it's not a good idea to do this right now. And there's no way that could have, like, obviously the, like, there's no way the victim could have known that you had just lost your wife. Like, could they? Well, no, that's not sure. I'm pretty well known. I mean, it was pretty well publicized. Okay. So that's not inherently, it's possible. say that's not necessarily proof of the. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I'll tell you what happens as far as clairvoyance all the time. It's terrible. It's a horribly embarrassing story. So when I was five years old, I went to the Natural History Museum and I stole a rubber teradactyl. And it's pretty common for me to walk into these cases and for the demon or the person who's possessed to look right at me and be like,

do you remember when we stole that rubber taradactyl? And it's like, you know, it's just a mess. with me, like to say, like, I, like, I know all about you basically, right? Like, and this is not a public story that they, I mean, now have you. No, no, no, no, no. Wow. No, no. Do you, uh, have you confessed this sin? Have you worked out? Like, is this a venal theft? Is a venial sin? Um, man, that's a, that's a, that's what. Yeah, because I, I do imagine that there are, like, you know, they just want to throw you off the game. And were you ever, especially in that case where you just lost your wife, uh, were you, were you, have you ever lost your cool. Have they ever been able to, you sound like you're going to laugh it off, but have they ever gotten

under your skin to the point where, because they would like you, I imagine, to lose your cool and get really angry, right? Yeah, I would say like in high school, there were times where I didn't get really angry, but there were a few times where I got so scared. I could, like, it was probably sinful, right? Like, it was so fearful like I wasn't trusting in the Lord. There was a case in high school. I remember where it was just this really awful case. They call them once in a lifetime case. you know, where you see like all the signs of possession. Category five, exorcism. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. One you don't want to be a part of, right? And, uh, and, um, basically at one point, the demoniac or an ergament or I don't know if they've used that term on the show or not, but like they've turned, they turned to me and they said at 3 a.m. I'm going to kill you, you know, three a.m. I'm going to kill you. So I, you know, I played it cool, right? But like, I started to think about it. And that's the way it works.

like I started thinking about it. And at 3 a.m., sure enough, my phone rang at my house. And I mean, I almost, I mean, you could imagine. Like, I almost had to change my sheets. I was so scared, you know. So it was really scary. And I answered it. And it was just like some weird noises on the, you know, on the other line.

But it was like, I was so scared at that moment. I had to be like, you know, like, am I not trusting in the Lord? Like the Lord's got me, you know, like, why am I worried about this, you know? But yeah, so there been times like that, sure. So that brings up an interesting dynamic because I have had various exorcists and priests come on the show and talk about this retaliation. And on one hand, right, all Christians are promised that you'll face persecution. Like, you know, the mark of a believer, right, is that you're going to face tough times. And so it seems like, especially, you know, coming from a Protestant background, this idea of blowback and targeted retaliation seems to be more of a ploy or a lie to get believers to avoid even dealing.

with this. We have a lot of people who would say, I can't even listen to your show because I'll be targeted. And we have to say, well, if it's true that there is this thing, right? If we say there are such things as demons, et cetera. But that means that God's real. And that would mean that if you're already living a Christian life, you already had a bull's eye, like it's a myth. And so when you hear stories about a fly in the chalice like Father Barton shared, or when you say a call at 3am, father has shared that. How do you work that out as far as, do you think that was your fear, a door or do you think it's a thing? Because you might, you, I talked to some Protestant ministers and they might say, oh, I know, like, as long as you're prayed up and you say, no, like,

you know, I take a thorn. No one's coming after me. I'm curious how you think through the retaliation dynamic there. Sure. I think in the bad cases, they're going to do whatever they can. That retaliation happens. Like, they're going to do what they can to see. if they find a week, a weak chain in the link, you know, a weak link in the chain. But most of the time, it's like parlor tricks. Like, it's like, um, poltergeist activity. Okay. And so that I can, I'm at the point out.

I can kind of laugh that off, right? Like big whoop. Okay. But, um, they'll, they talk a big threat and that's the stuff I don't worry about. Like, they'll say, I'm going to kill your children. I'm going to do this. I don't worry about that at all. I worry much more about that.

the people involved hurting me or my family, then the demons. Because in my mind, you know, like, I don't feel like we're running from the devil. Like, I feel like the devil's running from us. So I don't, I don't like to be talking about it in a fearful way. But certainly there's annoyances, there's problems. Exorcists get kept up at night. They, you know, there was a year of my life where every single time I drove to an exorcism. This is, and I mean this like not hyperbolicly, every single time.

My car broke down every single time. And I would borrow other people's cars. I would, I remember borrowing a brand new car. And it got annoying. And it got to the point where I was like, you know what, this is, this is stupid that I'm so annoyed. Like, God can use anything at any time. So I'm just going to sit and pray my rosary when this happens. And that's when it finally stopped.

You know, it was like when I kind of gave in like that in a certain sense. So this is why your lifelong band from Enterprise and Avis. Right, right, yeah. Right. No, father's had so many car issues on his St. Jude Relicator. He's blown through 14 tires. He's talked about, which is wild. But how do you, so you mentioned like poltergeist activity, et cetera. And I think, and I don't know if this is sort of a skeptic or Protestant perspective coming out. But like the idea, it would make sense that, you know, you could experience these sort of things outside sort of your domain. But in your house, like your consecrated area, the areas you know, of spiritual authority, it would seem like it would be, if we accept the spiritual paradigm,

it seems tough that a demon would be able to spiritually retaliate against you in your own home, unless, of course, and I say all this is a 99% because clearly God could say, hey, I'm going to allow this because I'm building up, you know, Dave's faith and confidence. Sure. Okay. Yeah, I don't know, I don't know if I would describe it as retaliation. I would describe it more as intimidation. So like during the case, I would say, like trying to get you to give it up a little bit, I would say that that's more likely.

But also, I think, I don't know that I've ever been retaliated against, like for a successful case that like something bad happened because of that. Certainly during cases, it's like a battle. And I guess the way I would explain that is it seems to me like we're all at war. There's no question, right? The devil's always trying to do whatever he can to draw you into his rebellion. But entering into this ministry in particular, it is something that you're saying like, okay, I'm going to do something a little bit more extraordinary than what I normally, like just everyday life, resisting temptation.

