The Exorcist Files - The Spiritual War with Fr. Daniel Ebert

Episode Date: September 18, 2025

Fr. Daniel Ebert is a priest in Copenhagen, Denmark fighting the good fight. In this incredible interview he shares his conversion story and journey from the wrong team, to God's team. Thank you to Wild Alaskan for sponsoring this episode! Get $35 off your first box of wild-caught, sustainable seafood—delivered right to your door. Go to:  https://www.wildalaskan.com/EXFILES.Go to shopremi.com/EXFILES and use code EXFILES  at checkout for 50% off.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hello, Exorcist Files fans. Normally, I try to begin the show with a little bit of snark or a dad joke, or in many cases, just an incredibly awful punton. But this week, I think it needs to be different, especially in light of recent events, specifically the horrendous murder of Charlie Kirk, who actually had Father Martins and I on his show and helped promote the Exorcist Files, and we're really grateful for that. And I know so many of us are feeling heaviness and sad. and I just wanted to try and open us up with some encouragement today.

The Exorcist Files has been documenting the reality of spiritual warfare for three years now. Part of that reality is that evil is real. We have a real adversary. The stakes are real. And as Father Martens famously told me in one of our first meetings, this isn't a game, son. I think we only need to look around to acknowledge this fact. There are floods and there are fires.

There's pestilence. injuries, illness, abject poverty and squalor, and of course, murders, and death. Our world is full of darkness, something I know many of us, including myself, are just feeling the weight of right now. And many times I just find myself asking, where are you in this, God? But we know there's more to the story, right? Now having interviewed and documented so many cases of spiritual warfare, I can honestly say, it's just awe-inspiring to see how at that moment when all hope seems lost, those moments when the darkness seems to have completely prevailed, it's at that moment we see God's genius and his light burst through and come through in a way the only he can and somehow

take the most awful, the most horrendous things, and flip them, redeem them, and use them to advance the kingdom. We see this all the time in the case files we've shared. Having studied this now for six years, I can say, I know that I know that I know. God knows what he's doing. Lord knows I don't have the answers, and it doesn't take away the pain. There's real suffering and pain, but God knows what he's doing, and I trust that. I think we would do well to remember Joseph's famous declaration in Genesis 5020, that which you meant for evil, God meant for good. One last thing before we start the show. The events of this last week have startled me awake to a reality I think we all know,

but often live in blessed ignorance of. And that is, we never know when we're going to be called home. We don't know when our number is going to come up. So today, as I pray, I'm asking myself, what have I put off? Who do I need to forgive? Who do I need to ask forgiveness from? What idols have I been inadvertently worshipping that I need to take? tear down. Who do I need to look in the eye and just say, I love you? Who do I need to encourage? Who do I

need to hug? What good have I withheld from my neighbor that I can do right now today? Because today is a gift. So with that, on behalf of the Exorcist Files team, say some prayers today for everyone, anyone and everything. Lord knows we need it and trust God. God is good. That which was meant for evil will be used for good. And with that, onto the show, I think you're really going to enjoy today's guest. God bless you all. Welcome back to The Exorcist Files, or should I say, Goodenacht, because I'm recording this, live from Vienna, Austria, and I am joined today by a very, very good guest, Father, Daniel Steiner Ebert. Is that correct, Father, did I get that correct? Yeah, it's pretty good, pretty good, close enough.

It's kind of good, kind of good? Yes, kind of good, yeah. It's Wunderwa. Vundova. Okay, awesome. Father, you are broadcasting live from a nondescript location deep in the heart of a religious mecca known as Copenhagen, right? Which is like just a bastion of conservative Christianity, right? Yeah.

I wish that's what my prayers go for. One day the kingdom will be a bastion of Rediddi's life, absolutely. That was amazing. Well, you I know are a good friend and have collaborated with Father Martins, but for the fans at home right now who are not blessed to be in the lands of great beer, could you give the fans a little bit of your background, Father and your ministry and just a little short info on your work, and then we'll get into some questions about your incredible journey and all things spiritual warfare. Yes. So, as you said, my name is Father Daniel Steiner Ebert, and I'm a priest here in Copenhagen. I've a relatively new priest. I've only been ordained a priest for three years. I did most of my studies in Rome, a little bit of them in the UK, but most of them in Rome. I came back here to Denmark and

was ordained. And then my first assignment was in the cathedral, even though that the spiritual directors, they always say, that's the last place you should send a newly ordained priest is in the cathedral. Give him peace and quiet and a small little parish. where he could be under an old and wise pastor. But nonetheless, I was sent straight to the cathedral. And there I did the hospital chaplaincy, yeah, service in the hospital. They call it the kingdom. It's like the biggest hospital in the kingdom of Denmark,

where all the very bad cases they go. So even if you're bitten by a polar bear in Greenland, you are flown to this hospital in Copenhagen. That's a real thing, Father. Have you ministered to someone or seen someone who has been attacked by a polar bear? polar bear. Not that I'm aware of. Not that I'm aware of. But I've definitely ministered to people who had wounds that could have been inflicted by a polar bear. But yeah, wow. We'll have to get to that. And obviously, for the purposes of the actresses files, too, and we'll get to this, father,

you have squared off with old scratch, as Father Martens calls him, the enemy. Absolutely. More than once. More than once. So, unfortunately, for all those Danes who are listening right now, the enemy is also active in Copenhagen? Yes, yes, he is. I would say he's. very active in Denmark. It's in a very subtle way, but he's absolutely here. And he has a lot of power in the Danish society. I'm curious, since you just mentioned that, could you talk a little bit about maybe the spiritual climate there? And you mentioned the enemy working in a unique way in Denmark. Obviously, the enemy's active anywhere that Christchurch is growing and trying to flourish. So maybe

unpack that a little for us. Yeah. So Denmark is one of these countries that were hit, with the full force of the European Reformation, or the Protestant rebellion is sometimes referred to. But here we just call it the Reformation. But it was hit very heavily. I mean, it was a perfect reformation in Denmark. The country went from being 110% Catholic to being 110% Lutheran overnight. It was from the top down, so the Danish king at the time,

he embraced the Reformation full force. and Denmark became Lutheran overnight. But that Lutheranism that was put in there didn't stay the same. It changed very quickly and it became very vague and weak. So very quickly, religion in Denmark became something very strange and weird. It was very fast reduced to something like, okay, fair enough, you have faith, but keep it in your own home. don't come running with it in public life or anything like that. So it became kind of shunned away.

It very quickly faded out of public life. So simply just not something you talk about. And that has made the Christian faith, no matter what denomination it is, very weak in Denmark. Because it's always something that fine you believe, but don't talk to me about it. Keep it at home. So it doesn't exist in the public debate. so on. I'm always amazed how freely Americans speak about their faith. Here, it's a gigantic taboo. There was a test. They were trying to see, like, which is more scandalous to Danish people in the

public, talking about sex or talking about religion? Oh, like a poll? A poll, yeah, exactly. And they did it on the public trains. And people were more scandalized when someone was sitting in the train saying publicly, I believe in Jesus. Then people would get angry and they're like, be silent, we don't want to listen to this, why that's nonsense and so on. But if people were saying, I was just out last night having a real good time with someone who's not my wife, people would be like, great, fantastic, that's wonderful. So that kind of says a little bit about the mindset here. You know, one of my favorite scripture verses is my people perish for lack of knowledge. And so does this climate of lack of religious belief and lack of faith, I think, would follow

of that mean that, would you say, the general kingdom of Denmark then finds itself more susceptible to the lies and the work and the activity of the enemy simply because people are not aware of his schemes that are happening there? Yeah, absolutely. So the weird thing here is people are not atheists. It's not because they just completely refuse the existence of the supernatural, but they dive into all the things that Father Carlos is telling us not. to dive into. All the new aid stuff, crystals, tarot cards, Ouija boards. They have all this

crazy stuff that they practice and they do it completely unaware of the spiritual dangers that are there. And you see it everywhere in Copenhagen. They're openly shops where you can buy crystals and all these kind of things. And people think like, oh, that's deep, it's spiritual. And that's what people will say. They say, I'm not religious, but I'm spiritual. I'm like these things. A lot of yoga. Yoga is super popular in Denmark. So all these things that Father Carlos is always warning us about, they are here on full speed. Why do you think Jesus is so offensive? A guy who came and said, by the way, like, in me, you're all equal in my love. Like he's a radical at the time, right? Offers this forgiveness. And again, following him, he did promise also persecution.

