Visitation Sessions (A Podcast)
The Truth About Exorcists and Demons
The goal is to grow in virtue, to love Christ more, to, you know, to live a more human life. So the rules of guardian angels are don't ever ask for their name. What else? Priest, I'm not going to ask your 16-year-old son to assist in an exorcism. Or, or, unless it's the son of God who's like, "Hey, 16-year-old John, over here, join me. Okay, okay." You're going to give me a solid shovel. You are listening to visitation sessions. Your weekly conversation on the sacred, the profane, and everything in between. I am Emily Stimson Chapman. I'm here with my husband, Christopher Chapman, Kate and Casey Stapleton. And this week, we have a very special guest for you, our friend Dave Van Vickle. For those of you who don't know Dave Van Vickle, he is a graduate of Franciscan University. He graduated around the same time I was here. He has worked for almost 20 years now for the church, doing evangelization, catechesis. And he has worked for 22 years with priests in exorcisms and deliverance ministry. So that's what we're going to be talking about this week as we approach spooky season. We thought, "Who can we bring in?" But our favorite non-exorcist expert on spiritual warfare, and we're going to talk about all sorts of things. We're going to talk about how Dave got his start. We're going to talk about what we need to be concerned about in terms of spiritual warfare and demons, and what we don't need to be concerned about. And where we give exorcists weight to speak into our lives, and where we recognize that they are humans with their own opinions. So, Dave, welcome. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I'm excited. We're so glad to have you here in our hot attic. Yeah, so Dave has been in our house before. You've been here. This is like a famous Steubenville house. You guys are like landed gentry of Steubenville. Just kidding. No, I mean the visitation house, you know, it's got a long history. Yeah. Can you tell us actually tell real quick what was your experience here? Why were you in the house previously? Okay. I've been in here probably four times, and three of them were when the fraternity of priests, which is the charismatic group of priests, owned it. And then they rented it to the T.O.R.s, and they were running their, I don't know, discernment house here, something like that. And my best friend from childhood was here discerning. I was here a lot. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we need to get more history about our house. Yeah. I know. I keep getting a little bits and pieces from people, and sometimes I have dreams about it. But... Yeah, you can give us his name later. He's probably still getting mail here. I know. It's true. It's so much mail. That's funny. We have no idea all the random people who lived here over the years were like, nope. Sorry. I'm not forwarding it on. So tell us about how you got your start in exorcisms and deliverance ministry. How does a lay person get involved with those sorts of things? Okay. Yeah. So I had like a pretty radical conversion when I was 14. I was at a student bill conference. I gave my life to the Lord. It was like a very, like when I was in high school, I had a very serious relationship with Jesus. And my spiritual director at the time was one of like nine, only nine exorcists in all of North America. And most of those were not like, we would call them stable exorcists where that's their normal job, right? Most of them were just priests who had done it one time or another. But he was one that was very busy. And one night he was very charismatic and he was doing a healing mass and I don't know. I don't know if he was asking me to be an altar server or what, but he asked me to come and help him. And I always remember it was the first time I ever drove on the freeway with my license. I was 16. And after the mass, I didn't know he was an exorcist, but after the mass, a woman came up to be prayed with and she like did all the things you see in the movies. I mean, it was just the craziest manifestation of evil, like you could ever imagine. It was immediately stuff that you knew wasn't mental illness. Like you could just see preternatural things happening. Can you give an example? I mean, yeah, I mean, she was like maybe a hundred pounds and she just like ran up onto the altar and took this brass Campbell stick and bent it into a horseshoe. Like it was nothing. Yeah. Yeah. And so it was like, and there were like 700 people there. So it was, it was terrifying. Did you know any version of cheering and screaming or something? You could just hear like a, you know, like a gasp and, but it was still going on. Like the, like they were still praying over people. And so he was like, take her to the sacristy. I'll deal with her later. And I was like, I'm not touching that like, you know, like you take, you know, yeah. Yeah. You're strong. Because you, you're a strong guy. Yeah. I mean, I was a big kid. So he saw us. He's like this guy. Yeah. But he could keep her busy for a couple of minutes. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know what he was thinking. David sounds before they begged him, they were starting a football team at his high school and they begged him to play. Just to give our, just to give our listeners a little bit. It was like, he was paid to play. I think this is important. It's a bribe. Right. Before we started recording, he was like, all right. I'm right. That's right. No. This is amazing though. They were like, you have to play football. Yeah. So you were clearly, it's a little less insane. He wasn't paid by his school. He was paid by fellow students. Yeah. I love that. Did he fundraise? Did he play football? It's a long story. Yeah. That's for our episode. He was nailed. He was nailed. He was a fun economic football. Like we did. The kids. All right. We're backing up. Yeah. Okay. So he was a strong 16 year old. We were a strong 16 year old in a room with a woman who just spent a brass candlestick. Yeah. And so, you know, he finally convinced me, like, walk her to the sacristy. And I did. And she ran in the door. Like she did not want to be in the church. Okay. Hold on. How do you walk a possessed person? Do you know, you know, as soon as I walked up to her, she right away. I was like, come on. You got to, you got to get out of here. And she was like, get me out of here. Like right away. She wanted to do that. Yeah. She wanted out, you know. And she ran into the sacristy and I could just hear a commotion. But I was terrified, you know, so I was like, I'm not going in there. And I like looked up and the priest was like praying over someone. He was like, get in there, you know, like pointing to the sac and I was like, no, I'm not going in there. I'm not. And he's like, wow. And finally I went in and in the lights were off. So I was like, no, I'm not doing this, you know, it's like a movie, you know, as dramatic as it could be. And I was like, you know, feeling on the wall for the light and finally I turned it on. And she was like up on a bookshelf like like a little spider. Yes. Yes. Yes. So it was terrifying. I mean, absolutely terrifying. Yeah. And he basically had it at that point where he was fully in charge of the ministry of exorcism in that diocese, like he did not need to consult his bishop before he formed exorcism. And so that night he performed an exorcism over her and I helped him like control her. So wait, at that time, had you like read about exorcisms, the signs? No, but I grew up in like crazy charismatic stuff. And knew the devil was real, was yeah, you know, stuff like that. And yeah, I probably had read Father and More's first book, probably because everyone had it that time, I think. What book is that? Unexus tells his story, the first one, which was just like wildly popular in 2000, like that era, you know, and I probably had read it by the time. So I kind of, I knew what was going on. But the next day, he like, he called like the priest called me and he said, Hey, how are you? And I was like, well, I'm pretty freaked out. You know, like this is like, that was really. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, get to head. Like how did it go? You're 16 years old and like, you're like, it's such a dramatic story. Are you allowed to talk about it? Yeah, it wasn't. I mean, everyone involved is dead. So I could talk about it. Oh, wait, seriously? Yeah. You need a lady to ask her. Well, what I'll say is this, that through the intercession of our lady Guadalupe, she was freed. She was freed. So it was after subsequent sessions after that night, so, but it was in dramatic fashion. So it was like, so some actually just call them like once in a lifetime cases. And that's what you would call this first one that I ever saw. It was like a once in like, you saw all the signs of possession that happened. And so when he called me the next day, he was like, you know, how are you? And I was like, well, I'm not good, you know, like this is weird. And he was like, well, he's like, you handled it well last night. He's like, you know, I have another case coming in today. Like, usually for your muscle, like let's bring the big strong kid with the word. I think it was more like, he was very weird, obviously, to let a 16 year old do this. He didn't have a lot of friends or like safe child, like, yeah, but he want to sidekick it up. Like, I know day like he was my spiritual life and he was like, I know Dave, I'll ask him to help. And so. So this is a bit of an anomaly. Oh, it's crazy. He's crazy. He's crazy. He's crazy. He's crazy. I'm like, most priests are not going to ask you're 16. I know. He's right. Yeah. He's a son of God who's like, Hey, 16 year old John over here. Join me. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Don't count him out. The what I would say is, yeah, it was, but I would to defend him a little bit. I feel in a certain, in some sense, I had a strong relationship with God in high school than I do even now because, you know, in high school, when you're a young man, you have no worries, right? You just give yourself to the Lord and, and I was serious about my relationship with Jesus. Like I was very serious about it. And so, so he knew that. Okay. So that's it. So then he asked me to help with more cases. Well, then in 1998, I believe it was Pope John Paul, the second issues of motive proprio saying like, look, every diocese needs to appoint an exorcist, like you, because what was happening is every, no one could find help. And so they were going to Rome because they knew there were exorcists in Rome. Because there were nine. So in the entire continent of North America, right, one continent, nine, and probably no continent. No, and probably at one time, there was probably as low as seven and it's still that way, a lot of countries, like America has more exorcists than they have way more places in the world. So you able to give some kind of historical context, like maybe 70 years prior to that, would that have been different? Or is it, I mean, excess, I don't know, I will, I will, so 70 years prior to that, it would have been probably less exorcist than we have now, but they would have been stable exorcists who were order priests that were brought into several diocese. Okay. That was a very common thing. So a more stable situation. So the Dominicans have an exorcist and they're moving around. Can you come in? Can you come in? Can you come in? Okay. So I mean, like the technical definition of an exorcist, right, like the bishop has it, right? He doesn't need anything special. He is an exorcist. Okay. He is the de facto exorcist. That is easy permission. Right. So the technical definition of what we know as an exorcist is that a priest who has a letter from the local ordinary and that letter should be written in a sense in a tense that he lends his apostolic authority for the express purpose of exercising the possessed, only the possessed. So that would be what we would know. So technically, one guy could have that letter in 10 different diocese, right? And actually, there were several of those guys that I worked with when I was young who were like that. So. So you ended up, you did one exorcism and then another one. And then while you were young, you were working with a lot of those guys. What did that look like? How did that happen? And why are you still involved today? Mm-hmm. Okay. So when he initiated the mode of proprio, basically no one knew what to do. Like they were like, well, okay, we'll appoint exorcists, but where there were no schools or conferences or even books, unless you could like read medieval Latin, there was no training. International association of exorcism. I mean, it was just starting and it was 100% an Italian and you would have to, like they didn't have a process by which you would say, yeah, can I come over and mentor? Which now they do. Like a priest here could say, I need six months with an exorcist in Rome, right? And they'll do that. They'll set that up for you. But at that time, they had nothing, you know, it was not like that. So you would have had to know someone and basically every time I moved to a diocese, they would be setting something up and I would just get a random phone call, like a priest like saying, like I heard that you've done that helped with this before and then conferences started and I started to go to the conferences and, you know, everybody kind of knows each other. Now it's kind of a, it's pretty much a close-knit group for the most part. And yeah, and now actually, to be honest with you, I've stepped away. I pretty much just speak on it. Like I'm trying and I do a lot intakes for several diocese, like intakes of cases, but I do not go to the sessions anymore. Are you like the first, I don't want to say the first line of defense, but the person that kind of does recon and is like, yeah, to see if, yeah, like to weed out, you know, drug use, mental illness, from real, from real demonic stuff. Sorry. My phone just doesn't-- Does it weed out? I'm just not understanding this phone. Like, does it weed out? Like, does it weed out? Like, does it weed out like-- My phone just doesn't-- My phone just doesn't-- That's awesome. That's awesome. I'm serious. Was it serious though? So I don't want to take us away from this super fascinating topic, but like I've been-- You guys have heard me talk years ago about my issues with Siri, so I was encouraging Casey instead of having a cheerful, subservient female to try out the male series. Just trying to mail. It went off in class. It was very strange. The students were horrified. The mail is so bad at it. Like-- It's like an effeminate southern African American male with like, it's also-- The whole bazaar. With tinges of-- Yeah, it's a strange-- Also, since he got it, he's like less kind to me because all my messages are read in this guy's voice. So instead of like a happy female-- It's like a little Nausex was reading my messages. If you guys are doing that, it's awesome. It's rough. So-- There's a lot. There's-- All right. So you're weeding out like, is it drug abuse? Like, is it your-- is it your phone? Yeah, what are-- What are-- Give us a recap for our listeners. What is an intake? Like, so an intake is when they say like, is this person actually possessed? So people call you-- you're not at the sessions anymore. But you are a part of like weeding out whether or not this might be a kind of possession. Yeah, warrant-- Was he with warrants seeing an exorcist? Yeah, that's what I-- Okay. I decided who should see. Do you talk to the person? Or do you-- Well, I try. I mean-- Yeah. Possessed person's not going to call and be like, hey, I'm possessed, I need an exorcism, right? That doesn't really work like that. Why did I not hear you talk to you? Like, who refers-- I mean, do they were-- Caretaker? Yeah. Very rarely. Very rarely. And that's my first thought of like, I bet this isn't real. But it could be. I mean, you never know, like, you know, it's a very weird phenomenon. It's a different level. Because there's different levels. Of course. There's oppression and possession. Yeah. And can we talk about? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, so let's talk about that. So an exorcist is needed for possession, right? That's what-- you need that, okay? And that's why like all the movies feature priests and not just pastors, right? Like, not just ministers or something like that. Because possession is a very serious domination of a human person that you often need, right? The church to step in and say, you can't be here anymore, okay? To reclaim baptismal rights is what the theology now-- like, the new ritual is a reclamation of baptismal rights, okay? And so that's what it would be like now. Now, besides that, like, there are other extraordinary ways the devil can attack us. And so, like, a lower way than that would be what we would call-- well, I mean, it depends on like what book you're reading, right, okay? But there's oppression, which would be like kind of like the story of Job, okay? Job is like the classic story of oppression, okay? He's not being possessed. He's not even really messing with his mind or like his cogitated process, but he's like messing with his relationships, finances, things like that, health, okay? And then the next step would be like obsession or some people call vexation. But obsessio is like the classical term, and that would be-- like the classical definition would be a prolonged and intense temptation given by the devil. And that seems odd because I think all of us have been like, "Well, I've had that before, I must be obsessed," right? But like someone who's obsessed, it's like they would have a very strange temptation, say, for instance, like, "Oh, I should kill my best friend," okay? Now, it's not just one thought, it's like they can't eat, they can't sleep, they can't stop thinking about it, all they think of-- so it's like this terrible temptation that makes them feel like they're going crazy, right? They often hear voices and things like that. And the point of obsession is to kind of get them to a point of breaking so that a person says like, "I'll do anything to let this go away, to make this go away," and then they'll be presented with, "Well, I can help you," right? The demon will present them with like a kind of a carrot and stick type thing, and they'll try to take more and more of their will. And at some point, obsession would become possession, and that's like what you see in the movies where they're able to take over a person's body, and it's very rare. And it happens like it doesn't happen immediately, it's not like you can accidentally get possessed, doesn't work like that, right? It's like a long, long relationship with this, you know, evil being that they've developed. So there's, yeah, three levels, but exorcism, like a solemn rite of exorcism is reserved for possession, for obsession and oppression. The church just recommends like the normal means of grace. And sometimes we'll use deliverance prayer if it's like a really bad case of oppression or obsession, but for the most part, what they need is like strong spiritual direction. They need to avail themselves of the sacraments, they need to avail themselves of like normal devotion, things like that. And what would you say, how would you clarify the difference between deliverance ministry and exorcisms? Because we hear a lot about deliverance ministry as well. They kind of get conflated, especially once you get outside of the Catholic church. Sure. Yeah, I would say deliverance ministry is a great umbrella term for anything trying to ward off evil. I think that's a good umbrella term. Exorcism is such a specialized form of that. And then solemn exorcism is with even, you know, even more specialized than that. So yeah, deliverance ministry would be any prayer trying to get rid of, you know, curb the strength of the evil one, I guess is what you might say. In Catholic terms, we would use minor exorcism and Protestants would use deliverance, right? So that would be the vernacular. Yeah. No, please. I've read in Spiritual Theology by Jordan Alton. Yeah, yeah. Great book. He talks about in the end for like extraordinary mystical phenomena. He talks about like, he rignosis is the name for like detecting, what is it, when things are blessed and like people are in a state of grace. So like, isn't one of the signs of possession, like aversion to holy objects or to like. That's weird. It absolutely is. But for some reason in the Prano Tanda of the ritual, it gives three, three signs of possession. Yeah. And then it adds in the fourth one and that's a version to the sacred for some reason. So he says, so he says, here are three signs you should see to determine possession. The first would be pre-natural physical abilities. So that would be like. Like you stick with the barbell. Yes. Levitation or super strength, okay. Like the disproportionate strength, right? Yeah. Right. The second would be clear buoyance, okay? So that would be, they know things they shouldn't. So a joke I often tell that's not really that funny is that when I was five years old, I went to the Natural History Museum and I stole a rubber dinosaur. And