The thing is, I guess I just always keep in perspective that like a tire popping, being kept up at night, poltergeist activity, anything, even really awful stuff, like, that's nothing compared to like what they want is to draw you to hell. right so like that's this is nothing so i don't know i just i've never really thought about it that much to be honest um now i know i will get many questions if i don't ask this but uh this is sort of the gold standard of of fascination with this but have you ever seen levitation or anything like that yeah sure sure anybody who's been doing it this yeah yeah now when you mean Do you mean just contorting in an angle like Michael Jackson and Smooth Criminal where it's just a really cool dance move?

Or do you mean violation of natural law? No, I mean, I mean, I mean like imagine eight guys holding someone over a holy water font trying to get them down for baptism. And they're they cannot get them down to the font. Like, I mean that. That's what I mean. I mean full on levitation. Like you could take your arm and put it under them like it. It's not, yeah.

Or like, maybe not levitation, but like several times I've seen like where they crawl up a wall. And, and Ryan, I mean, you cut out what you want to cut out. But like when I talk about this stuff, like I get nervous because I just want to make sure like everyone realize like I've never walked away being like, well, the devil's like power is amazing. I've always walked away thinking the power of the priest is incredible. You know, the power of God is incredible. So I just want to throw that out there. No, no. Well, we feature that in the case.

And again, my role on this is I try to play like natural skeptic here and just say, I'm a lot of fair questions. And I'm going to assume, too, that you would say someone who's done this, that would you concur with sort of what I think is the majority opinion that the vast, the vast number of cases of reported demonic oppression or probably mental illness or not, you know, it sounds like you're dealing with some extreme cases. Oh, yeah. Okay, so yeah, so you're hearing an almost lifetime of experience.

But yeah, I would say, so I do intakes for a lot of diocese, okay? And I would say probably 97% of what I hear will never see an exorcist. Like, I will never let them through because it's usually somebody who's overzealously interested in spiritual warfare, sees the devil around every corner. drugs, but like particularly drugs are becoming an issue now because of psychedelics, right? Like so the psychedelics are becoming a really difficult part of my job because someone can do it 20 years ago and it's still having very sincere effects on their brain. Okay. And then the third would be mental illness, you know, and mental illness is for the experts.

I don't diagnose that. But there are sometimes when I just can tell this is not spiritual. And so it sounds like, I mean, so like, for example, so if you see someone doing Spider-Man on the wall, which it sounds like you have, et cetera, like that you go, okay, that's probably not drugs or mental life. That's defined gravity. That's either really cool Elon Musk technology or that's, that's legitimate cases. But in the vast majority, in your, in your ministry and intake, it sounds like that it's just a lot of fear. And unfortunately, a lot of people are dealing with, you know, real problems. But, they're probably not spiritual in origin. Right, right. Or if they're spiritual in origin, it's not, it doesn't warrant the intervention of the church, right?

It's just, you know, you give them some good spiritual direction on the phone, you know. Right, because that's a risk you run, right, is if you grants, I was thinking about this other day, if you grant someone, and I know you, but if the bishop and the priest obviously grants an exorcism, you are in some sense validating their concern, right? Because they know, hey, if they think there's enough evidence, right? That's like going to your doctor. And all you want to hear is, I don't even need to run this test.

And instead they're like, actually, let's bring you in for some tests. You're like, whoa, wait, what? You think I actually have a problem? Right. This is one of the issues I have with some of the deliverance ministries is like, you tell a person they have a spirit of, I don't know, Jezebel or something like that, which they love to throw around all the time. For some people, like that could cause them to not sleep for weeks, right?

like they are terrified at what what does that mean whereas in some like charismatic or protestant circles we throw around that phrase all the time right like you can say the spirit of anything right all the time and it doesn't bother people like that but for some people yeah you have to be really really careful um because it i mean it is scary especially if you don't know i mean for me as a christian as a catholic like i know god's love is what wins history like no matter what happens here, like, in the end, we know who won. But if you don't have that, like, demons are absolutely terrifying, right? They're scary. And this is why people have recourse to, like, psychics and stuff like that, because they're afraid, you know, they want to control things.

Amen. Father Martin's here. I want to do a quick plug for one of the most powerful tools I've seen for breaking free and growing closer to Christ. Exodus 90. The Exodus 90, the Exodus 90 challenge begins this year on January 20th. But this isn't just a 90-day program. Exodus 90 is a spirituality for modern men that is built on three ancient pillars, prayer, self-sacrifice, and fraternity. We all long for something more. We long to be the men God created us to be, sons of a loving father. It's time to turn away from our idols. It's time to break free from the Pharaoh's that hold us in bondage. If you're ready to make a fresh start and embark on a journey to uncommon freedom in Jesus Christ, then download the Exodus 90 app today. This is your chance to break

free, refocus, and rediscover who God is calling you to be in the new year. It starts January 20th. So go to Exodus 90.com slash X-Files to learn more about Exodus 90. that's exodus 90.com slash eX files to join tens of thousands of men from all over the world for Exodus 90. Again, it begins Monday, January 20th. God bless you. Absolutely. Wow. I just, I have so many questions.