I'm curious as a priest, why do you think people are so open to crystals and stuff that we would say, okay, there's at least historical evidence for Christ, but you're playing with a rock and hoping it's going to change like your energy are. And again, maybe there's some science I'm unaware of on some of these, but I'm going, why are people so offended by the name Christ, Jesus Christ, but they're totally open to horoscopes, Ouichie boards, and, you know, seeing a psychic? Yeah, I think here amongst my own people is because Christ is demanding. That's at least how they perceive him. Like, who is he to come here and tell me how to live my life?

How dare he? I can do whatever I want. They don't like that he's demanding. But also, they don't like objective truth. This Pope Benedict, the 16th in one of his speeches or homilies, he spoke about the dictatorship of relativism. That's a real thing here. like big time. People here have this almost a mantra. They will say, well, that might be truth

for you, but it's not my truth. So, okay, you just take your truth, go with that. I take my truth. And that's how they like it. And if you disturb this, then they get very angry. They're like, how dare you come say to me that even the possibility that my truth is not truth, they get furious. Interesting. And then so I suppose all these other devices allow you to continue. you being sort of your own God, right? You can use crystals, use Ouija boards, you can use divination to try and accomplish your goals, but Jesus comes along and has the tenacity to say, you're not in control. Yeah, exactly. And all these new age things, at least they have the illusion of having no demands on you is essentially something you use for your own gain and you choose it freely.

It comes with no extra things, or at least that's what people think. All right, so you're a priest, you deal and you minister with all sorts of people, and I'm curious, you're warning people, you're saying, hey, Father Carlos is absolutely right to avoid crystals, Ouija boards, tarot cards, all that. To the skeptic who's like, I don't know, father, that just sounds really, they're games, this is silly. What could you say to that person right now from firsthand experience saying you definitely want to avoid these things? I mean, I saw a meme on the internet that I thought was very fitting. I could say like everyone makes fun of the Catholics until they have a demon in their house. And there's something very true about it. People can hear what we priests say and they can ignore it.

But what are they going to do when they find themselves in the presence of a demon that is not going to leave them? And obviously, we can't do anything but just warning people saying, don't do it. But there is an element of experience that if people don't want to listen, They might end up with a very bad experience that can scar them for life. And as a priest, I have experienced evil. I still experience evil in my daily work as a priest. At the moment, I'm the chaplain of a prison here. And I mainly work with ex-gang members, especially the big motorcycle gangs and so on.

And it's just very evident that the devil is alive. But yeah, if people don't want to take that serious, then, okay, it's a risk. that they are free to take, but I can only warn them and say, please don't do it. So what are some of the manifestations that people you've ministered with have experienced? Does it line up with what we've documented on the show, the infestations, the moving objects, the chest pressure, not to give too much attention here, but I know people are always curious to know the reality of what's going on over there. But what's some of the experiences that you're able to talk about?

Yeah, I can give a little bit from my ministry. I had a guy in the prison recently. A case I actually shared with Father Carlos just to get his take on it because he's way more experienced than I am. I'm not an exorcist. I'm just an ordinary priest. And every now and then the devil, he bumps into me and then, okay, we have a fight. But I fight with Christ. So Christ is always victorious.

We had a case in the prison where one of these guys, and they are in for a long time, and they'll do anything to get out a little bit earlier. And this guy, he's thinking to himself, he figured it all out. He's like, okay, I'm going to sign up for the Catholic priests' course in the prison. And then they'll look real good on my papers. I'll be able to get out because they say, oh, look, he's become so pious. He really repented his crimes and so on. And then I had a feeling that there was something with him, but I couldn't pinpoint it. But I welcomed him and said, you were more than welcome to come.

And we started doing heavy catechises talking a lot about. our previous lives. And then the prison, I just go straight for it. There is no soft preaching because serious crimes that they're in there for. So they need to hear those of the gospel that matches their previous crimes. And this guy started feeling really ill, especially when I started talking about the demon Maimon, which is also with all the money and material goods and so on. And this guy has specifically been very involved in that kind of stuff, like lots of money, material, wealth, and all these kind of things. And it was very evident that he was feeling very ill. So I asked him if he was okay.

And at that time, he just said, yeah, yeah, I'm fine. And we finished the session and we left. And then the next time, we started the catechises again. And then he was getting very, very ill again. And then he interrupted me and he said, Father Daniel, I have to. say something, I am not feeling well, something is very wrong. And it was very evident that he was scared. So I asked him, what's going on? And he said, whenever you mention the name of this demon mammon, when you talk about how we need to repent and let go of all the longing for riches

and so on, so on, I feel someone is moving inside of me. It's like there's a person in me wearing me as a skin suit. And it's twisting and doing weird things inside of me whenever you talk. And now I have a very powerful voice. I can almost not hear what you say telling me to kill you. So I said, okay, tell me more about that. And he started telling me, and I was realizing, okay, this sounds pretty serious. So I said, how about we finish this session?

with the others. And then you just stay here with me and let me ask you a few questions. So he agreed. And I asked him a lot of questions, did a full interview to figure out like what has his life been up until this point. And it was very evident that there was a point in his life where he had severe trauma. He had lost the main caregiver in his life as an eight year old. And then at that time he heard a voice saying to him, allow me to enter and you will be completely free of all kinds of pain and sorrow and so on. You will be numb. Instantly he said, yes, enter. Come into me. And he felt like someone was walking into him. And this happened when he was around eight years old and now he's a full grown man in his late 30s. And he had kind of forgotten it or at least it was kind of pushed very far back

in his memory, but it came out as all this happened. To me, this sounds like you invited some very bad stuff inside of you. At least you agreed to it. So the question is, now, are you willing to let go of it? And he said, yes, absolutely, he would like to be free of it. And this is where I shared this case with Father Carlos and I said, what's your suggestion? How should I proceed with this? And as he has mentioned before on the show, he said, well, if you can get him to do renunciation, to sort of cancel the permission he has given, then it will probably help him. So we did that.

I made some tailor-made prayers for him in Danish that he could pray. And then we started the next time I was in prison, we started prayers. And it was very evident that there was something that didn't want to leave him. I'm not sure this guy was 100% possessed, but his mind was definitely taken by this demon. And it fought when he was. starting to renounce these things. He started feeling cramps in his stomach. He was hurting him a lot. I could hear sort of in between his lips, sort of curse words and not very pretty things about

me and my priesthood were coming out in a different voice and so on. But at the end, on the final blessing, it left him. And it was very visible that it left him. He completely, he went from being very pale and angry looking and color of his skin returned. And he was as if he was newborn. It was very sort of evident that something left him. I felt it in my hands. I'm a very hands-on guy. When I pray for people, I always lay my hands on them.

And I felt it. I felt something left this guy. I knew the second I said, amen, I knew Christ had freed him from whatever it was. And this guy is, he was an extremely successful drug. dealer. I mean, the amount of money this guy made on drug business is just insane. Massive houses all over the world. And when I asked him, like, but how can you be so successful in this? He said, well, that voice in my head always gave me the business. It literally told me, go to that guy, make that deal, do this, do that. And he said, I always just followed it and thought that it was my

intuition. But being free, he said, obviously nobody is born with the intuition that makes you the supreme drug lord. So that's one case. And he's now very devoted to this catechesis and is on his way to be taken into the church to become a Catholic. 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 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.