on several occasions, it has come out in an exorcism where they're like, remember when you stole that dinosaur? And it's like, it wasn't last week, I was like, I was five, you know, like. Do you get all sheepish too? Is that like, yeah. No, no. Yeah. But what is it? That's the worst thing you've done. Like, wow. Nicky. I'm like, the demons are like, we know everything about you. Definitely. You stole a dinosaur one time. Definitely not. Like, I wish that was the first thing I've ever done. They love to take things that no one else would know, right? They love to impress everyone in the room. Except now everybody knows this. Right. Right. So now we'll be the next thing. Yeah. You're gonna have to find something else. Robin, you have your power on that one. Right. What is it? Like, does it pertain to angels to know, like, all physical creation? So like, your imagination, memory or physicals, their fair game, so to speak. Oh, man, you're getting really deep in the demonology here. Yeah. Right. So, so that's really hard because. So for us, it's like, well, how does he know he stole a dinosaur but for them? Right. I mean, we're all like Helen Keller's and like, you know, like. Absolutely. So this, so this is a common problem is that people say like, they all, they've heard an exorcist say, well, a demon doesn't have access to like your, your mind, okay? Like they can't know what. You're intellect, right? Yeah, you're intellect. And it's like, well, what do you mean by that? Right. Because for a modern day American in 2024, like your mind could mean a hundred different definitions because pretty much you're going to think they have access to your mind, right? Because like for instance, they read body chemistry really well, right? They're super subtle. Yeah. They're amazing. Right. So you put a pizza in front of me, a demon's going to know what I'm thinking. Right? Because you're going to see me like, yeah. Right. Right. We all start moving toward it. Right. Right. Right. So they're going to know. So they'll be things like that. But, okay. So, sorry, preternatural physical ability, clairvoyance. This is funny though. The occult languages or. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Knowledge of unlearned languages. That I used to assist often in another country. He's like a language scholar. He speaks 12 languages fluently. He like worked for the Vatican for a long time. And that's what he would do. And I remember one day like in this village, this kid, he looked like he walked out of, I don't know, like a movie about Indians, like American Indians, like, and this exorcist like interrogated him. He was like eight years old and asked him 12 different questions and 12 different languages and this kid just responded perfectly in each language. Perfect grammar, perfect everything, including like ancient Greek, Hebrew, all of these languages. Like it was, he knew right away, you know. Who questions? Does it have to be like biblical languages or can it be some? No. In fact, like sometimes it's just weird. They love the bizarre, right? They love the bizarre things. So like, you know, that the second case that I was involved in, he would constantly sing like rock songs in like Chinese. Wow. But it would be like songs that we would all know. Yeah. Like he would do it like that. It was just weird. Yeah. They love to do weird things. Like they want you to look at it. They work. Yeah. They want you to look at it. Yeah. Yeah. Like my husband's obsession with this Korean like dance troupe. And the ambiguous dance company. Awesome. And a cold play video. Not obsessions. It's really weird. It's so funny. Yeah. It's not like that. I think it's not like that. It's not like that. To be said. Yes. Like Chris's love of the ambiguous dance company doing Korean pop dances. It's not the same as being. Okay. Right. I know. I've seen it. So I can see like weird obsession. I was like, oh, I don't know. Yeah. So the praetotana it says these three things. And then it says and for some reason, I don't know why it says four things. It doesn't say four things. It's like in the Psalms. Yeah. Yeah. God hates three things. And this. Right. Right. It says on a virgin just to the sacred. Yeah. A virgin to the sacred. And that's the one that you most commonly see first. Right. That's usually the when you start thinking about this, you know, like. Or when someone sees like kid comes home from college, you know, and goes to master their family or something like something happens, you know, that kind of thing. Okay. So can I ask like, normally when we think about exorcisms, we think about pre-stewing. If we as priests have to be the ones doing it, what is the role? How common is it for a layman to be involved in exorcisms? Is it helpful? Why? Yeah. Why are you there? Tell me about like you being there. Sure. I'm here just cause I'm a big guy, right? And I've worked as a bouncer my whole life and I hold people down. Okay. Sometimes that's like a really confident exorcist. That's probably all I'm going to do. You're an exorcist bouncer. Yeah. It's cool. Like it's like a bouncer instead of working at a dance club, like you work at exorcisms. Sometimes and this is like more commonly how it's been for me the last 10 years. It's a new exorcist. And they're like, what do I do now? You know, like they're like a resident doctor who's like, I guess I'm going to do this normal. It's like none of this is going to be normal. So let's just get that out, you know, so you're the trainer. You're like the doctor trainer who's like, yeah, to like kind of be like, yes, put the stitch in next stitch. Yeah. And then like a lot of times, because I've been doing it for so long, a lot of these cases hinge on a mystery, right? Like they love to pretend like it's this big mystery that the whole fate of the world lies on its ridiculously. They're like children, right? They're like petulant children. The demons I love children? Yeah. They're terribly behaved children and they love to think that the whole world revolves around them and they're one like operation on this soul. And so like that mystery is usually the key to getting them out. And so oftentimes like they'll do whatever they can to hide it. And it's been like, I've been watching them for so long that sometimes I can just, you know, right away like, tempt it out or tease it out or something like that. Like solve the mystery. So solving the mystery house. What do you mean, like what do you mean solving it? Are you trying to ask the right question? Okay. Because I've read it. Okay. Yeah. No. Okay. So, so a demon has to have rights to be in a person. Okay. They have to have rights to extraordinarily attack someone. Right. It's very legalistic. Okay. And they would have to have either explicit or implicit rights. Okay. So implicit rights could be the kind of thing like we were talking about before. That's very rare. Like you buy something from an antique store that happened to be owned by a witch or something and the witch used it to do her or whatever and you put it in your house and then weird stuff happens. So it's infested? Is that the same? Yeah. It's infested. And that would be implicit. Like you took it into your home. You didn't mean to like contract with demon. Possession usually happens because of an explicit desire to be possessed or to gain that power that they have. Okay. And so oftentimes they make you do things like for instance, you do this ceremony and then you'll be and then I'll give you this power or you commit this sin and then I'll give you this power. Very commonly you need to know that in order to break that vow or that curse. So what it was that first initially led to that contractual agreement. Right. Do they actually deliver or is it like sometimes it's like, yeah, let's go to the backyard right now and dig it up and we'll destroy it and it might be like a, it might be something like bodily like blood or something like that. It could be, you know, like a talisman or something like that or yeah, it could be any of those things. But oftentimes it's a, you know, major sin that they're hiding, right? And they just are, I've been hiding it all along and then finally it's like, we figure what it is. Okay. Everybody leaves. Let's show go to confession, he'll go to confession and that'll be kind of what it hinges on. But, but the biggest reason lay people would be involved is possession is like, like I've worked with every marginalized kind of person, right? Like the poor, like immigrants, same sex attracted like anyone that is like hurting wounded. I've worked with all of these people. Okay. Possessed people are the most like hurting people I've ever worked with in my entire life. And they desperately need to be loved, to be catechized, to be evangelized because exorcism is in magic. Right. Like they have to cooperate with this process. And so oftentimes that's my role is like walking with them, discipling them, teaching them about Jesus, teaching them about the church so that they can, it's kind of like the analogy. I use like if they, if you can get their head above water so they can say, I don't want this anymore, that's when it usually ends, right, when they can start to cooperate. So I do a lot of that. There's also usually a lot of lay people involved in like the diagnosis because we let like psychiatry, psychology, take care of that, like we don't assume that we have that expertise at all. So someone else will help with that. And then because it's America and we're so litigious, a lot of times we're using not like police officers instead of like just normal people like me to hold people down because it, I mean, there's, there's problems there, right? Like to restrain someone who's an adult is not, there's a lot of legal issues. So an exorcist would call in a police officer if they were gonna do one, if they didn't have David Vickle, they were like, all right, he's not available. I usually say to them, like, do you have any police officers in your congregation that are really faithful Catholics, like, can we get them to help her? Yeah, I once read in the, in the life of St. Norbert, because I was with the Norbert teams for four years, we'd read like, you know, every night for dinner, the sections of his life, not the whole book, but it talked about, he did a lot of exorcisms and there was one, there was like a blonde girl who was like possessed and was like reciting the Psalms forwards and backwards and every language and stuff. And at one point, the whole village crowded around him and her and he was like, cut off her hair because it says it was too beautiful and like whatever, so they cut off her hair and she started calling out the sins of everybody present, which sent everybody wild, like scattering everywhere. So yeah, I was asking like, you know, cops, yeah, yeah, you wanted to be, yeah, faithful people. So what I would say is like, everybody in the room knows that we're all sinners. So like, it's like, yeah, yeah, when you find out you're sinning. Right, yeah, right. Yeah. So I mean, it happens. They're just getting in particular. I said, we're going to liturgy. So they will read these in. Yeah, they will, though, like find one that if you, if you have a deep wound, they'll tug on that and they'll find it and they'll touch it. She has to be careful. So you need some spiritual maturity. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So going down south, I was helping at an exorcism right after Amber died. And it was so, I don't know what I was thinking. It was just, it's always been a part of my life. Sure. Right. For those who, Dave lost his wife, our friend, Amber, a year and a half ago. Yeah, year and a half ago. Yeah. So yeah. Well, like just immediately, you know, this, this exorcism starts immediately. They're just like, boom, I'm like, I'm being targeted, you know, and it's like, so it's like, oh, why did I not know that this would happen? Like I would teach people not to do this. Why did I? I thought it was broken. Yeah, probably. You walked into this, like with the broken, that's like super vulnerable. Yeah, they're bullies, right? How rare is it? So you're saying it's rare, like what is the proportion of rare and how does it seems like everything is getting so much darker and darker all the time? Like Halloween is ramping up. Everything our popular culture is like in love with demons, is it, is it on the rise? Like, how rare is it and is it rising? So, okay, so I'll, I'll temper my answer by saying I think most exorcists would say it's on the rise. I tend to think that things are getting better. Interesting. Because like, like using like the priest crisis as an example, like it came out, right? But it was happening before no one really talked about it, but now it's out. So it seems. Like over a thousand years, yeah. Right. Super evil because we're seeing it, but like it's exposed, like that's a good thing, you know? Bring him to life. And even like with like transgender stuff, like when I read some of this stuff and it's if it's like something that like a kindergartener can like say like, well, that's ridiculous, right? Like I was born a boy or something like that. I think like, yeah, the devil overplayed his hand here, right? Like he took one step too far, like this is, this is too self-evident. He was too prideful, right? He stepped too far. So in my mind, it's like, he kind of overplayed a little bit and right lately. And I think like the exposure of this, even like things like, I don't know, like when Pope Francis was elected and like the Vatican Bank, like when he went after the Vatican Bank, it's like, I've been like losing sleep by the Vatican Bank for decades, you know, like they've been almost corrupt. You know, it was really bad. And then all of a sudden it's like, yeah, beneath the tiger, like, yeah, and it's like dead. And so many millions of dollars. Right. And so many people were like, oh, can you believe what's going on in the church? It's like, no, it was. Like now we know and it's exposed. So yeah. So I tend to be on the other side. But what I would say is like, exorcism is up, but I think it's more because it always was there and the church just wasn't responding. I really don't think exorcisms go up when evangelization goes up. That's what happens. When you go into his territory and take it, that's when exorcisms go up, right? So like the early church, they're happening constantly. Alba Genci and heresy, like the response to it, I mean, there's like exorcism happening on every corner, right? Like things like that. Right. There's constantly Dominicans in the streets exercising people, right? So like evangelization, like weeds out, you know, what, you know, this kind of situation. And that's when it happens a lot more. I don't necessarily think it's happening more, but of course there are some like really popular exorcists out there who are saying like, more demons are being released from hell than ever. And I tend to. What's like, there's like a vault, like, Oh, the chain's broken, right? Right. Well, so I'm curious though. I will say we live in the middle of a city, like we live in the middle of Pittsburgh and we go to city pools and I have noticed in the past couple of years that I'm sitting at the city pool and I'm looking around me and there's multiple women tattooed with demons. Like there's demons covering their entire body. And then I'm looking around my entire neighborhood and I'm saying that as someone who lives there and feels comfortable walking the streets at night and, you know, works there, loves people. I'm in the middle of it, but I'm asking you as an expert, what are the fact that people are tattooing themselves with demons in on a regular basis and then going to this swimming pool? What, what does that mean? Yeah. Okay. So, well, I mean, obviously they're good. Okay. Let's just say that. Okay. Not a good idea. But I think that we deal with in exorcism, like say actual Satanists would never admit that they were. Okay. Really? No. There's there. These are like mafioso type figure. Yeah. Like they're, they're serious cults that pass things down from generation to generation, right? This is like cloak and dagger stuff that, you know, nobody needs to know about really, but like the on the nose Satanism is usually more it's, they worship rebellion, right? Like that's what they're, they're into this rebellion. Now, now it's pretty precarious to get a tattoo. Satan was a rebel. Yeah. Yeah. So if you tattoo your entire body with. Yeah. Not a good idea because blood is a currency. Like demons, you will use blood as like a, that would be like something they could very much use to get at you. Okay. Um, so that wouldn't be a good idea, but I don't think necessarily like I, like I've never seen a witch that has come to us or Satanists who has come to us with any outward markings that, yeah, no, they would, they're criminals, most of them, you know, okay. So part of me, I'm torn here about what to ask you because part of me wants to say, well, how much do we need to worry about this? How do we protect our children? You know, that mom instinct that comes out and then part of me is like, how much do we not need to worry about this? Yeah. Like where is the balance of health for the average faithful Catholic, like in a state of grace, not committing mortal sin on anything, you know, such a great question coming towards Halloween. Like, yeah. So I'll tell you with, with my kids, the way I look at it with my kids that our family model, right, is like, we're going to go to heaven and bring as many people possible with us and we make every decision based on that. Okay. That's all how we make all our decisions. And then besides that, what do I tell them about the devil that he's afraid of them? That's pretty much it. I, until they're older and they start asking questions, I do not tell them. I'm not like constantly telling them to do novenas or like, I'm not, I mean, you're out there. The names, the demons. Right. No, none of that kind of stuff. He is afraid of them. Absolutely. And your kids are how old? My youngest is seven. My oldest is 15. Okay. And your message is the devil's afraid of you. Why is that? Yeah, because well, we know, I mean, we know this is to be, we know this to be true, right? Like the Satan's terrified of particularly families on fire with the love of God. Are you kidding me? Terrified of things like that. Does not like truth, beauty and goodness does not like joy hates those things. So if you fill your life with these things, right, this is, this is going to be a wonderful deterrent. Was it, was it St. Therese that was like the devil's terrified of a baby in a state of grace or something? I don't know. That sounds interesting. I mean, that sounds possible, but what I would say is like, yeah, I mean, I don't, I'm like, I, I would say I'm more nervous about stuff than, than I should be. And I'm not really nervous about it at all. Like, you know, like I, but I've had people like come after me a few times. So it's like, I, I do get nervous about that, like around Halloween and stuff like that. But like, no, I don't, I don't worry about visitation sessions. Army rise up, rise up, defend David, all cause defend us, like David's the one of the instances. You know, maybe they head on to you, Dave, cause like you, you have like an idea. The way you, I mean, curp me from wrong, but like these, these solemn exorcisms, exorcisms are almost like sessions and they're, they sound very similar to like, working out or someone that like is totally out of shape, needs to work out, they get to the gym, but they're just, they got to get over the hump. Perhaps that's one natural reason why they picked you. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Also you're mad. Um, I'm such a mess that I'm, I'm never going to think that I'm something. Like so. I don't know. There's more messes. There's more messes than your people. There's a, there's a, there's a major problem with, uh, with the ministry of exorcism that like, you start to believe that you're something more than you are, right? Like arrogance. Right. The devil works with Erica. Yeah. Sure. I mean, at least I don't want to name names. No, of course. I think there's a danger that we've noticed over the years working in the church. And again, everybody is due to the honor, you know, that is, is do them people do great things for God. And I mean, but you know, he's, we're still servants, but there is kind of like this, I would say kind of a cult like following or sort of this de facto magisterium, cause just the other day, I was reading an article about political stuff. I won't say it, but this guy, and I really respect him, but the end he quoted a certain exorcist and pointed out that he was an exorcist, an exorcist that said this. I'm like, I'm reading an article about politics. The fact that this guy is an exorcist has nothing to do with what he said. It's like, did you ask him for stock quotes too? Right. I mean, it's like, yeah, I was like, I was like, okay, in this case, if he's got some knowledge of that, in this case, his, you know, his thinking on this issue needs to stand alone. It is irrelevant that he's an exorcist or that he's holy or, you know, whatever, like his thought needs to, so maybe a little faith and reason here, but, you know, exorcists play important role, but they're not a magisterium apart. You know, they're not, I don't know, what are you? Yeah. So many thoughts and I'm going to argue both sides. Yeah, please. So some of the public exorcists, in a certain sense, like play the role of like Flannery O'Connor. Okay. So like one, one who's a close friend of mine, right? He would, he would say, look, what I'm doing is waking up a culture that is dead to this. Okay. Whether you agree with that or not. So I'm going to argue on that side a little bit just for him. Some of them say, give us like moral guidelines to protect us, but what you have to remember is that their moral guidelines are to protect from possession. It's not necessarily just to protect from sin. So there are some nuances there. Okay. Like, there are some issues, right, that like, like for instance, like we just put in a pool, right? And I tell my kids, you are never ever ever to go near the pool when I'm not around. Ever. Not ever, not ever, ever. No. In reality, could my kid go by the pool when I'm not around? Like, if there's a ball in there or something like that, of course. But this is the way an exorcist responds to everything kind of. They have this idea like, no, I've seen a case where this was involved and so you never do this ever and that's the kind of, and we put them in this like kind of higher guard. I think the bigger problem with like saying, it's not so much the exorcist, it's us, right? You kind of made the point. Like why is that guy quoting an exorcist? And we have this idea like, whoa, the devil is being fought by exorcists and that's like kind of like ground zero and that's like the front lines. And to be honest with you, I feel the opposite among that, right? Like it's catechists, it's parents, it's evangelists, it's husbands and wives loving each other who are on the front lines of spiritual warfare, right? This is kind of like a mop up duty for extraordinary things. The other thing is they talk often in such dramatic fashion and then they leave us to like try to wane it down to our lives. So you read like an exorcist tells a story and I have a lot of respect for Father Amorth. I think he was fantastic and wonderful and a holy man, I think he'll probably be a saint. But like you read those books and you're like, well, what do I do now? You know, like I have to like pull that down to my own life who's in a normal battle. I'm not seeing things go bump in the night, I'm not like flying across the room or getting pulled out of my bed or something like that, right? What do I do now? That's like not super healthy, right, to like teach but not teach to the fullest extent. And then finally, what I would say is this, we all have this tendency, right? Like, I mean, I have an ego, right? And I'll give you an opinion on just about everything in the world. And I have expertise on almost nothing in the world, okay? But that's everyone like, and what happens is, I think a lot of times is we put them in this pedestal and they're commenting on things that they really don't have the expertise on. There's one in particular that I constantly have issue with. And it's particularly like, you know, with he's a Thomistic scholar, okay? But like he doesn't have a PhD in philosophy or theology. His PhD is in psychology, okay? And this is interesting because everyone goes to him for Thomistic philosophy, okay? And I would say like, he's not a great Thomistic scholar. Like he's not that. Is he swervy? Is he inaccurate? Like what's his deal? Because there are people that don't have like, okay, good point, good point. Yeah, I would say there are things that I'm like, yeah, that's not, that's not right. That's not okay. And then finally, like, there are very few rules with this ministry, okay? Like, Kanamaw has very few, very little to say about exorcism. There's two, two Kanamans about it. And then there's very little in the pray notanda of the ritual. So there is a lot unsaid, okay? And so like the idea of like should an exorcist be anonymous or not, that's up to the local ordinary, you know, that's up to the local ordinary. A lot of them are not now because it's so hard to find them. So a lot of them feel like I need to be public so that people can get to me. And I understand that I kind of in a certain sense, but that's also solved by other means. Like you could solve it just through the communications office of the diocese, right? Yeah, I was like, you could just call the diocese. The 16-year-old bodybuilder bouncer to answer the call. Shout out to the communication office. I'm going to give a, like, pass to the exorcist on that one. I don't know that, like, sending things to the communications offices of the diocese. Like they've really, no, they've gutted everything communications. They fired everyone who was doing news. Like they're, that's a skeleton skeleton. Maybe this, I mean, if I can just, my thinking on this is that one of the things the exorcists give us is a supernatural worldview. And so, I mean, especially an exorcist gives that. And, you know, after the second Vatican council, not to blame the council, but I think there was a real diminishment of that, maybe especially in diocesan communications, you know, like the Catholic worldview, which is supernatural, which does involve, you know, the visible and invisible, that gets lost completely. And so people are hungry for that, and the exorcist oftentimes is the one that reintroduces it in a dramatic fashion, like, hey, there is an invisible world. Interesting. Interesting you bring that up. So, so that's what my last point was going to be, like, in defense of that, of them doing things publicly, is that, and I still am on the fence of this, right? And I think there's certain ones who can and certain ones who just shouldn't. Like, I've read every single thing that the father said about exorcism, the devil or demons. Like, like, there's not a single quote that I have not tracked down or I've read it all. Okay. At least anything that's in English. Okay. If there's things that haven't been translated yet, I haven't got to. And I have it compiled in a document. And almost, I'd say like 90% of the times exorcism is mentioned, it's an apologetic, right? Like, we have power over your gods, and it's a sign of the kingdom. And so I get talking about it is a good idea. I don't necessarily think the exorcist talking about it is a good idea. And mostly for their sake, because it is dangerous. Like the people that they're helping, like I said, they're criminals, right? This is not like the person who owns like the witch shop down the street in Lawrenceville, like who sells crystals or something like that. These are real witches and real Satanists who practice of, I mean, things that would make us lose our mind, right? Like, this is not good. And they would love to kill one of these exorcists. Like, they'd love to do something to them. And so I think that to keep them safe, it's probably a good idea to kill them. Can you speak about that a little more? Because I know the documentary, which I use to show my kids in school, and then I kind of backed away from it. But, I mean, it wasn't over the top, but it's about the exorcism that, you know, spawned the story, you know, the movie, the exorcist. Oh, yeah, sure. So the historical one. But in that story, the priest actually is attacked by the, you know, the person who's possessed of it was the name, but it is, but, you know, and it gets a hundred stitches in the arm. And the priest, who was a friend of this priest, said, well, this priest really didn't have enough faith. And it was actually a dangerous situation. Now, eventually it was a Jesuit who exercised this, this, I think it was a young man, actually, but anyway, I mean, so-- He just passed away. Oh, yeah. Interesting. So, I mean, maybe speak to maybe the reality of the, you know, what-- Yeah, it is. It's, yes. Or rats. Yeah. Okay. So it is certainly dangerous, but not, it shouldn't be for a good exorcist. Okay. That's what I would say. There are cases that are, they're incredibly strong. In the case of Robbie, like, he, you know, he ripped up, whatever, out of his bed, out of the bed and cut him. And several times, like, I have a scar from that first case, from that first lady and stuff like that. And they do things, and it's mostly part of the tricks, but a good exorcist, like, they're in charge, right? Like, there's never, that's the problem with the movies, okay? The problem with the movies is like, you're like, who's going to win? The demon or the priest? The demon or the priest? That's what makes a good movie. Yeah, right. Right. Totally. It's like fighting in movies. You don't want to see, like, real fighting's boring. You don't want to see, like, real fighting's boring. You want to see, like, telegraph punches. Exactly. Blood sport, right? Yeah, right. Right. And so, like, yeah, but like, in the real exorcism, right, there's, there's no question about who's going to win, right? And, and, and the big problems come about when you go around the rules, like you violate the rules, or if you're wondering who's going to win, right? Like, if the priest is having a hard time with that. And so, for instance, like, one of my close friends was breaking the rules. He was exercising alone. And he got just, he was in the hospital for six months, you know? So like, yeah, it was, he broke the rules, you know, he was doing something he shouldn't have done. And that's not good. Yeah. Yeah. So how much do, does the, or like a faithful Catholic, like, how much do we have to worry about it? But generational curses and Masonic curses and, you know, do I have to worry about something because my great grandpa was a mason. Like, what, how do we, how do we, I have obvious thoughts on that. Yeah. Gypsy Gypsy does talk about being cursed into the, whatever team's generation, right? If you fail to follow him. So what? Yeah. But that's like prior to the new covenant. I, I tend, I tend to, uh, so nobody agrees with me. No one. Okay. So there's, there's one, and there's one theologian in Mexico who was commissioned by the International Association of Exorcists. Wait, is that the guy who was in the helicopter exercise in the country? I don't know. No. There was a whole group. They actually hired to investigate generational curses. Yeah. Oh, you know this. Okay. Follow on. Okay. Is it healing your family tree? Is that the one? The book? No. That one. That one's a no, no. I read his talk too. Yeah. So all right. So your position on general curses is. I don't think