This is just so cool to hear from someone who's, you know, because we've talked a lot about a lot of different things in the show. I want to get into some, obviously, having been in the room now, have you, what are the most common doorways that you have seen when these priests are getting these things out? Father talks a lot about unforgiveness, sexual sin, and, you know, obviously in Catholic theology, violations, or mortal sins and violations of the Ten Commandments. But, you know, in your ministry, what are you right now seeing as being the main culprit and doorway that gets opened? No, it all, at forever, always has been a violation of the First Commandment, right, through a cult activity, right? The number one reason we see people is because they're messing around with things they shouldn't

be messing around with, i.e. mediums, psychics, Reiki, all these kinds of things, right? We're getting all these cases from that. And that's so common today. You're still seeing that still, like, it's, it's not like- It is a billion-dollar industry in America. And believe it or not, I don't know why, but it correlates with atheism. As atheism grows in a- country so does a cult activity it's bizarre absolutely bizarre now but yeah i mean it's it is it is an absolutely booming industry now in america it's they would call it like white magic right that's what they would say whereas like you might go to like you know people from south america africa italy they might get some like bad really awful curses or something like that but it's happening

more and more here i mean it's a it's a big deal here what does that typically look like when you see someone who's, you know, is it they went once or is, are you talking about cases where people have gone really far down the rabbit hole and they're like, you know, what, how does that kind of play out? Yeah, I, I really, and maybe some of the exists would agree with me, would disagree with me, but I really shy away from the idea that possession can happen by accident. It's very, I've, I've almost never, ever seen possession happen by, like, somebody fell into something that they shouldn't have been, you know, messing around with. It's usually sought after, first of all. Usually they're looking for that relationship with a demon.

But second of all, yeah, you're talking a serious relationship with a lot of yeses, a lot of yeses to a demon that allows them to have that level of control. Yeah, you don't get possessed by accident. I mean, you really don't. There are odd cases that most exorcists don't deal with of like Satanism or someone who's born to an actual witch or something like that, where as a child, a demon was invited into their life. And in that case, yeah, you could say it wasn't their fault. But for the most part, someone is seeking after this relationship. So you brought up interesting. One of the more controversial topics and we've had different exorcists talk about this is the idea of generational sin. And in our series, we profiled several

cases of people that were experiencing pretty profound effects and exhibiting symptoms of illness from something in the past. And one of them, we featured on there, and it blew my mind just hearing her story, Tammy Comer, which we shared her testimony, sick for 20 years and only found out because her aunt went to a fortune teller. So it's very strange, right? And they said, hey, you have a curse on your family that goes back several generations. She looked back, saw the pattern, got one deliverance session, has been healed.

ever since. And even she would probably say that's, she's never heard of anything like that before. So are those just the oddball rare cases? Yeah, I'm one of the guys who doesn't get into the generational curses thing. I mean, is there a possibility they're real? I guess so. I guess so. But anytime I've ever seen something generational happening, it was through secondary causes, like something passed down through physical touch, like something, like a grandpa handing something to a grandson or something like that. And I'm sure you got into this debate with a lot of the exorcist, because I'm usually the only one at the conference who takes this tone. But like I, yeah, I really, really don't like even the concept of generational sin, particularly amongst people who have been baptized.

I have a hard time with that. Yeah. And I can get into it if you want. I mean, they're, no, no, that's what made Tammy's story so tough. And even the case we shared in season two, which is that you had a great-grandfather, a great-great-grandfather making a cult pact with the devil or some spirit, which you can argue perhaps any, you know, no intention. And obviously, I don't think anyone disputes the idea of generational curses in the sense

that if we accept the Christian narrative, we're all feeling the effects of the same. So that's the thing. I think where we probably get a little, you know, where it gets a little touchy is like, you Would God permit people to experience the consequences of things that they had no part in? But see, I look at that, though, and I go, I see genetic problems passed down that are no fault. And we obviously, one of the weird elements of life today is that, and are living in our universe, is that God permits the free exercise of will of certain people to affect other people who had no moral responsibility to that. So yeah. And so I guess what I would say is like my my issue usually comes up with the baptized because at least in Catholic theology like baptism is the liberation from darkness par excellence. Right. Like it is the that is the character of that sacrament. So I it just I just does not sit well with me.

Theologically, but there are much more theologically astute people who believe in them. I tend to I don't know if you ever had. Father Roger on who wrote the paper against generational healing. Basically, like, 10 years ago, the International Association of Exorcist commissioned a theologian, who was also an exorcist, to write a paper about it, to, you know, look into it. And I really think he was right. Like, he basically comes back and says, this is not, this is a new occurrence that came from, he traces it back to you. I can't remember if it was Herbert Thurston or someone who was into this stuff.

But, you know, anyways, it's a long discussion. Is that a public paper or is that private behind the paywall, you know? No, I'm sure it's out there. I'm sure it's out there. It's in Spanish. I had to Google translate it because my Spanish is bad. If we can track that down, listeners, we'll post that for you and get there. But no, but also, and I guess it's probably, you know, to put a bow on it too, right?

I mean, you're right. Because, like, there's things that violate our sentiments and we don't like it. But I think about the Job story and nothing in that story sits. well with me. You know, the most righteous man of all. And I know it's pre-baptisms there, but Job is just hanging out, doing life. And it seems like a wager. It's just for sport happens.

And then poor Job, like, even though he gets some restitution, he still lost loved ones, et cetera. And it was just to show him, hey, like, you know, you don't know as much as you think you know. Yeah, you know, you mentioned we started talking about entry points for demons, you know. And Job, Job's actually a really important story to understand for entry points for demons because we're always going to point to like a sin or an occult practice or something like that. But if you look deep into the cases and that's my job is I accompany people who are fighting the devil, right?

Like I get to know them personally. They come to our house for Thanksgiving, right? They need family and we give them that. And I would say like the problem of pain is a major. issue at the beginning, right? If you don't believe that God is good, that is always the beginning of these cases. So, for instance, most of the cases are going to have some kind of abuse from their childhood, right? Like that they were victimized as a child. Most cases are. And if you grow up thinking, how could God let that happen? And you're doubting the idea of a good God, that's a major, major

entry point for the devil. It's his first lie, right? Because don't forget, you know, he says to Adam and Eve, like, did God really say you couldn't eat? Right? He's trying to make you doubt his goodness. And that's what he does to all these cases. He tries to make them doubt God's goodness that God would actually protect them. So now, and it's probably good, right, for us to keep humility and say, look, we only, you know, only God knows the heart, right? So at the end of the day, we can look at the facts of the case and God will permit or not permit something. to happen and we may only be getting a tip of the iceberg when we see it come out or you know they're afliction yeah and i i think that's that was always my issue with um generational curses is

that it became a bucket that we put like well we can't figure out any other reason so it must be a generational curse and and i'm sure like the exorcists that have been on here are much more fastidious than to do that but i have been around for a long time and seen you know it was like the Wild West when I first started, like, you know, people were doing whatever they could, you know, learning from movies and stuff like that. Now, I have to ask, you know, I've asked father this a couple times and I said, has there ever been a comical moment in a exorcism where you just, you're self-aware of the absurdity of like, you have that moment?