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God bless you. Wow, that's wonderful. Praise God. Do you find ministering, especially people in prison, what resonates about the gospel there? Do you find that ministry of forgiveness is so important? Do you find that people are beating themselves up? How is Christ meeting people who are incarcerated? To be honest, I wish I could spend my whole life in prison with these guys.

Because here, the prison I'm in, it's so evident that Christ is there. He really wants to be there. Here in Denmark, there is no such thing as a Catholic prison. chaplain. It doesn't exist because everything here is state governed and the state doesn't really recognize Catholic priests as such. We are sort of an annoyance to them. So the fact that I'm in the prison is in itself a small miracle and also that I'm granted permission to work so freely as I am is also a miracle. Through the whole trip, the whole journey in there, it's been very evident that it's Christ. He wants to be in that prison. And

And the conversions, they just come. I mean, I don't do anything except for just being there, and then they come. So I have a very strong experience. Christ is calling these men saying, come to me. And then he has placed me for whatever reason he has done that. He's placed me there. And I just receive these guys. And I try as best as I can to preach the gospel as loyal I can.

and not in any way trying to diminish the message or anything, and it works. They thirst for a very strong, direct and clear gospel. Because the gospel message, the charygma, the good news, is tailor-made for sinners. But the difference between the prisoners and the freeman is that those prisoners, they know they are sinners. Because they have their sins on a court paper. They know they are murderers, drug dealers. and all these things. They know.

So when they hear the gospel message, when they hear someone saying to them, well, you, yes, specifically you, Christ became man for you because he loves you and he wants you to be with his heavenly father. Christ hates sin and want to eradicate it and he has done so through his cross. He died for you on the cross.

Now there's only one thing left. Do you accept this free gift? And most of them, they just say yes. They're just like, wow, want that. If someone can free me from the burden of all my sins, all the evil stuff I've done, then yes, absolutely yes. And what is very touching with these guys is that many of them, they will say, Father, I know the devil exists. I've seen him. I've run with him for so many years. And if he's real, then Christ must be real. And I was, amen, brother, absolutely.

He's real. And he's so much more powerful than the devil. And then slowly, they experience it. We go through the catechises. We go through the gospel. We teach them how to pray and so on. And then when these guys, they pray, it's so beautiful. Their prayer is so pure. When you stand in a room with, you know, full of murderers and thieves and drug dealers, and they pray with such a passion. You know, it's just pure prayer. It has really revived my priesthood because even though I've only been a priest for three years, it's brutal here in Denmark. There are times where you think. I can't do this anymore. It's so lonesome and such a big lack of faith and so on. But going to these guys, they have really saved my priesthood. Wow. That's beautiful. It's interesting. I guess all of us have prison bars around ourselves in one way or another to sin. And I guess the advantage these guys have is that they're aware of the bars, right? I'm curious, Father, you mentioned working with a lot of gang members. I know in the States, some of the big biker gangs have some occult connections and whether that's more of a branding thing or actual you know we do know

father's profiled some cases of some serious drug gangs that actually have like very serious devotion to occult deities involved with initiations etc have you seen or experienced anything like that and the gangs you work with or have they mentioned any sort of occult bargaining that goes on with it well it's not something they normally talk about but they're it's seen in their tattoos and body art and so on. And here in Scandinavia, there is a weird fascination in the criminal environment with the old pagan gods, Odin, Thor, these kind of things.

And many people don't know about these guys because Hollywood has made Vikings very popular now, but they were brutal men worshipping brutal demons. I mean, Vikings had huge. human sacrifices and everything. And they thrived in a culture of death where the only way you could get to Valhalla, which is a Viking paradise, is by dying with a sword in your hand on the battlefield while taking the lives of others. I mean, if you didn't go like that, then you would just be bound to the Viking version of hell,

which is an icy place. So that whole mentality is definitely there. And you see it in their tattoos. and very often you meet some of them in there that would directly say and admit, I worship Odin and Thor and these guys. And it is a thing here in Denmark. It's recognized as a church in Denmark, the old pagan religion. So that's definitely there.

I don't know how systematic it is. I doubt that it's as systematic as this horrible thing of Santa Muerta and all these things. But there is some of it. We had a case we profiled on the show where someone as part of their initiation to the gang had to take some vows, and I've heard that is a part of many gang initiations, etc. So I was curious if you'd run into that. Have you dealt with any house infestations or has that ever occurred in any of your ministry? Have you had to go bless any homes that were experiencing any preternatural phenomena?

Yeah, absolutely. There's been a few times. The strongest one I've had is a regular family coming into the church. They weren't Catholics yet, but they were coming into the church and they were leaving a lot of new age stuff behind. And a few days before these things started happening, I had had a very serious talk with the mother in the house about getting rid of statues of Buddha and Hindu symbolism and crystals and stuff like that. And she had cleared the whole house out. But there was a few things that she was emotionally connected to and that she didn't want to get out. And she didn't tell me.

She was a little bit embarrassed. And she was like, oh, father is very strict. He's going to tell me off and so on, so on. So she'd try to hit it a little bit. And then a few days later, one of the children in the household contacted me. She was a teenage daughter. And she said, Father, I need to talk to you because something weird is going on in the house. So, okay, yeah, tell me, let's go.

And she said, well, the other day I was sitting in my room, reading my homework. And I heard children running around in the attic, which in itself is weird because you can't enter into our attic. There is a trapdoor, but I mean, you can't open it unless you have like serious tools. But initially she thought, okay, it's my younger brother. He's probably found some weird way to get up there. He's an annoying little brother. But then she went downstairs and realized, well, he's there watching television. He is definitely not running around on the attic.

And that was her first experience. And then that night when she went to bed, again, she heard what sounded to her like little children laughing. And she felt a presence in her bedroom. And when she opened her eyes to look around, she found herself being face to face with someone, standing very close to her face, looking her directly into the eyes. And when she woke, this thing disappeared. But she said, no, there was definitely someone standing. face to face with me, looking at me. I instructed her with a few prayers. I said, okay, when you go to

bed, make sure you ask God for protection and so on. And then while I was sort of finishing off with her, the mother in the household contacted me independently of the daughters. She didn't even know her daughter had contacted me. And she said, father, I need to talk to you. There is someone in my house, someone that is not a human person that's part of my family. And I said, okay, so what do you mean? Why do you say that? And she said, well, someone is walking around in the house. I hear it and I feel a presence here. And I also saw someone the other day. I was leaving the kitchen, looking into the hallway, and there was someone standing there looking at me with a lot of anger. So, okay, let's talk about it. So I finished that conversation with her and we made an appointment. So I went out to the

house and we started blessing the whole house with the holy water, oil, incense, the whole thing. And while we were blessing that house, when I went up to the first floor, that trapdoor to the ceiling, it was bolted tight together. That flung open as if an adult man had kicked it open with such a force. I mean, really made a lot of noise and it scared me a lot. Just the shock of that sort of very sudden and powerful release of energy bursting it open. And I mean, obviously no one was there. There was no one in the attic. There wasn't some guy trapped up there or anything like that. But it was very evident that someone didn't want us there. So I finished blessing the house and I went back home. And we had agreed that if it continued, she were to, to

can contact me and let me know. And as I walked home that night, I came past a, there's a sort of a security room on the grounds, things that people shouldn't have freely access to. So there's a security door, an electronic security door, which you have to have a code to open it and so on. And as I walked past that door, it also flung open with an explosive force. And it's scared life out of me just again because of the shock. And I was like, okay, someone is really not happy about this house being cleared out.