that they happen. And I, I especially don't think that they have been post baptism, like I just, I cannot. Baptism is the exorcism par excellence, right? So like you have to understand that, like, right. So if, if communion with Christ is to the Eucharist, right, liberation from the dominion of darkness is to baptism. Okay. So that is really difficult for me to believe that there would be a generational curse. And of all, it's a very recent belief. It's, I think, I'm sure you think who, I think it was Herbert Thurston or something like that in like 1890 is kind of the first person that came up with this. But let's say practically anecdotally, because the way I see it played out often is when you can't figure out what else is going on with the case, you lump it in the bucket of it must be generational. So that's a major problem. Second of all, the, in America, like, Freemasonry has become the boogeyman that it can't really be. Okay. So like in Europe, you did have like these situations where, or they are certainly still situations where Freemasonry is being mixed with Satanism and that's normal at the heights of society, right? Satan is going to go after those people and like, you know, so I've had cases like that where it's really bad, but in America, it's, it's really more of a social club. Okay. Now, do they practice curses and things like that? Yes, they do. They think it as a joke, similar to fraternities, okay, fraternities do things like this, okay? And so I, so I would say like, I would not, like if my grandpa were a Mason, I certainly wouldn't have his stuff in my house, but I also don't worry that I'm like cursed because of his Freemasonry. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? I wouldn't keep his Freemason like guidebook or anything like that. I wouldn't do it because I do think that they're, I mean, they're an evil organization, but I don't think it's like an explicit form of Satanism in America. I don't feel that way at all. And there's, there's nothing in church teaching at all ever about Masonic curses, about generational curses. Like this is something. No, it, no, it, anything about the Freemasons has to do with the fact that it's similar to communism. It's an atheistic organization bent on destruction of the church, right? So like they'll write things that are like that, but, and they were definitely really rich Freemasons. Cause I, I walk all the time through the Allegheny Cemetery, which is, they built some fancy buildings. Oh, ultra, ultra rich, ultra rich, ultra Masonic. So there's Masonic. Yeah. That's true. You know, imagery everywhere. You know, the generational cursing is, is it real problem for me because I, I'm convinced, like when I go to the extras and conferences, I'm the only person that doesn't believe in them. And I just like, but father, father alone, he, he presented at one of our conferences. And I mean, he had absolutely no qualms saying they do not exist. They do not exist. And that, that came from the International Association of Exorcists. And by the way, this is after Father Gabriel Amorth. I'm not saying Father Gabriel Amorth wasn't a great theologian, but the guys who are in charge now are like serious. Like they're serious theologians and they're, they're hefty, right? This is not like, it's not elementary at all. Like, this was a serious paper that he wrote. Okay. Okay. No, I just like, I don't know a lot about any of this, but I, I do know that I was, I was raised kind of with this idea that the devil is going to go after. If you're in a family that is Catholic and is praying the rosary and is trying really hard to be Catholic, the devil's going to go after you extra hard. So you're more at risk. And so what you're saying is actually, the opposite of that is really, really, really reassuring to hear that because I just felt like, oh, we're the most under attack. Like if I'm going to be trying to go to Mass and trying to pair with my family, then I'm going to be, I'm on the front line. Right? I mean, that was what I was raised with. And I haven't ever thought about it in that way until this conversation. Yeah. Okay. Could the devil like, like target a family because he's annoyed by the good works that they're doing? Yes. It's possible. Like, that's like minuscule percentage of what like happens, right? It's, it's people who get with like, Padre Pio's famous quote, right? Like it's a dog on a chain and you get within the length of the chain and you're going to get hurt. Like that's, that's the big problem. In fact, I would say like, you know, like, no, families, they're, they're the ones who are destroying the devil, right? Like they're the ones who are destroying the kingdom of evil. He despises things like that. Now, what you're saying is like kind of from an old wives sale, not, not a real old wives sale. Okay. In the sense that a house that's infested with demons, if a family moves in that's secular and worldly, there probably will be no manifestations because the demons are like, they're not bothering me. But you move in and you have a father who's like praying in the rosary first family and the demons are going to be like, I don't like this in my house. So there might be manifestations. Okay. That could be true, okay, that could be true, but again, that's very rare that that would be the case. Like for the most part, you know, no, we're safest when we're following the Lord, right? Obaying his commandments and living a joyful Catholic life. Yeah. One time, I don't know if I should share, yeah, yeah, one time, share away. We are very close. Casey's not reliable on this. One time, one time during an exorcism, you hope that they never turn their attention towards you, you know? But one time, like they were just kind of ripping on me, you know, like a bully. The demons were looking at you. And one time they said this, they said, and we hate watching them have coffee because like that was like a big thing for us when Amber was alive, because like every morning, we would have coffee and all the kids would gather around and we would like talk for hours. Wow. I think we all think like we need, we desperately need like this special Jubilee medal of St. Benedict that's blessed 20 times by a priest who lives in a cave. And it's like, no, what you need is to love your wife. Like he hates, he hates romance. He hates joy. He hates human nature. He hates beauty. Right? Like one of my cases that I want to visit on his birthday in New York, we went to a Broadway show and we saw Les Mis and he was healed from watching Les Mis. He was healed of his case of watching Les Mis. Like beauty is a, you know, as a powerful remedy against evil. So I think like that's the thing with like exorcists, like we want like, yeah, that like specialized and you can imagine that's what the cases want to. So like the case is expecting Yoda to show up at their house, right? Who's like been praying in a cave for 20 years and is ready for this, you know, at midnight to like, you know, put this cross up. And it's like, well, no, I show up and they're like, what is this guy going to do, right? But it's like, no, I'm going to teach you how to like obey the commandments and follow the Lord and pray and pray a rosary and, you know, that kind of thing. So yeah, can you build on us a little more? So our history, not that we're close friends, but when I worked for the diocese, I brought them in to talk to the teachers and what I wanted you to talk about was not the exorcism element at all. It was living a spiritual life, which you're very knowledgeable about as well. I mean, you've studied these, you know, these, you know, Saint Tres and I mean, you know, there's all kinds of doctors in the church, but I mean, you're already alluding to it, but it seems like, you know, an exorcism is a dramatic way to be invited into following Christ. Absolutely. So, but most of us have been taken in in ways that we might just dismiss, you know, how I was baptized when I was two months old, you know, and, you know, whatever, but at some point we wake up and of course the devil is around tempting, right? I mean, this is part of life, you know, so, but, you know, the goal is to grow in virtue, to love Christ more, to, you know, to live a more human life. Yeah. A good entrance into what you're saying is the story of Saint John Biony, right where this demoniac is going crazy and he comes out of the confessional and he blesses him and the demoniac says, if there were three of them of him in the world, my kingdom would end. Okay. So it's like terrible story where you're like, are there not three John Biony, you know what I mean? Yeah. Am I not? Are we not bad? You know? Right. Right. Right. But in a certain sense, like that's what we have to focus on in spiritual warfare. Okay. Right. When we choose like to follow the Lord and turn away from the devil, it helps every exorcism. Okay. Like, because don't we get like the way Roman Catholic exorcism is set up is it's in the name and authority of the church. It's not the, just the faith of the priest. That's what's beautiful about Roman Catholic exorcism, right, is that that letter means he stands there for the church. And so the bulwark of holiness of the entire church of the communion of saints of all those is brought to bear on that demonic attachment. So when we fight our own battles, like we help in every way. And so like probably the fifth most common email I get is how can I do what you do? And it's like, you don't want to fight the devil in an exorcism, fight the devil where you're at and you're going to help everyone, you know? And I remember when I was on campus here, do you guys remember Pete Bremburg? Pete, like, he was like a rugby stud before he got cancer, he had to cut, you know, they had to do that surgery and I was like, what? Yeah. Pete. He kind of slings off? No, like his, like the bottom, this like radical surgery to his knee because he had cancer in his knee. Yeah. He's, he's really amazing guy, but he was like a rugby stud. And I remember one time we were playing like Ohio State's like end team or something like that. And there was this guy who was like 500 pounds on their team. What? Yeah, really. He was so big, he could hardly get out of, you know, what he was riding and, and Pete was like, man, I wish we had a guy like that on the team. And I was like, Pete, he could hardly move. And he's like, yeah, but if you just gave him the ball once, they would get so tired, they wouldn't be able to play the rest of the game. And I've always thought about that because when you think of John Biani, when you think of Catherine of Siena, when you think