Yeah. What is my life that I'm in a room watching this? And you just have that moment of like, Lord. And he shared one anecdote about a demon who had some really bad flatulence. and the team made it mark. And they all just attention to the moment. They all laughed at it, et cetera. But there's not a lot to laugh at, I know normally.

But have you ever had any comically self-aware moments in there? Sure. Yeah. Certainly, as soon as you said that, I thought about a case, just like what Father Carlos said. But one that I always love to talk about, my favorite exorcist ever, he's just a holy man. Like, he's real simple guy. He doesn't claim to be. He's very blue collar.

And his Latin is just horrendous, absolutely horrendous. So we were at this case and the demon kept correcting his Latin as he was going on. And we were all just, I mean, it got to the point we were all in the room laughing hysterically, you know. How would that sound like? So how did that sound like? Would he be like, you know, Espiritrethusant and the demon be like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like, how would it go? No, no.

Exactly. Exactly. They would say, no, no, that's not what it says. And then they would say it in perfect Latin, you know. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's been plenty of times like that where you laugh like that. Yeah.

There was a time one, there was a time once where, and I laugh at it now. At the time I wasn't laughing. But I, there was this case and this, this old exorcist promised this girl that she was going to be liberated on her birthday. And I was mad because I was like, what are you going to say to this poor girl if she's not liberated, right? So it was a week before her birthday. And he said, we're all going to fast this week for her birthday.

And I was playing football at the time. I was like, I'm not fasting for a week. Like, I have to do something else. So I decided I was going to wake up a half hour early, you know. And he, so we go, it's Saturday morning. The session starts. He makes a sign of the cross. And I mean, the second he finishes the sign of the cross, this poor girl, like her character changes.

You can tell, like, the demon's present. he jumps down on it. She jumps down on her knees and puts her hands together like she's begging. And she says, tell him to stop waking up early. Tell him to stop waking up early. Tell him to stop waking up early. And he didn't even know I was doing this, right? And so he goes, is somebody like waking up early and offering it up?

And I was like, me, you know, I like raise my hand meekly, you know. And it was just funny because like for me, it was nothing, like that little scrap, like that I would wake up a little bit early and be like, Lord, if there's anything here like I'm I'm I'm mad that I'm up early I'm angry I'm going to complain about it all day but if there's any kind of virtue in this if you could if you could use it to free her please do it and it was like it was so annoying to them and I always I always laughed because it was like they hated it so much she couldn't have known right oh no no no no one had any idea no wow and that is the bigger miracle a young person getting up so early right so that was that

that was the more international thing. So I travel around with an event. It's called the Catholic truth about angels, demons, ghosts, exorcisms, and hauntings. And basically, I speak in churches all around the country and answer the questions that everybody has about this. And because of that, I get emails every day. Like, this is happening in my life. My son is having this problem. Is there any help you can give me?

And a lot of times, if people can't find an exorcist, I find the place that he's speaking the closest. And without telling him, I say, just go up to Father Carlos and say, my friend Dave, or your friend Dave told me to come see and get a blessing from you and see what happens. And on several occasions, he's called me and been like, are you joking? You should have warned me about this, you know, like, you know, because it's their real cases, you know. Oh my gosh, that's so funny. All right. So I'm curious, what is, so paint a picture for us.

So you're in the room. Where is a holder in relation? Is it start off as just prayer? And then you only go hold when they're manifesting. or is there a preemptive, like you're holding in preparation for it? Give us a little bit of color of what it looks like to actually be a holder in the room. Yeah, it's both the end. I would say like at the beginning, you're definitely ready and you're holding them.

But you get to know cases a little bit more. Some are more violent. Some are not. I don't know why. It's kind of a mystery. But yeah, you certainly get to know. It also depends on the exorcist. Like if the exorcist is inexperienced, you know, you're going to deal with more struggle for sure.

And so you're there. But yeah, you're praying. Usually, you know, everybody's on their knees for the litany of saints. And then that's when you start to see a manifestation, that's when the holders, like, would start, you know, grabbing on. And you're, you know, basically just trying to be as gentle as you possibly can without putting anyone in danger, you know. And they'll try to trick you. I mean, they'll be real docile. And then all of a sudden, so you've got to be on it because they're quite.

quick, you know. How do you actually hold them to avoid getting like, you know, bit or, you know, hit? I can imagine it's a very strange way. I mean, like, you know, what does it look like? Yeah. Yeah. You basically try to hold their arms like as if I'm trying to think how I would describe it, as if you were like, if you had a girlfriend, you're holding her hand, but you're inside, you know, and there's a guy on the other side, so you're holding their hand. Because you kind of have a little bit a control there like that, you know. And, you know, I mean, it's, you have to be really careful because they can't get hurt. This is one of the reasons why like when I'm working with a new exorcist, I always tell them like, do you have any like police officers in your congregation that you trust

to do this? Because, I mean, there is a liability there. You know, you need someone who knows about restraining someone and stuff like that because there are laws and things that you have to be careful about. So yeah, I mean, it's, it's tricky, but I've been bit a bunch of times. I mean, it happens. It's just, you know, there's nothing really. You can do about everything. You can't, you can't protect yourself from everything, you know. And that superhuman strength, obviously, is one of the, you know, signs that they point out. And that's something I imagine you've seen it would make your job doubly difficult. Well, yeah, I mean, it's, yeah, I mean, I mean, you just have to realize that you're not going to be able to, like, only God is going to be able to,

keep them in the room. You know, you're just hoping that you can do your best, you know, to try to keep them in the room because, I mean, there have been several times where I'm just like in front of the door basically trying to get them not to leave, you know, and just praying like, God, please stop them because I know there's no way I'll be able to. But, you know, you do your best, yeah. So you're holding on for dear life and just praying the whole time. So are you holder slash intercessor? Yeah, everybody is. Everybody is. Yeah, you don't, want to not pray in those rooms. Yeah. Of all time. Um, so I'm curious, one of the dynamics that's always fascinated me is the idea of these prayers. And obviously when we look in scripture, Jesus is just like,