And then I thought, that's weird that this is happening, that what's going on. Maybe it's still there. So next morning, I texted this woman and asked like, how was your evening? Did everything go well? As you said, no, there's definitely still someone here. Someone is making a lot of noise and it's very aggressive now. And it was just sounds banging on the doors, on the windows and in the kitchen furniture. and I arranged with her, okay, I'll come and say a mass.

We'll celebrate Mass in the house and then we'll see what happens. And we celebrated a Mass and then that was the end of it. The house was completely rid of whatever was there by celebrating that Mass. And then they had peace. But that was a very, very powerful experience. And then just to take another one, that was actually while I was still a seminarian, I was home on holidays and was helping us. out in a parish. And I always wear a cassock. Always. This is the traditional black priest rope of a

Catholic priest. I always wear it because here in Denmark, you never see it. I like a good fight. I don't mind showing who I am. And a lady came running out from one of our schools. And there was a kindergarten, a Catholic kindergarten connected to it as well. She came running out from there with tears and her eyes, almost in a panic. And she grabbed a hold of me and said, are you a Catholic priest? I said, no, not yet. I'm a seminarium. I'm studying to be a priest. And she said, I beg of you, please don't report me.

Don't think I'm crazy or anything like that. I said, okay, calm down, come down. Tell me what's going on. I promise you, I don't think you're crazy. I'm used to hearing a lot of stuff. As he said, you have to help me. I don't believe in God. But I have to say this.

Every night at 3 o'clock, all the furniture in my house goes flying around all over the place. I said, okay, that sounds wild. What's going on? Why is the furniture in your house going around like that? And she said, I have no idea. But it's been going on for a long time, and it's ruining my life. My family don't want to visit me. My children, they refuse to enter into the house.

I can't have guests over because everyone is creeped out whenever they're into the house. And so on. So are you married? And she said, yeah, I'm married. What's your husband's opinion about this? And she said, he's the one refusing to leave the house. I said, oh, okay, so what's the story behind your husband? And she said, well, I don't know.

I mean, he's a nice guy, but he has a weird aunt. How is she weird? Well, she's into all this kind of silly stuff like witchcraft and so on. Oh, okay, yes, well, that might be the root of the problem. And she said, so you believe me? I said, yeah, I believe you. It's a thing. It can happen.

But I said, listen, I'm not a priest. can't help you with these things yet, but I can definitely pass you on to someone who can help you. So I passed her on to the bishop, and I actually, I don't know what that story ended with. But that was definitely a case of, yeah, everybody makes fun of the Catholic Church until they have a demon in the house. And she said, I don't even believe in God, but yeah, still these things were happening in the house. Wow. Talk about a spirit of IKEA, right? Yes.

I had to get rid of that. Wow, that's incredible. Now, Father, one thing I find really interesting about your story is that, you know, you've done a lot of ministry in prisons and not quite headed that direction, but you are not the saint in route that you are today. You started off a little bit of a prodigal son as well, right? Yeah, absolutely. So as I said before, we started, My family is originally from Austria and Germany, and I am what would be classified as a third-generation immigrant. My grandparents came here, and then my parents were born here, and then me and my brothers were also born here. The family has always been Catholic, but it's not easy being Catholic in Denmark. Everybody thinks you're weird.

And then also being German-Austrian, it makes you even more weird, because we were occupied by the Germans during Second World. war. And there were a lot of fascination with fascism and the Nazi politics here in Denmark and so on. So there has been a very strong confrontation with these things. And it resulted in the Danish population were very anti-German afterwards because it was very important to distance yourself from something you might have been a little bit too happy about when the Germans were here. Because of the war, my grandparents, they had a lot of trauma. There were no one. in the family that came out of the war in a good way. I mean, everyone was completely ruined with horrible experiences of war. But very interestingly, my family received it in two ways.

My father's family, my dad's family, they were very solidly planted in their faith. So they survived all their trauma and they really found healing in God. My mother's family, they weren't able to get through it, especially my maternal grandmother. She was very, very ill. She had severely PTSD. She was blown up by a bomb when she was a kid in the war, and it was a very horrific situation. It's something that's not popular to talk about, but the ally forces, they dropped bombs on the civil population in Austria, but disguised as toy, play toys for children. So the idea was that a child would find a flashlight, a teddy bear or something like that and thinking, well, wow, free toys and bring them home. And then when they engage with them there, then they would blow up. And I mean, it was something that was done because we had to break the population because they were fanatically supporting the Nazi regime and so on.

Or at least so was the story. So my grandmother's younger brother, he picked up a bomb disguised as a flashlight. He took it home. in the kitchen and in Austria, it's very family-orientated. It's very common that the whole family stays together, all generations in the same house, and you eat together and so on. And this is exactly what they did. They were having lunch.

He came home. The whole family was there. He said, look, Mom, look at this new flashlight. And he pressed the button, and the whole thing exploded. And he died, and a lot of people were wounded and so on. and my grandmother, her whole face were full of shrapnel and her hair were burned off and so on. So that experience, together with others, in the war, really damaged her a lot. And this is so broken, had so much pain and sadness and so on, which basically hindered her in her function as a mother.

It was very difficult for her to pass on the love that at least I needed. oldest son. I mean, today I love my mother to bits, and I know there's not an evil bone inside of her, but nonetheless, the damage was there, and that damage was passed on to me. She's hurting because of something called the Second World War and trauma and so on. You just think, it's me. I am the problem here. I mean, obviously, she's sad whenever I'm with her, so I must be the reason why she's sad. And that kind of put into me this very heavy feeling that I cause my own mother to be sad. How can I be a good thing when I'm causing her to be so sad?

So I must be fundamentally something very, very bad. And that kind of sent me out on a very bad course in a very, very young age, gave me such a huge rage. There was so much anger built up in me. And it came out very early. I went from early school. Whenever someone was saying something, doing something against me, I would just react with violence. And as I grew older, it was intoxicating.

It was like a drug, just crushing someone under that, almost like a berser rage, crushing someone with that. It was so intoxicating. So I became addicted to it. It followed me through school, and it followed me into all kinds of bad stuff. already as 12, 13 years old. I began smoking a lot of marijuana, all this fighting, started going out with girls, starting stealing a lot of scooters here in Denmark at that time.

It was very popular to have a scooter. And me and my friends, we very quickly found out like, okay, the local biker gang, they have a drug dealer in the neighboring town. And if you come down with a scooter, you hand him that, he will give you a couple of thousand crowns. And that was a lot of money when you're only 13 years old. So that kind of became a whole thing.

You know, just go out every night, pick up four or five scooters, hand them down to him, get some cash, go out, do crazy things. And that kind of just escalated, it became worse and worse and worse and worse and worse. So it just became more violent, more drugs. Marana became cocaine. The violence escalator became much worse. People got very hurt. Fists became a knife.

A knife started becoming a gun. things like that. Everything just escalated. And I was completely engulfed in that. And it was destroying me completely. I was so miserable. I was so sad. And then at one point, the local officials in my area, they were kind of realizing, okay, there's a problem with this young man. And even my own dad, he phoned some of these social workers. And he said, I need help with my oldest son. If he doesn't get help, he'll end up killing someone. And they'd did, they reacted to it and I was sent off to, it's something called an Ifto School, which is more or less a boarding school. I think it's a place where you live. But it was very strict. I mean, it was some tough rules. And it was a brilliant place. It was run by the evangelical church. And the rector of this institution, he was a hero. He said, okay, I'm going to take him in then. I'm going to use him because there's something very good here because I have all these Christian kids who come from good families. And they need to see that not everyone is born into a good family like that, where everything is just fine.