of Hildegard, and like, I mean, Hildegard, it's kind of the Parax Alance, right? They're so holy and Satan is sending so many of his resources to stop them. It helps all of us, right? Like it like takes the pressure off of all of us in a certain sense. And like, I always think about that, you know, yeah. Well, one of our Kate's brother's friend, his name is Ben played rugby at Franciscan. I don't know if you were there when he played, but he was 462 pounds. And who is this? What's your last? What's your name? Can we see his last name? No, no. Hit. That was Ben. And leave in hyper? Yeah. Yeah. He was a force to be able to win. He was losing weight. Wow. He cruised at 490, but he's 462 pounds. Wow. That's amazing. Leaned out. And he played rugby. He would be that big. Just genetics. Just yeah. He was huge. He was huge. A farm guy. He was from Oregon. So this is my brother. Yeah. He's a light snack of four hamburger patties cooked in their own grease. It's like a light snack. But also, but he was like a huge, tall, strong, broad guy. Also, super smart into computers, like he does IT for like Microsoft. But anyway, so one day we're at the rugby game and he finally gets the ball and we lose it. We're ballistic. We're cheering. We're freaking out. He's got the ball. And one enemy player grabs his leg and Ben's just trucking and we're like, "Yeah, yeah." And the guy grabs his leg. Can't do anything. Yeah. And Ben's like, "Yeah." And then a third guy grabs him. It's looking a little uneasy. And a fourth guy. And then a fifth guy. He's watching bear baiting from the Shakespearean party. Yeah. He just goes down and like he can't get up. He's like a turtle on his back and they rip the ball out and they run off. And he's just still like stressing to roll over. Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah. So what's the extent to which people should pay attention to these sorts of conversations? Yeah. Because everyone likes to have them, you know, everyone likes to have an exorcist on their podcast and people are reading about it. They're on spiritual warfare forums. To what extent do we pay attention and to what extent should we tune out? Like when do we say, "Okay, I'm just going to go love my husband and not think about my demons, the demons who are attacking me with names." To be perfectly honest, and the reason I started like my spiritual warfare forum was that once people learn how to respond to temptation and to respond to the normal action of evil spirits personally and then culturally, I don't think we need to pay any attention until things are preternatural. And so like that forum will set up so that people could say, "Hey, this happened in my house. Is this preternatural?" And we could say, "Nope. Don't worry about it. Like everything's okay. Nothing to worry about." Or we could say, "Yeah, you should probably see an exorcist or someone like that." So I think like those two extremes, right, like we teach our kids like how to respond in temptation. We teach our kids how to be culturally active in the war, like praying an abortion clinic and to respond to the kingdom of evil on Earth, right? But then after that, I think the next time you need to worry about the devil is you move into a haunted house or you meet someone who's possessed or something like that. Your kid joins a cult or something. I don't see, I think certainly there's too much focus in our circle because we're kind of in a Catholic bubble here, well, you guys aren't, but I am definitely in the most Catholic bubble of all time. So in my-- We bring that bubble out of where we go. In my bubble-- And my bubble bumps up against it. Yeah, right. It's bubble bumpers. Right, right. So I would say like there's too much focus, certainly. And I say that ironically because I make my living with an event called the Catholic Truth about angels, demons, ghosts, exorcisms, hauntings. So which people can find where can they find you? Oh, the Catholic Truth about angels and demons.com. Okay. So what do you teach your kids about temptation, about how to fight off temptation? Pray and move, you know, the classical thing, and also that if you're doing the right thing that temptation is way easier than responding, right, later. Yeah, that's what I teach them. But mostly for me, like I try to really skew the ratio between the world and truth, beauty and goodness, right? So I'm not like Amish, I don't like my kids, we watch Disney movies, I'm going to go out. Yeah, right. It's very popular. Very popular. Things like that. Which have a lot of darkness in them. I mean, the forces of darkness-- Lot of maternal issues? But that's true. But I think like also the forces of darkness earlier were easier to root out because they were clearer. So if you look at earlier Disney movies, it's like this is bad and it's like all the forces of darkness are right against you as a giant serpent. And now it's kind of diffuse and none of the kids will watch the movie, right? So like the most recent one that came out, the kids-- no kids will touch it with a temple. Why? I don't know. Wish. Wish. Wish. Wish, yeah. It's not-- it doesn't have a clear plot or a clear differentiation in their whole ideas about what desire is, are very sort of disparate and spread out as opposed to like sleeping with you. And it's very sad because there's no redemption. Right. Right. There's no redemption for the guy. There's no struggle in this game. Sorry. You sinned once. Now you're damned forever. And it's so antithetical to the Christian story. Yeah. So not even about our topic at all. But I get annoyed by Disney because of classical stuff because like all of a sudden the switch, it used to be like you went on this journey, you fought the dragon, and you won the princess. And now it's like if you just know who you are, you know, then like that's like, you know what I mean? Like just like that box. It's not from St. George to Descartes. Right. I sort of wish is like when they sing, it's like we're going to have a Broadway musical to defeat evil. It's by our singing. You're like, yes. That's like every theater nerds kids dream, like we'll just sing evil to death. It would be their dream if the songs were good. So it's not because they're not. But okay. So anyway, you're not honest with my kids with my kids, like I'm not. I am not like they trick or treat. They do all things that would scandalize a lot of the people who come to my talks. Okay. But like I make sure that like as far as like truth, beauty and goodness like that that's what is going to move their life, right? Well, Dave, quick, real quick. Give us a quick hot take of trick or treating go like hot take. I know I heard you go. I know. I cannot. I couldn't tell you why it would be bad. I couldn't tell. I'll tell you this. Here's something you can roll your eyes at. Okay. I'll give you one of my cliche things. Mike, I don't do witches because similar to like I wouldn't let my kid dress up like a gladiator because like gladiators killed the Christians and I know witches and witches hate Catholics. They despise Catholics. They spend their days like trying to ruin Catholics life. So I have like a personal thing about them. But it's not because I'm afraid my kids going to get possessed if he dresses like a witch. Yeah. I won't like I won't let the kids I won't let us have Halloween decorations, witches and stuff. Like no, we're not making it. Yeah. But that's about as. It's been a lot of time talking about demons and stuff, but on the flip side, because demons are angelic. Right. Okay. They're like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, they're non-corporate. Right. Yeah. Right. Yeah. They have people to develop their guardian angel because like don't guardian angels and demons. I mean, angels know more because they have like a bit of vision as well. Yeah. Okay. Well, I think just acknowledging that the guardian angel even exists is like countercultural in the church now. Like we've kind of let that go. Right. That is like an elementary thing. So bring in that back. I mean, I teach my kids the guardian angel prayer and then I teach them like the rules of guardian angels. Right. You don't need them. You don't ask for their name. I'm like weird about stuff like that because I have had so many cases of like people asking like, right, we do get a lot of cases of like real like religious like people who are super religious and they like wander away from the rules that you should, you know, follow. Like for instance, like, I'm going to do this retreat and at the end of the retreat, my guardian angel is going to tell me their name. Right. What? Like that's not even Jacob could get a name. He has a book kicked. And he got renamed. He's like, what's your name? I'm trying to rest. Right. It's it's a terrible idea. Right. It's a terrible. Okay. So the rules of guardian angels are don't ever ask for their name. Yeah. And like don't name them also because we don't have power over them. I would say another rule would be unless you're saying to you don't send them on tasks. Like lie. You don't have time. So a popular panel would often go send his guardian angel to find someone. Well, he's on the level. Yeah. So he's okay. But like for me, it's like I need you here. Like. I asked them to talk to somebody else's guardian angel. Yeah. I all the time because they don't. Yeah. Because that would be different than. It's often their heart. Yeah. All the time. All the time. Talk to this person's guardian angel. All the time. Wow. I do. I told my students I'm like, when you're in trouble, listen, I'm not. Yeah. You did what you did. However, when you get called down, but your top three buttons, look as pity bulls possible. And second, pray to the guardian angel of the school administrator who's about to yell at you. Yeah. To soften them. And it always works. Always works. And patter, eat your heart out. Right. Catholic magic. No, it's not real magic. Not real magic for me. Catholic grace. You're going to get your treatment. No, I actually had a conversation at Carnegie Mellon University many years ago about these. Anyway, it's an aside, but these two girls who were Catholic were actually witches. Yeah. And then we had a debate about magic and grace. But what was revealed at the end of it is they actually witches. I was like, oh, this explains a lot. Yeah. Well, there actually, there's a lot of things now really popular in the church. And like really in our circle that I would, I would say, like I would put them in the occult. So what are those things? Ooh. You're gonna get me in so much trouble. You're gonna get me in so much trouble. You're gonna