come out and it happens. And then obviously in cinema and, you know, sort of exorcism culture and, in movies particularly, we see these like shouting matches and prayers, et cetera. But how do you walk through and, and sort of reconcile the simplicity of, of Christ? slid exorcisms in scripture versus the sort of experiences that you've seen in the room and, you know, litanys and shouting and prayers, et cetera. And why do you think that happens versus kind of what we see depicted in the New Testament? There's a few different things that we have to remember. The first is this, like, it's not as if we're fighting just a demon. Okay, there's, that's the problem with exorcism. That would be easy, right? It would be so easy if it were just a demon. But

there's all this human stuff that goes with it, right? Like, they're inhabiting a human. And so there's lots of emotional, mental issues that go along with possession. And so, like, for instance, I don't know if you've read the preno tonda of the old ritual, but the old ritual in the preno it says, with a commanding voice, with a commanding voice, the priest pronounces a prayer. Okay. For a long time, I thought, why does that matter? Right? The demons, it doesn't matter if you yell at the demons, you know, it doesn't matter. But you have to remember, there's humans in the room, right? And so if a priest walks in and they're like, in the name of the father and they're afraid, everyone in the room is going to be like, this is not good, right? Like the exorcist is afraid.

It's there for the humans. So a lot of liturgy, which is what we're talking about in the exorcism ritual, especially the new ritual, a lot of liturgy is for the human element. Right. Because as Catholics, we believe, like, we're made for liturgy. Okay, we're made for liturgy. And so the different parts of response, the call and response prayers, the litanys, these kinds of things, they're very human things to do. Okay. And like one of the examples I use, like, for instance, like, you know, we pray the

rosary a lot, right, in this ministry. It's a big part of the ministry. And a lot of Protestants probably don't agree with that. And I get it, right? But little things like that, like moving beads through your hand, might seem like nothing, except for the fact that Christ took flesh, right? He took a body. And because of that, things we do with our body can be signs of grace, outward signs of grace.

And demons particularly hate the incarnation. I mean, they talk about things they hate all the time. But the thing they talk about the most is how much they hate the incarnation. And so physical manifestations of grace are really abhorrent. to them. So yeah, so I would say, I would say I've seen both things happen, right? There was a very famous exorcist, very, very famous. He's long dead now so I can tell this story. But he was like, not just famous for exorcism. Like he was well known for in Catholic circles all over the world. And he was a faith healer. Like that was what he was kind of known for as like preaching and faith

healing and academics and I was there with him one time when he was doing an exorcism and the bishop had said look there's only latin for an approved ritual like at this time there was only a ritual that was approved in Latin you have to do the Latin so he was like stumbling through the Latin and he was getting more and more frustrated and he kind of like looked at the bishop and the bishop was there at this time and and the bishop goes Mike just do whatever you want and he set the book aside and went and just put his hands on his head. And he said, come out. And it was over.

It was over. And all I could think was, man, just do that every time. Right. Like, just do that every time. But obviously, like, every case is different and every priest is different. And, you know, it's based on so many different things. And so, yeah, the ritual is basically a collection of what the church learned to use over years. So, yeah.

And so, Father and M. any other extras have shared how, you know, one of the surprising things, especially for Protestants to hear, you know, if you're already going, okay, wow, demons are real, like step one, that's crazy. Step two, wait, it takes dozens and dozens of sessions to liberate someone. That's something that I know. I personally, like, had a tough, and still do, frankly, reconciling with what I read in scripture and that. So can you talk a little bit about, has that been your experience? Especially after hearing someone just put their hands on and going Gandalf, style to Theodin and just like casting it out.

Exactly. That's what it was like. Yeah, that's a great, that's a great question. So back to that human side thing. So the length of, of the fight, right? The length of the fight is based on a lot of different things. The depth of the attachment is, is one big thing. How honest the person is with the team. Because getting back to that human side, right? Like most of the people who are coming to us are outsiders of the kingdom, right, of the church. They don't speak church language. They're nervous about priests. They're nervous about preachers. They're nervous about pastors. And so they're not just going to come in and be like, here's everything that I've ever done and could be an unopening. So there's like a little bit of a progress that happens where you start to see like, well, it could be this or it could be that.

And usually what happens in most of these cases is something's going on where it's like, why are we not making any progress? And then one day they'll say, well, I forgot to tell you. you, there's this. Like I didn't, I haven't forgiven my father or something like that. So there's that. But, sorry, let me move on. So, so yeah, so the faith of the people praying, the faith of the person. But you have to, you have to remember, like, exorcism is not magic. That's the big thing to remember. These people have to have a basis of a relationship with Jesus Christ for liberation to set on. And so I always say, like when you said I was a holder, I was like, well, yeah, I guess I do hold. But most of what I do is I evangelize people.

I introduce them to Jesus and I try to build a relationship with Jesus with them so that they have some basis to hold the freedom that we're trying to offer them. So you could kind of look at it like this. A demon has control and a person, they're kind of holding a person under the water. and then this priest comes along in the name of Christ and pushes that demon around, beats them up a little bit, and the person gets their head above water. And what we want them to do is get their head above water long enough to say, I don't want this anymore. And then they can cooperate.

So it's not as simple as like, you have authority, you tell them to leave, they leave. It's more than that. It's much more human than just that, right? I don't know if that answers your question or not. No, for sure. And then, I mean, did you find, you know, and this could be, to be clear, this could just be God's grace and mercy in that. Because you talk to different spiritual warfare, quote, experts, and you'll hear different, I never talk to the demon. I issue commands to the demon. I mean, and it seems like God in his mercy just endorses multiple.