And also he wanted to show kids like me, like just because you have a wound in your life, just because you're hurting, doesn't mean you have to become miserable and destroyed by these things. There's a way out. So I was sent away to stay on this school for three years. That was tough because I didn't respect anyone. and I didn't like to submit to anyone. My solution was always, if you cross me, I'll beat you. That's how it worked. But then there was one day, which was beginning of my conversion. They had this system in the school like, if you're late, then you get punished.

And you get punished in minutes. So if you're one minute late, that will give you 60 minutes of punishment. And that would be physical labor. So one minute late gives you an hour of physical labor. I have polished so many toilets and washed windows and the rector's car moaned his lawn and I don't know. I have worked a lot. You're also German. You're not allowed to be late.

Aren't Germans really good at being on time? Exactly. Normally they are. Exactly. But here because it was school and I hated school. I hated studying. And then I was always late. Normally that was fine.

I took my punishment. I'd rather be out there scrubbing toilets than being in a classroom. But then one day, I was five minutes late and the teacher himself was seven minutes late. So I thought, great. I mean, he's late, I'm late, but he's more late than I am. So no punishment. Okay, fair enough. But then there's a girl from the class that rats out on me and she says, oh, Henry, which

was the teacher, Daniel, was like, you were what? He was late. Okay, Daniel, that's five minutes late. That's five times 60 minutes. And I went ballistic. I was going to give him a good beating because I was like, this is so unfair. I mean, you haven't led by example. I'm not going to accept this. So I was threatening him on his life and so on. And poor man, he was very scared and so on. And it resulted in, I was called into the rector's office. And I was thinking, okay, now I'm just going to get some kind of telling off. And I wasn't. paying any attention until the rector he said to the teacher. You were wrong, man. You were really wrong. Why do you behave like that? And I was looking up thinking, surely it's me he's talking to. But it wasn't me. He was talking to the teacher. I was like, what's going on here? Is he drunk or what's going on? And he was looking very intensely at this teacher and said, I'm not going to accept that kind of behavior. You were late and then you punish one of my students for being late.

no way Jose, that's not going to work. So he told him off and said, like, I'm not going to have that again from you here. And this teacher, he was like, okay, I accept and so on. Then he looked at me and he said, Daniel, how dare you threaten one of my teachers? Who do you think you are? I didn't hear much of that because I was completely flavagasted with the fact that he has just told the teacher off. It was the first time in my life I experienced someone from the official system that stood up for me. So that opened something inside of me, gave me just a tiny slither of hope where I was thinking, okay, in all this pain and madness and anger and rage and drugs and alcohol and all this, there might actually be a little bit of hope.

And I was kind of chewing on that experience for a long time. It really felt very, very bad. And it went on at the school and I was just feeling more and more in the darkness. and it escalated. I had a girlfriend that was very much in love with, and she decided, okay, this wacko, there's no good in him. So she left me. It completely heart broke me. And there was another guy who was very interested in her. And I almost killed him with a knife because I was so angry and jealous and heartbroken and sad. So the whole thing collapsed. And I was so down that I said to myself, I don't want to live anymore. I don't want to do this. I am so

miserable at being alive. I'm the biggest loser. I don't know how to be alive. And then one of these days in the school while was feeling really, really, really bad. Some of these very pious Baptist girls, they were like, oh, Danny, you just need the Holy Spirit. You just need to pray and so on. And I was raised Catholic. So I always believed. I had faith, but I was just, God is there, but he's just not interested in me. But seeing these girls, there was something that provoked me immensely because I was like, if they can experience God, then I can also. I mean, why are they experiencing him so easily? I became a little bit psychotic with that.

It was almost possessed by this idea that if they can experience God, then I will experience God. So I kind of paused my suicide quest for a moment and said, I'm not going to die until I I have experienced God. So I started praying like a maniac. I had no idea what I was doing, but I was praying and praying and praying and praying and praying and praying. And that went on for a long time. And then finally it was the third last day of my entire school thing there at the time I was there.

I gave up. I just said, God, okay, obviously you're not interested. You're not answering my prayers. You're not doing anything. I respect that. But then that's it for me. I'm going to take it out. then the same evening there was a praise of worship session in the school and while we were that

praise and worship session I started feeling very very angry this was like a weird anger coming over me and it was weird even for me because normally something had to happen I mean at least someone had to look at me in a weird way or provoke me or something like that but people hadn't done anything I was just standing in the back everyone was facing the band playing and so on and I started getting this huge rage in me. I asked the Baptist priest there, I said, can I please go outside? I'm not feeling well. I'm afraid I'm going to hurt someone. And he said, yeah, absolutely, go out, get some fresh air, chill out and calm down. So I said, okay, I'm going to do that. But before I went out, I remembered my dad had given me my grandmother's rosary. And he said, this is on all the

bad stuff you're going through. And so whatever you do, you don't even have. to pray this rosary, just keep it on you, keep the rosary with you. So I remember that and I thought, I'm going to go to my room and get my rosary. So I went up to my room, I got my rosary, put it in the pocket, and then I thought, I'm just going to pour some water in my face and calm down. And then while standing there at the sink, I had this immense feeling. It was evil in its essence that came into the room. And it came pouring out of the sink. It came up through the toilet in through the ventilation system. And the only way I can describe it is that I knew if I touch this, my soul will cease to

exist even though it's not possible. But that was the threat level kind of coming through. So I was freaked out. I was very scared. And I went outside. I phoned my dad. He's the only one I could talk to about these things. He's always been very faithful in that.

and I phoned him up and I said, Dad, this is what I have experienced. What's going on? And my dad, he's raised by a German soldier and he himself been a professional soldier and so on. So he's pretty straightforward. And he said, son, you've been living your life with the devil. You need to make a choice. Either you're with the devil or you're with Christ. God has spoken to your guardian angel and told it to back off so you can experience true evil. And now you experienced it. So make a choice. So I went outside, completely confused and scared and so on. And I said, okay, Jesus, if you are there and you can hear me, then from this day on, from this very moment, I give you my entire life. Everything I am I give to you if you're there.

And then normally here, someone would say, then I saw Jesus or something like that. But that didn't happen. I saw a demon. A demon came at me like with a full speed. was so intense. It was so violent. It was like violence incarnated that came at me. It's such a rage that I was a guy full of rage, but this rage scared life out of me. And it came towards me. But I realized sitting there, to me it felt like hours, but in reality it was maybe five minutes. But I sat there and looking at this beast that's clearly wanting to destroy me, realizing

it cannot touch me. There is a barrier between that demon and me. And then it was like I was sitting inside a bubble and I realized it was the love of God. The love of God was

protecting me and it was so powerful that this beast of rage had no chance. It couldn't even approach me even though it was trying. But the weird thing is I didn't feel the love. I just knew that is love

but I didn't feel it at all. And then while sitting there in a state of terror, the Baptist priest came out and he grabbed me. And he's just like, I need to pray for you. Come with me. And he drags me into a classroom. And in that classroom, there is another teacher sitting ready to pray for me. And they pray for me, like full Baptist style, laying on of hands and everything,

praying their hearts out. And I don't hear anything of what they're saying. I just know they're praying. And I'm sitting in a chair like this, just looking in shock. And while they're praying, the wall in the room that I'm looking, that I'm facing at, it disappears. And I just see into almost eternity. And there are millions of light balls, small sort of hovering balls of light, millions of them as far as I can see. and the very first one of them in the front row comes close to me and it's the face of Christ.

It's the actual face of Christ. And when I see him, when I look into his eyes, it's like his eyes are piercing my heart and exploding it with love. Such an immense love that I thought I'm going to die on this spot. there was no human sense that could contain that intense love. There was no spiritual ability or sense in the soul that could contain that love. It was so intense that I felt I'm going to die of love. And I cried and cried and cried and cried and cried and cried after that session. Everything changed in me.