I mean, I know really respected, you know, ministers who have completely different, the core is the same that only Christ is the one who can liberate, et cetera. but as far as the best practice and whether you should even attempt to get any information because they're all liars versus no i'm issuing commands uh yeah do you find that just there's just different styles and you know god just in his mercy kind of lets multiple ways lead deliberation yeah yeah it the the important thing to remember and this is when it gets really weird especially in catholicism it can get really weird right is you pray with faith Like people will email me every day and they'll say, this is what's happening. The devil's attacking me this. Is there a special prayer I can pray for this? And it's like, yeah, pray with faith.

Like pray what you want to pray. The devil hates prayer. He hates prayer. Are there times? Now, liturgy is different, right? Liturgy comes from the church and we have to follow that. But when it comes to just personal prayer, you just pray with faith. And I think to your point, one of the sticky areas for Catholics is that we have to be able. obedient. So if there is a law in your diocese, for instance, if a, if a bishop does say you cannot use this language when praying, we believe like, look, you got to be obedient there. And my point to everyone is you don't need any form, like a special formula, like you pray with faith. You love someone. You teach them the truth and you pray with faith and it'll work, you know, and those things will work. Are there cases that need an actual formal exorcism? Absolutely. Yeah, it happens. But I don't know. I mean, that's God's, you know, I don't know why, but I know oftentimes what it seems like is God is trying to accomplish something through this case. And so oftentimes it drags on because it's like, it's like he's, I don't know, dotting eyes and crossing T's a little bit as far as what he's trying to do to draw people closer to him.

Have you had any collaboration with other denominations or Orthodox, et cetera? What's been sort of your interaction and your ministry and work with other expressions of Christianity outside Catholicism? Yeah. Well, I mean, if you find yourself in a situation where you're in a battle with evil, and you're like, depending on the denomination you're in of Protestantism or Christianity, you might find yourself totally without help, right? And so it's pretty common like Presbyterian Lutheranism, you know, the Methodism that they'll forward cases to us. It's a pretty common thing. Like a lot of times, a lot of the calls I get are from ministers saying, hey, I was giving spiritual direction to this person. This is what happened.

That's not really our thing. I saw on the movies that priests do this. Like, can we forward this person to you? You know, that kind of thing. whereas like in the more Pentecostal or the more like charismatic denominations, they would probably have someone who deals with that sort of thing. And yeah, I've trying to think, I've never worked with them. But like I've actually gone to their conferences a couple times when I was younger and found them to be fruitful.

Yeah. Well, that doesn't be a surprise, right? Because as Father will stand the show to the gift of, you know, being able to pray against evil spirits was, you know, given not just to the apostles, but all those, all those who believe. And even Father Morath, I read a book of his recently, and he said that he was grateful for some of the Pentecostal traditions in the 60s or 70s when that was a real focus and bringing that back to the Catholic Church and say, hey, we need to acknowledge this reality. You know, we don't need a, we don't need just a therapist in every diocese. You know, we need an exorcist. Well, yeah, I mean, and when I started, that was the situation is that a lot of people were having to go to Pentecostalism to get help. like they didn't know what else to do, you know.

Yeah. Was there a case that was, I mean, obviously this first one you shared that was really, you know, that was perfect, kind of got you roped into this. But are there one or two cases that stand out, though, particularly formative for you as far as your theology, your experience, anything that changed your paradigm or ones that just you to this day go, it's a head scratcher? Like, man, God, I don't know why that was allowed to go down the way it did. Yeah, sure.

there was one case in particular that made a big impact on me that it was it was just i don't i guess the mechanics of heaven of the mechanics of the of the unseen world is odd to me at times okay so like for instance so you know in our bible we have the book of tobit have you ever read tobit i haven't i always mixed it up with uh as being one of the j k or jr tulkins uh paula about that books, you know. Yeah, in Tobit, there's this really weird scene where he has him cut the guts of a fish out. An angel has him cut the guts of a fish out and burn the guts of this fish. And it's like an exorcism.

Okay. That happens. It's very strange. It's very odd. And like when we would look at it, we would say like, oh, that's like an occult or a pagan ritual that we're witnessing, you know. And I think sometimes like. we don't really understand, like, angels have their own exorcism rituals, right? And God uses, God loves to use secondary causes. Okay. That's one thing that's big in Catholicism.

Okay. God loves to use secondary causes. And so it's really common that angels and saints intervene in these cases. And there's two instances in particular that really stood out to me. And the first is this, I was doing an intake for this poor kid. He was 18 years old. I had everything going for him, but all of a sudden started to have all these problems. And when he came to see me, his uncles were these two huge firemen. And he was like being held between them. And I mean, he was just screaming the F where he was so mad that they were bringing

him in, you know, just super angry. And usually what I do if I'm in person with an intake is I'll ask them a lot of mundane questions to get them to calm down. And then I'll kind of sneak in a zinger. So I was like getting him to calm him down. I was like, do you play sports? And he was finally calming down and able to answer. How do you do in school? And blah. And I asked him like eight or nine questions like that that no one would be offended by. And then I just really quickly said, Jonathan, like, do you know how much God loves you? And I mean, before his uncles could move, before. where I could even blink.

He had gotten away from them, and he had gotten this vase and broke it. And, I mean, it had to have been, it had to have been less than a second. He had it up to my throat. And I thought, this guy's going to kill me. You know,

this kid's going to kill me. I could see his eyes. You can only see the whites of his eyes. I knew what was exactly what was going on. And all of a sudden, he just looked in terror above me. And he looked back down at me, and he said,

if that little, if that little expletive from Italy or from Luca weren't behind you, I'd have killed you three seconds ago. And I thought, what the heck? That's so weird. You know, I had no idea. So we admitted him for exorcism. And every time I'd walk in the room, all of a sudden he'd start talking about this little, you know, expletive from Luca, Italy. I'm thinking, what is going on, you know and finally the exorcists got annoyed and was like in the name of jesus christ i command you to tell me who this person is it keeps walking in when dave walks in and finally after like 15 minutes of commanding this demon the demon says jemma galgani jemma galgani at the time i had no idea who jemma galgani was but she's a major saint that shows up during exorcisms who was from luka italy she was this young

girl who she's what we call a victim soul. She offered up all her sufferings for others to go to heaven. And I would say like those kind of situations, she's probably intervened to save my life on several occasions where I'm just like, this is, I would never believe this if someone was telling me this story. Like if a friend was telling me this, I wouldn't believe. I'm the skeptic. I'm the most skeptic person. But this happened to me. And it was just unbelievable to think, like, wow, the people who have gone before us want to help, you know, and God loves using secondary causes. The second case was, I always cry when I talk about this case because it's just really, there's this girl who, this priest who was exercising was a Dominican theologian.

And he had this really deep devotion to St. Joseph. And this girl had been a beautiful. used by her father in every way possible. And actually the father, her father, her biological father, had trafficked her amongst his friends. I mean, it was just a horrific thing. And she ended up in the porn industry. She ended up on Coke and some major drug addiction. Well, when she went to like a center to get rid of her drug addiction, okay, which in any other

day, my brain would remember what that's called, but for some reason my brain's not morning. She met another person who was from the porn industry, this other girl. And the other girl said, I'm so glad you're here. I want to tell you about Jesus Christ. Well, she had this massive conversion as she was cleaning up, getting sober. And at that time, unbeknownst to her, her dad was in prison, dying of cancer, and the prison chaplain was talking to him every day about Jesus. And he had a conversion. and he wrote her a letter saying, I'm so sorry for everything I've ever done, but it never got to her. So she moved in with her aunt, who she found, and they were Catholics. They brought her to church one day, and she just went ballistic, absolutely ballistic.

They put her in like a psych ward. The psych ward says, we don't think this is mental. Like, we're seeing things that we don't want to deal with. Eventually, she was admitted for exorcism, and this case was going on. years. I was part of it for years. It was terrible. Weekly exorcisms for years. And one day, almost like in a frustrated way, Father Paul was like, you know, there's got to be something we're not thinking of. There's got to be something. Is there anything you're not telling us? And she said, he said, have you forgiven your father? And she said, I'll never forgive my father. And I don't know

if it was her or the demon, but she said, I'll never forgive him for what he's done. And knowing her well, I knew her well. In my mind, I was like, yeah, I don't know if I would. would either. You know, I mean, it was the most horrific story. And he knelt down and he said, St. Joseph, please intercede for us. You were Jesus's foster father. Please intercede with us and give us the grace of being able to forgive our fathers and all those who have wronged us. And the door of this room opened up. It was bizarre. And she looked at the door and I could tell she was seeing something, but I couldn't see anything. And all of a sudden, there was a chair right next to her. she started having a conversation with somebody in this chair.

And after about three minutes, I could tell just from context of her part of the conversation that she was talking to her dad. She was talking to her dad. Her dad had died of cancer in prison. And basically at the end of this conversation, she said, I'm sorry to. And I wish I had seen you before you died. And she just started sobbing, just sobbing. sobbing. And she said, I totally and completely forgive you. And all of a sudden, like,

she was fine. Like there was just peace in the room. And she was totally with it. And she was like, you know, still crying, but we were like, you know, kind of coaxing her out of that. The exorcist said, what happened? You know, what did you see? And she said, an old man with a with a, like a walking stick brought my father into the room. And my father got down on his knees and begged me for forgiveness and apologized for everything he had done and I was able to forgive him. And she said at one point the demons tried to get into our conversation and the old man with the stick just held up his hand and they were completely silent and ran away. And it was like the most amazing moment of just total and complete. I don't know. It was just beautiful.

You know, it was just beautiful. And I don't know. It's always stood out to me as like one of the more beautiful things that's ever happened in exorcism. It's funny. Protestants don't really disagree with the idea of obviously there's a community of saints, etc. It's mainly they kind of fix it on the practice of asking, you know, saints to intervene. But with this experience, would you just say, hey, look, if you're, you know, not sure about that, these are two experiences that you recognize are hard to believe, but just seem to. communicate the reality that God is using those people that have gone on before us to intervene on our behalf. Yeah, I mean, I would just say like, certainly I had no idea that to me,

the saints were just examples to follow. And I think like from both these experiences, I've been like, wow, you know, it's more like they want to intervene and God allows them to intervene. And I've never, I mean, certainly I understand the objections. But I've never. ever prayed to a saint. It's more just asking them for help, you know. And so, yeah, I think I think a lot of people, at least from my speaking, people say like, my grandpa, you know, died and I was really close to him. Can I ask him for prayers? And I'm always like, yeah, why not? And I think that's more palatable sometimes than some obscure person that I never met, right, in Luca, Italy or something like that. But it's no different in my mind, right? It's the same thing.

part of our family, God's family. Yeah. I guess let me wrap up here. So we've mentioned, we've talked about a demon setter, and you talked about saints, any angel stories that you want to share, anything that's how? Have you ever seen anything particularly angelic happen or you would attribute to angelic intervention? Yeah. The story that Father Carlos wanted was, there was this kid.

He was 16 years old and he ran away from home. He was in a like up in the northeast and he joined this this like um it was like a hippie commune but but they were like religious it was it was very sexual too and stuff like that so it was darker than than just like a communal living space um but when he when he was like 19 years old he wrote his parents a letter and he said mom and dad like i want to leave but they won't let me and his parents, you know, I don't know who these people were, but it sounded like they hired like the A team to go and rescue this kid from this cult. You know, it was like this strange, strange thing kind of.

And they got him back. And, you know, this was like a typical Catholic mom. She was all ready for this kid to come home and was like, Michael, I'm going to go to mass tomorrow and Father so-and-so has been praying for you for the last three years. Like, would you like to come and see him? And he was like, sure, I think I'd like to come and see him. And she was even more ready. She was like, actually, he has confessions before mass.

Would you like to go to confession? And he was like, yeah, I think I'd like to go to confession. So he said that when he walked in, he got just an immediate headache from the holy water. But he was okay. And he went to the confessional. and when the priest came out before Mass, the mom said, like, I saw his face and obviously he couldn't tell me what was going on because the sacrament is sealed. But I could tell he was really disturbed by whatever happened in the confessional. So Michael was able to get through Mass.