All the anger, all the rage, all the sadness, the darkness, everything left my body, everything fled from the face of Christ. And for three days, I was crying, just crying of sheer happiness and love. I knew instantly when he looked at me, I knew this is my creator. He loves me with everything I am, every single cell in my body he is in love with. It was such an intense love that it's impossible to describe. And I phoned my dad straight away and I said, Dad, take me to church.

Take me to church. I need to be with Jesus. He's in church. I want to be there. I want to be with Jesus. Whatever it takes, I want to follow him the rest of my life. And my dad was obviously like, what's going on here? That was like the essence of my conversion story.

And many years later, I found out that my previous girlfriend, because it was strange. Like, why did this priest come out? How did he know? I found out that my previous girlfriend, my ex, at this praise and worship session, she had fainted in the session while I was out. And when she came back, she said that a man in gold came to her while she was out and said to her very strongly, pray for Daniel. And that's why the Baptist priest came out and picked me up. And then healing began because I was broken.

And I mean, this kickstart of seeing the face of Christ, that intense experience of his love for me, gave me the strength to let go of my misery and try to follow him. And then there was a very, very tough journey of healing because I had so many bad habits. And I'd done so many bad things and evil things. And I had dived into sin in a very intense way. So that journey began. And I didn't want to become a priest at all. I was just happy that Christ loves me and I thought, okay, now I can die happy.

Jesus loves me. But then not too long after this experience, his voice came through very clearly saying, be a priest. I thought, no, this is the leftovers of the drugs going through because this is a bad idea. I fought it very intensely, this voice saying be a priest. I did a lot of stupid things and a lot of bad things in order to prove to God, to my bishop and to myself that I had not a vocation to be a priest. But Jesus persevered. He drove me crazy. Every day he said to me for a few years, be my priest, be my priest, be my priest.

He wouldn't leave me alone. And I kept saying, no, Jesus, I'm not going to be a priest because I'm a freak. I'm a very evil sinner. I've done horrible things that maybe you. You love me, but the world will never accept me. There is no way I can stand on the altar. I can never be a priest. Denmark is a small country.

One day, there will be one of my victims or something like that. They will stand there and say, oh, that priest, he has given me a sound beating. So I thought, no way, it's never going to happen. But my dad, he said to me, I mean, pull yourself together, son. If Jesus is telling you to be a priest, be a priest, make up your mind. Who do you live for? Yourself or Christ? And that was like the essence of my conversion.

I just knew I had to follow Christ. Wherever he took me, I had to follow him. So at the end I said, okay, I'll accept it. I'll try. I had a very good friend, Father Robert Cula, who was the French priest in Copenhagen. And I spoke with him about it. I asked him, Father, can you help me? Because I'm going crazy.

I have this voice in my head. And he said, oh, Daniel, you should go home to your house. You sit down and you imagine life with a woman. You are married, you have children, and she is very ugly. She's no more pretty. She's not young anymore. Okay, Father, I'll go home and I'll imagine that. So I went home and kind of imagined a married life and so on.

And, I mean, it was fine. I didn't feel sad. I didn't feel happy. It was just neutral. So I went back and I told him, okay, Father, when I imagined married life with all the details, I just feel neutral. And he said, oh, maniique, now go back home. Imagine you are a priest.

Okay, so I'll do that. And I don't know why. I went home that day. I sat down and I said to Jesus, okay, if you want me to be a priest, I'll be your priest from this day on and forward. And then the second I said it, there's just a divine peace that descended on me and the voice disappeared. And I thought, oh, no, this is not good. This is not good at all. This is very bad.

And I went home and told my dad. And my dad, he said, okay, that's it. I'm going to take you to the bishop. And my dad arranged an appointment with the bishop. And he drove me all the way into the bishop's house. And he left me at the door, waited out in the car. And he said, now go inside and tell the bishop everything. And let him decide.

He is the voice of Jesus in this diocese. So you tell him everything. And I thought, that's a good idea that I'm going to tell him absolutely everything, all the details. Because then surely he's going to realize I'm not made out to be. a priest. So I went into my good, holy and pious bishop and I told him absolute everything. And he just sat there very silently nodding, making a few sounds, looking at me and so on. And I thought, okay, now I'm done telling the story. Perfect. He's going to tell me, Daniel, thank you for coming, but no thank you. Instead, he looked at me and smiled and he said,

when can you move into the cathedral? And I was like, you've got to be kidding me. Well, Hasn't he heard anything? Was he asleep while I was talking or what's going on here? But he was dead serious. So the week after, I moved into the cathedral and kind of came under the wings of the parish priest there. And the diocese, they looked at me and they said, okay, you had a colorful youth. You need to show us that you can study and that you can behave. So a journey began there.

I had to do a lot of studies here in Denmark just to get my level up to the ordinary Danish standards. because I hadn't paid much chance in school, and I had to prove to them that I could stop fighting and stop going out with girls and all these other things. And it happened. The grace of God was upon me, and I did my best, and we managed it. And then when time was ready, the bishop said, okay, I'm going to send you off to seminary. And then the rest is history, as they say. Wow.

I thought you were going to say the bishop's like, when can you the cathedral? And have you seen my scooter? I've never seen him ride on a scooter. I have seen him ride on an elephant, but not a scooter. What a story. I mean, there's so much there, but I love that. I wonder how many things we try and disqualify ourselves from. I am curious, if you could just distill it down for anyone wrestling with any type of vocational invitation,

be it to the priesthood, be it to a missionary, to go minister somewhere, be it to start something, just a godly desire that's been planted on the heart and you just can't shake it. What is that like for you? You mentioned a voice in your head. What advice would you give to people to say, yeah, how do I know it's a calling from God? Because you mentioned it like it just burned and burned and burned. And when you yielded to it, there was a piece. So maybe you could give a little.

Yeah, so I think looking back on my own story, the thing that has been constant in my relation with Christ from the moment he, allowed me to see his face. It was like, my heart was so intent on doing his will. It was like, I'm so in love with you, Jesus, that if you go on top of a mountain, I'll follow you. If you go on the bottom of the sea, I'll follow you. That was my foundation.

And it is what won the victory in the end. Because even though Daniel did not want to be a priest, but what he did want was to follow Christ. And if Christ asked him to be a priest, then he would be a priest, even though it was a very tough thing to go through. But it is what won the victory. So I call it goodwill. And that's what I would say to people. You have to make up your mind. Are you willing to follow Christ or not? And if you say yes to that question, then don't put any boundaries on it. It has to be an unlimited yes, a boundary-free yes. But then at the same time, as I have experienced myself, It can be extremely frightening to do that because Christ is wild.

He has crazy plans for us. But trust him. Trust him. He's so good and merciful. And he's infinitely gentle with people who surrender to him. When we resist him sometimes, okay, he has to use a little bit of brute force to get our attention. But when we surrender to him, I mean, he will guard our souls like a roaring lion. He will do anything for us.

But there is an element of leap of faith. Yeah. And would you say oftentimes it's just like a small kind of thorn that you just like a, like, I love Morpheus in the matrix as like a splinter in your mind. If there's something like, I just can't shake this feeling, I'm supposed to do this. So if you have one of those, take it to God, pray about it and, you know, see just how would you advise someone to discern whether it's a call from God or whether it's just a, you know, normal obtrusive thought? Yeah, the vocation shows up in many different ways, I guess. It can absolutely be a little splinter something that sticks there. But I would say in general, look out for the peace, not just a superficial piece, but a peace that penetrates your soul.

It might not be as clear as my vocation, but look out for the peace of soul because where Christ is, there's peace, there's tranquility and there's love, a lot of love. but also discern whether those things in your head. Is that your own ideas of what life with Christ is? Or is it from him? Because life with Christ is not necessarily what we imagine it to be. I mean, he does say, whoever wants to be my disciple needs to pick up their cross. So there's always a cross there.