He was fidgeting and uncomfortable, but he actually went and received communion. And then he ran outside and threw up as soon as he received communion. They went home and things kept happening that were just so weird like that. And they started to realize like what was going on. Well, this diocese did not have an exorcist. So they sent a priest out and the priest could see like this is this is something we need to deal with. Like this is real. You know, this is not good.

Did all kinds of tests. And they called the next closest diocese. And they said like, look, we have an exorcist, but he's 92 years old. He has a walker. And he's and it's four hours away. there's no way we're going to get this get him to you. And at this point, the kid had become violent, and there was no way they'd get him four hours down to receive an exorcism.

So finally, the bishop made a decision. He said, like, look, we have to do this. So I'm going to appoint a priest that I trust to do this for one case, which happens. It's happened a lot in the past. And it does happen. It's not ideal. So this priest knew me, and he called me and he said, could you come in? like we're going to do this exorcism and this weekend we got to help this kid and I said well one

weekend's not going to I mean sometimes it takes a long time and he said like look Dave like this kid is actively trying to get back to the cult like we got to do this so I went we're at this little retreat center in the middle of town and there were like two nuns there three priests there me and then the parents in the room and as soon as the exorcism started this kid he showed all the signs of possession. I mean, it was just like the movie stuff, you know, that people want to hear about. And it went all day and probably like 7.30 at night. So we'd gone from mass time in the morning at 8 until like 7.30 at night. We were all just exhausted. I was just sweating, you know, just it was terrible. He started like screaming this kid. And it was like a low pitched scream.

That's the only way I could describe it. But it was so awful like everyone in the room like was like, was suffering from this. And the mom actually left. And I could hear, it was just a small little retreat center. So I could hear her pull away in her car. And I thought, well, this is weird. Like this mom just left this kid in the middle of this, you know. She drove away.

And the screaming continued. And finally, I was like, we got to stop and start again in the morning. So I said to the priest, like, let's, let's end. And let's be done. Like, this is too much. Like, you know, we're all tired. So he was kind of trying to get him out of this trance. He was like saying, saying his name, Michael, Michael, Michael.

Well, about 20 minutes later, still screaming, right? All of a sudden, we hear a carpal up and his mom comes back. This is so weird. And she had this icon of a guardian angel. And so she walked in and she goes, Michael, I brought your angel. And I saw him look at it. I could see his eyes roll forward and look at this guardian angel. And I thought that's weird.

Like all of a sudden, all of a sudden he came to a little bit. And then his eyes rolled back again. And the priest prayed for the intercession of the guardian angels. Well, all of a sudden, like the low-pitched scream stopped. I mean, this is going to, no one's going to believe this story. But basically this guy opened his mouth and I could hear, you could hear like a choir singing out of his mouth, like a beautiful choir. singing in like some other language. I have no idea if it was human or what.

But it was so beautiful, we were just crying, you know, just crying. And at one point, one voice kind of singles itself out and starts singing in English and was singing like basically like the Psalms, you know, the beautiful deeds of the Lord. And got into a point where he was singing like, no longer shall his servant be oppressed, no longer shall a servant be enslaved. But today he shall go free. And it just ended it. was so beautiful. Literally, we were all just crying. And he was just sitting there and he was silent. And I kind of like tapped a priest on the shoulder and I said to command it to tell you who it is. And he said, in the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to tell me your name. And he said,

I am the angel of God that stands before his throne for this little one. Tonight is the night of his, of his chains breaking. And when he, he, he said, I am the angel of God. And he, he stands before. And when did that. Michael made the sign of the cross. His eyes rolled forward and he was freed completely. There's one session. It turns out that this, like when he went through like his rebellious phase, he always for some reason kept this angel in his bathroom. Like he loved it. It was a gift from his godparents at baptism. And for whatever reason, he always loved this, this icon of this angel. and it was like that little scrap of grace that God used, you know, to deliver him. It was amazing.

Yeah, it was an incredible story. Wow, what a beautiful. What a beautiful story. Wow. Well, gosh, this has been so amazing. Dave, actually, I thought of one last question. If you don't mind me going out on what I hope we can parlay into a hopeful note. But you mentioned you tragically lost your wife.

And I'm curious, you know, you've, as someone who has seen God and the church move so mightily, and so powerfully. How did you process seeing, I'm guessing God not answer some of your intercession? Was there any bitterness of like, hey, God, I've served you in this way, et cetera? Was there a thought exercise of like, God, why did this happen? And how do you think through that now, having heard angelic choirs and seen people crawl up on the church vanquished stuff? And yet when it strikes close to home, that can be dizzying.

So how do you think through that and maybe any words for people who also have experienced? loss like that. Yeah, sure. We also have, I have five kids and two of them have serious special needs. So they were in wheelchairs. And so we're no stranger to suffering and the problem of pain. But what I would say is this, that there were certainly times where I wondered, like, how do I reconcile what I've seen with what's happening right now? Like, I can't even get my family to church by myself. Like, how could God want this to happen? You know? And it took me a while to like see like, you know, when you, when you hear that verse, like, take up your cross daily and follow him. I think you think of like this stark, difficult cross on a hill that's all alone and empty.

And that's kind of the way I thought about it. And it took a while for me to realize like he's on the other side of that cross, you know, like Jesus is on the other side of that cross. And you might think you're alone on it. but he's right there. Like he died for us. And God gave his only son to do that. And so in moments of suffering, like he's so close. And I would say, yeah, I've seen unbelievable miracles happen in God's victory over evil.

But I've never felt closer to him than in our suffering because I think that's when his hearts poured out, right? He died for us and for us personally. And recently, a friend was diagnosed with cancer and she said, how do you keep your faith during this? And that was my only piece of advice is like as soon as you can, stop thinking of God as the God up there and start thinking of them as the God on the other side of the cross that you're hanging on

because he's right there in the midst of suffering. And I'm thankful to the victims of the demonic because they've taught me that. I mean, I've watched them suffer so deeply, and I'm thankful to be able to see that, that played out. Well, thank you so much, Dave. It was beautiful, and we so appreciate you coming on the show. And, yeah, so thank you so much for doing this. And we'll have you back. And, yes, you certainly held our attention the entire time.

So thank you so much, folks. See you soon.