And I will be very honest and say, priesthood is my cross. Priesthood is absolutely my cross. It's terrifying every day to wake up to the reality that I am a priest. But it's also that exact thing which will deliver me from my sins. Now, Father, I'd be remiss on our kind of waning hours here as we have to land our plane. You are known for a particular devotion and enthusiasm around the brown scrapular. For those Protestants listening who are like,

what is that? And maybe you could walk us through a little about what that is, a little brief of the history, because if I recall correctly, it was a British priest, Simon, who received the revelation about it. And then your own personal experience, it sounds like you did an incredible pilgrimage to Fatima and had an experience with the Blessed Mother that led you to have kind of this heightened awareness and excitement for this. So give the fans a little bit of a taste of first, what is this, and why you're so excited about it? The scapula. Scapular in Latin just means shoulder.

So it's basically a piece of cloth, a very simple cloth that you wear over your head. It rests on your shoulders, and it goes down in front, and it goes down in the back, more or less equally same length. And all the religious orders, most of them they will wear it.

So you'll see them as part of their habits. Now, the brown scapula is a little bit special because of this priest, St. Simon of Stock in England. So he was a Camelite friar, a Carmelite priest, and he was the head of the Carmelite Order in the Middle Ages. They were having a very, very hard time in Europe, because the Carmelite order is originally founded on Mount Carmel in Israel, so where the Prophet Elijah has his famous fight with the priests of Baal. And they were having a very hard time because the other religious orders weren't really interested in having a new order coming in,

being the new and popular guy, and they were being threatened their existence and so on. So he prayed, he asked God for help, and he prayed that Mario would help him, because the order was from the very beginning dedicated to a lady of Mount Carmel. And she did. She helped him. She responded to his prayers, and she came with the brown scapillar to him in a vision, and she said, I don't know what the exact words in English would be, but more or less, that whoever wears this scapula and dies in my habit, they will be saved from eternal fire, from internal damnation.

Not meaning that the scapula will save you, but meaning that if you live like our lady, if you model your life on our lady and live like a true disciple of Christ, following Christ everywhere, giving your life to him in devotion and so on, then obviously you will be saved. So obviously there's nothing new in this message at all, but it's delivered in a very Carmelite way because the Carmelites, they look to marry as the perfect disciple of Christ. So that's very roughly an overview of it. There is far more to it, and I'm sure a native English speaker would be able to explain it much better than I. But that's sort of the story of the scapula.

And then the church has, through time, recognized that this is a very good thing. It's something that is worth imitating and doing, trying to. to live like Mary following Christ the same way as she did. So the church opened it up. It made it universal. So in the beginning it was only given to Carmelites, but then the different popes, they said, no, this is something that is good for the entire church.

So today, everyone can be vested. Everyone in the church can be vested with the brown scapula. You don't have to be a Carmelite to do that. Now, when we get vested today, the brown scapular is in the scapular confraternity, which is what I am leading here in Denmark, it's a sacramental, not a sacrament, but a sacramental. But it is similar in a way to a sacrament without being a sacrament, but it does allow us to open up our hearts for the grace of God in a greater way. And the brown scapillar is helping us to open up the same way as Mary.

So every day we say, be unto me according to your will. So I am the handmaid of the Lord. So we tried to put ourselves in that serving position, the same way Mary did. And you had an experience at Fatima where you actually felt that you got a revelation from the Blessed Mother about this particular sacramental. Absolutely. Yeah. So I was finishing my studies in Rome. I was going back home and getting ready to be ordained a priest. and I was having a hard time because I knew priesthood in Denmark, that's not going to be an easy thing. And I then went on my canonical retreat, as it's called. So everyone, all men who are to be ordained a Catholic priest, they have to go for a canonical, which is the church law, the demands that they go on a retreat.

And my spiritual director, he said, go to Fatima. There's a priest there, a hermit I want you to stay with, or at least to be on the church. his wings for your retreat. And I did that. And it was an amazing retreat. But it was tough because I had this, like, I'm not able to complete this mission of being a priest in Denmark. But the last day, I was sitting in the church, looking at Mary in the main church and

looking at the crucifix. And I was just kind of sitting there, spacing out, thinking, I mean, what's going to happen? This is not good. And then I heard Mary say, vest this person in the brown scapula. and nothing else. And I thought, that's weird. So I thought, okay, I have a history with drugs and things like that. So I wanted to make sure that I'm not just being crazy.

So I contacted my spiritual director and asked him, like, what do you think about this? And he said, well, it sounds pretty good. Go ahead. See what happens. So I went back home and I phoned this person and I said, okay, you're going to think I'm crazy. but I think Mary told me that I should vest you in something called the brown scapula. And this person was like, the brown what? I've never heard of it.

What is that? So I said, okay, don't worry about it. If you're up for it, if I haven't freaked you out or anything, then let's meet up. And I'll explain to you what the brown scapula is. But she accepted and I explained it to her and she was fascinated by it. She was like, okay, wow, that's great. So I vested her in the brown scapula. And I thought, that's it.

Because I just thought, okay, obviously God wants something with her. It's a gift for her. So I thought, okay, I've done my job. Then a few weeks later, this person calls me and she says, Father Daniel, things have gone crazy over here. I mean, she lives in the completely opposite end of the country compared to me. Things are just going absolutely crazy over here. It's wild.

People who sees my scapula, which I'm wearing outside of my clothes, they convert. they are drawn to it. They're so beautiful. And a brown scapula is not beautiful. It's just a piece of brown cloth with a sort of a little imprint or something like that of Mary and the Sacred Heart. But it's not a piece of art. But people are drawn to it.

And she's a schoolteacher. And schools in Denmark are always socialists. Socialists are drawn to the school system. The last people who will convert in Denmark, it's the school teachers. But nonetheless, these school teachers, they're just drawn to it. by the beauty of this scapula, and they ask her, like, what is it? And she just started teaching them about the brown scapillar and our lady being the mother of Christ and then teaching them about Christ.

And it results in that some of them, they convert and become Catholic. And then this kind of spreads. And in her own parish, people are saying, what are you wearing around your neck? That's a really weird necklace. And then she starts talking about the scapula to them. And all of a sudden, I get requests from this parish. saying, Father, whatever you've done to her, you need to come over here and do to us. And I thought, okay, maybe two or three people will be there.

But the church was packed. There was a full church. And a lot of people got vested that first time we did it. And then a few days later, the next parish contacted me. I said, Father, whatever you did in that parish, we want in our parish. I was like, okay, something is happening here. And then it became a whole thing. Then we just started touring around the diocese, vesting people in the brown scapula.

And it has really been, it's a mission amongst Catholics to revive their faith. Because what the scapular devotion is doing is exactly what Mary is doing. What Mary says in the gospel of John, do whatever he tells you at the wedding in Cana. That's the best way I can describe it. And that's what we do with the scapillar. we put all our focus on Christ and we try to tell people, do whatever he's telling you. And then our lady is doing all the background work, like the amazing mother she is. She's just facilitating the whole thing.

But the whole focus, the whole center is on Christ, pointing to him, helping people to realize that Christ is really calling them into a relationship with him. And the miracles, the stories that we have experienced here is just wild. I mean, lots of people who have been away from the church for so many years, decades, coming back to the sacraments, coming back to faith, or they just experience that their faith becomes alive again. That's amazing. All right, Father, last question, and we'll let you get back to the important work, or go have a cold brew at Carlsberg Brewery on the show.

I always like to end on an encouraging note. For anyone who's maybe struggling with sickness or illness or something that they can't shake, Have you seen any miraculous healings, and perhaps is your time in the hospital doing last rights, any sort of miraculous endings and your work as a priest? Yeah, absolutely. Do we have time for two stories? Of course, yes. Good, because one ends in life and one ends in eternal life.

But both of them are very good. So the first one that ends in life, I have a family that they basically adopted me. We have Chaldean Catholics here in Denmark, which is the original. population of Iraq, and they're typically Catholic, and I have a Chaldean family that has adopted me more or less. I love them to bits, and I would do anything for them. But it happened that one of the daughters in the families, she was diagnosed with cancer, very serious cancer, and they said, she's not going to survive this. I mean, it's tragic. She's super young, 24, and she's not going to make it. And they did the whole thing in the hospital going there for

scans and all these things. And then at one point, the mother says, well, allow us to come to you and please bless us and give her the anointing of the sick. Absolutely, of course, come over. So they come over. They have a long journey. They come over and stay a few days. And I pray for her.

I give her the anointing of the sick. And the moment I laid my hands on her, I knew Christ removed that cancer. I knew it was gone. Obviously, it's not something you're just going to burst out and say, because if you're wrong, I mean, then that's bad. Then the next day, they had to go to the hospital in Copenhagen, the hospital where I was a chaplain, and they had to have all these scans and so on. And the older sister, she phoned me with tears in her eyes and shaking voice.

And she said, it's gone. It's gone, father. The cancer is gone. It's completely gone. And I said, I know it's amazing. God is amazing. He's absolutely amazing. I started crying myself because it was just so, so powerful. He's the God of life, God of the living. And Jesus just showed it there that he restored her life. And the doctors there, they went ballistic. We have the report. We have the physical report from the hospital where the doctors say, like, this is a miracle.

There's no way the cancer can just disappear. But it did. It completely disappeared. And she's healthy and doing really, really well today. like living her life to the fullest, praising God and educating herself and so on. Praise God. Oh, that's beautiful. But I know, obviously, that's the mystery of this side of eternity, is we all get healed, just not in the timeline sometimes that we would hope and expect. So what's our story that ends us in eternal life? Yeah. So this is obviously good. And I mean, God has a plan for this girl. We don't know what it is yet, but he has something because he obviously wanted her to stay alive. and be here with us for a little while.

And the other story is the opposite. It was very evident that God wanted this soul to be with him. And I was called a late evening to the hospital to a dying man. And it was a weird request. The doctor said, he's Catholic, but he wants to leave the Catholic Church. I thought, that's a very weird thing to do on your deadbed. That's like canceling your life insurance policy right before you die. Like, what are you doing, right?

Exactly. that's like crazy. So I thought, I have to go and talk to this guy. So I go there and I meet this guy and he's very, very ill. He has this horrible illness that just killing his lungs and his muscles. And he's basically choking to death slowly. And he tells me, Father, I want to get out of the Catholic Church so I can be buried in the Lutheran cemetery close to my parents. So they can visit me when I'm dead.

And obviously, I'm not a cold heart. man, I understand his line of thoughts. But as a priest, I had to say to him, I'm sorry, but I cannot help you leave the church of God at the moment of your dead. I would be a horrible priest if I advise you anything like this. So what I can do is that I can give you confession, anointing of the sick, and the holy communion so you can die with Christ. I can do that.

And he was shocked that I said that because I said it very directly to him, but it was an important thing to do at that time. And he said, okay, he had to think about it. So I left. But the next day, they called me from the hospital and they say, he wants to see you again. I thought, okay, there. Please God, keep him, make him sure he's on our team. So I went there.

And he said, okay, father, give me the sacraments. I want the whole thing. So, okay, so started a process. I followed this guy through his whole death process. And he got all the sacraments that he needed. He came back to God. And the transformation, a man who hadn't really lived his life on the best side, and he came back in that moment, and he became such a powerful Christian in those last days of his life.

And we had a very strong experience of the hospital wanting to mitigate him into the next life. And I took that fight with them. I said to the doctor, that's murder. I'm not going to allow you to do that. it's not going to happen while I'm here. And the crazy breakdown of the doctor that started crying. And so he had never heard someone talk to him like that before. And I think he was confused, but also kind of impressed with the witness of dedication to that man.

But then the family arrived. And they were also a little bit confused because I think some of them were kind of thinking, well, let's just medicate him into the next life because at least he's not going to have any sufferings. And I say, well, obviously, I can't dictate what he should do. but I can just say as a priest, don't kill yourself, man. Don't do that. That's not good. And the guy in the bed dying said, we'll go with whatever father says.

I follow him, which in itself is super impressive. I've only known the guy for a few days. But he trusted me so completely. So I said, okay, if you're ready for this, I mean, I will walk with you to the end. And God will be there for you. So he said, okay, we're doing it. I'm going to die naturally when God says it is. And he knew he was super brave.

I mean, he's such a brave guy because he knew that was going to mean a lot of physical pain and suffering for him. But he made his decision. So then he became very, very ill. He fell into a coma. So normally they call this, at least in Danish we say, it's the death coma. So that's like when the body is shutting down and they're basically on their way. So they called me and they said, okay, father, you need to say the last prayers over him. So I said, okay, well, I'm coming.

I'll do that. So I went in there and I just put my hand on his forehead. And the second I touched him, that man, he woke up in a way that he shouldn't be able to do. He opened his eyes and he started breathing by himself. At this point, he had a massive tube down his throat. That was this machine breathing for him. He opened his eyes. And even though on the paper, all his muscles were out on function and he couldn't move, he sat up in bed and very clearly communicated. He wanted that tube out of his throat so he could talk. And the machines in the room, they went ballistic, beeping, making all kinds of sounds. And the nurse in the back, she stood up, shouted, what did you do? I said, I didn't do anything. But he really woke up and everyone came running in and

what's going on and so on. And the family was freaking out. The mother was also like looking at me, like, what did you do? Again, I said, I didn't do anything. I just laid my hands on him. But I said to them, okay, let's calm down. So you need to use this time. God has given you this time. You need to use this. So say what needs to be said to your family and then call me when you need me. So I just went out and they had a moment where they could do whatever they needed to do. And he used that moment very well. Whatever needed to be fixed in the family was fixed at that moment. And then when I came back in, I asked him, do you feel ready? Are you ready? And he was. I am ready, Father.

I know they are waiting for me. And I said, just do one thing. Promise me when you get up there, pray for me. Tell Jesus that I'm sorry for all the bad things I've done and ask him to have mercy on me. And he said, absolutely, Father, I will pray for you. I will say that. And then a few hours later, he died.

And when I came in that room, I don't know how to describe it, but I saw him in heaven. I have seen so many dead people at this moment. And this guy, he didn't look dead. I mean, it was as if his physical remains had a glow of heaven. It was so evident that that guy died in the state of grace. And I've never seen a person look not just happy, but full of joy in death. His corpse looked joyful in such a wild way.

It's like his corpse was gloating. It's victory over death, right? Absolutely. It was so powerful. And the beauty of it was like, the question is, why should he die? Why didn't God just heal him the same way he healed my adopted sister? But the beauty of it is that his family, they all came to church, they converted. They are practicing Catholics today.

And they were so touched by the very evident hand of God in all of that. And now they believe they have faith. So through his sacrifice, through his saying yes to that final intense pain, he gave faith to his parents, to his siblings, and so on. So, I mean, just a wild story of how amazing God is. I mean, God is so brilliant. It's always got a plan. He's always up to something.

Man. Well, Father, this has been inspiring, incredible, moving. So thank you so much, Father. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for being a fan of the show. And we just really appreciate you. And we'll be praying for you out there in the people's Republic of Denmark and the people's kingdom of Denmark and keep fighting the good fight.

Thank you so much for joining this, Father. Thank you for having me. It's been an honor. Who would have imagined that a crazy bearded priest like me would be here? Well, with great beard does come great responsibility, right? If any of you are missing a scooter, you can reach out to the number we'll put in the show notes. And Father will do his best to help locate your scooter. All right?

Absolutely. All right. God bless, folks.