get me in so much trouble. Okay. Only season. If they don't worry. We'll protect you. Visiting the army. I think like there's a little bit of an issue with like teaching people that if I ask God for a message, then the next thing in my mind is from God, I think that that's pretty dangerous. That's superstitious. I mean, flipping the Bible open to the random passage you mean like this is a little bit. A little bit. Yeah. I would find that suspect immediately. First of all, God is not under my control. Well, I would tell you that a lot of faithful Catholics that you follow are teaching that regularly to people now. Okay. Stop teaching that. Or using that. Or using that. That's weird. To teach. So wait, so in having looked at all of salvation history, they're like, hey guys, it's actually easy. Just ask God for a message and he'll send it right away because that's how he works. He's expressed that zero times. I think that's the reason I think that the reason they use that would be that they think like this is how you start listening for those messages, like to be open to it. And so they would say like, just speak it, whatever came to your mind, just speak it. And I think that's really wrong. What else? What's another good example? I think like there's like a little bit of most of these are within the cares, macronool like prophecy used to be like, well, God spoke something and I preach God's word. And I think there's a little bit of a weird thing now where prophecy, they teach it as like you have the ability to speak God's word into existence, like in a certain sense. Like, for instance, like someone will come up to me at a conference and they'll say, what are your biggest needs right now? And I'll say, well, I'm broke and they'll say, oh, I'm going to prophesy wealth into your life. Like that to me is very. Yeah, let's prophesy wealth into your life, like our needs are Catholic. Yes. Like, yes. Good vibes times eleven. I mean, it sounds, yeah, it sounds like it's not too good to be true, right? Like, it's so good. It's like someone to prophesy wealth into my life. Yeah. We have every kitchen appliance that's currently created. Yeah. Right. Someone please prophesy. The friend broke an hour ago. Yeah. Emily would like someone to prophesy a refrigerator. The fridge and the garbage disposal. I'm sure my family's not under attack right now. Oh, my gosh, that's what that's like 98% of my job is like people. That's another thing. I'm very suspect about saying I'm under attack. I mean, it's a fallen world. So I'm like, yeah, things break, you know, right? I don't know. I mean, you know, again, it's easy, but don't forget this skews both ways, right? Like, it's like either under attack or like you break yourself on, you're like, I'm having the dark night of the soul. Right? So you're not going to have a few of those you've been to church for 18 years and you're coming out through this dark night of the soul. I have known as when I write about something. Yeah, that there's an uptick. There's an uptick in things like or if I write something really beautiful about like loving your body, then like I'm beset with temptations to hate my body. So that certainly is on the nose, satanic activity, right? Like that they just are going to make you pay for that. And I mean, this is like 20 years of writing. Yeah. It happens every time we take it on and Chris is like, okay, you know, this is going to be tough. Certainly. Certainly it happens. Certainly it happens. And usually, for the most part, it will be like, can I get them to despair, you know? Because that's the goal, right? To get you to despair of God's grace is the goal of the goal of every demon is to have you in mortal sin and dead as soon as possible, but, you know, they're so all those things, you know, temptation, you know, possession, obsession. The goal is, right, what they, the way they always work, their common pattern is they lead you away with temptation and they keep you coming forward and they hope that by the time you look back to God, that the chasm will be so large that you'll think his mercy can't fill that. And that's when they have, you know, like, so like my case is that I still have like that have been ongoing for years that I still continue to work with. Like on the way here, I was texting one of my cases like, yes, you've not committed the unforgivable sin. God loves you, no matter what you've done, no matter what his mercy is greater, there's nothing you've, you know, like I'm constantly reminding them of that. So kind of a scrupulosity. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I would say like, like, I, you know, I'm very much aligned with you in terms of, okay, okay, people chill out about the demons. Yeah. But I do sometimes feel like as doing the type of writing I do that I'm like putting a target on my back. Yeah. That's what I struggle with here's, and I'm going to speak something that's going to help. And then I'm going to be faced with a lot of, like it's a, so I don't know, I don't know where that's over. That's just my own human weaknesses. No, no. I think, I think that is true. I think, I think oftentimes what it is is that they're attacking you all the time. Okay. They're doing everything they can to draw you to hell. There's no, you know, always. But when we do things to bring others, it becomes more physical, more like on the nose, more apparent, and then it's like they kind of like show their, it's like an animal you back into a corner, they're going to rear their head, you know, like that kind of thing. So, yeah, I mean, certainly it happens. And I do, we deal with that a lot. I mean, this is, I mean, not, not, not that any of us are victim souls, but right? Like this is like kind of the concept of a victim soul is that like they're taking the brunt of this because they're praying for souls and they're trying to, they're, they're being apostles. Right. And so, yeah, the devil's not going to be happy about that. So before we wrap things up, I want to ask you one last thing about deliverance prayers. Like, what prayer should we pray? Oh, no. What prayer should we not pray? The worst question ever. Like when we're being prepared, what like goes? Okay. Don't say this. Like what are kind of the rules with those? Who should be ready? So you're, you're ready for people to complain about my answer. I think I probably already, I, I, I just have to time quote you when I'm writing this thing. So he complained about me. Okay, let's say the hard and fast rules and then we'll say what the best practices, the hard and fast rules are this. No lay person can use a reserved prayer and the reserved prayers as of right now would be like any exorcism ritual that was like before the last 200 years. Okay. Plus the, the formal exorcism ritual that's currently in use, the one from 600 years ago that's not currently, well, it's half in use, half not in use, and then a prayer called the exorcism against Satan and the fallen angels by Pope Leo the 13th, okay? A lot of lay people have been using that one, the exorcism against Satan and the fallen angels and, and what they'll say is like they'll pass it out and it'll say a lay person can pray this in his own name. Okay. That is not allowed. No matter what it says, it is not allowed. It should never be prayed. It is very similar to the prayer that is the original prayer to St. Michael. The original prayer to St. Michael is for sure allowed to be prayer. It's great. It's a wonderful prayer. I recommend it all the time, but they're very similar so they get confused oftentimes. So those are the three that we know, no chance, no lay person can ever pray them. They're written with priestly language. We should not be using them and that's, that's that. Okay. Now, should an ex, should a lay person address a demon directly? Yeah. Can you guys, can in law, like you're not allowed in personated priest duties? I don't, interesting. I don't know where it would fall under, but they're under, it's reserved. I mean, that's, you know, even, yeah, so, uh, now, can an exorcism address a demon directly using imperative language or imprecatory language? That's where the big debate is, the big debate is should a lay person use imprecatory language at all. My, my humble opinion is you don't need to, I, there is no document saying you can't. There is no document saying you can't, no matter what anyone says, there's no document saying, there's no document saying you can't. Are there, are there any female saints that, oh, that way? Yes. Oh, absolutely. Um, St. Catherine of Siena, let me think. Did she use imprecatory language? She was non-ordained. But I'm going to say if Jesus and you were having one on one chats on your bed, like, so she, she hit the head on that, right? So authority comes from three places, right? Could be from office, come from carism, or come from holiness. Holiness is where we want to put, like, right? But Hildegard would be the one who is the example, right? She, she did all kinds of things and exorcisms that were reserved for priests, but she had a letter from the Pope saying she could do that, like, she was allowed to. So now, so the question is, can, can a lay person say, I command you, David, to be gone in the name of Jesus? The answer has not been determined, so it's really up to the local ordinary. And so the local bishops often have rules about what a lay person is allowed to say. And this is coming about because of unbound, it's so popular, right? So a lot of local ordinary is just starting to release, release things. My, my plea is that I would say, like, I have never needed to use that language. I have never needed to say, I command you. I can just say, God, can you help this person and, and you're going to get a response, right? Or, or even I don't say that, even I just oftentimes, like, if someone comes to me, first of all, I say, no, I don't do deliverance prayer at all. But if someone begs me and they're like, I can't have, please, please, please, please. I might hold their hand and pray the rosary, like I wouldn't, I don't address the demon directly because I don't think you need to. Now, let's say lay people shouldn't be using that command prayer. You can use it like in the middle of the night, you hear something and you suspect Satan's power or something like that, you can use it, okay? But what we say is like you probably shouldn't use it over another person, okay? Because in the case that they were seriously afflicted by evil, there could be major blowback. And that's actually the phrase the church uses, like when they talk about the reserved prayers, they say lay people shouldn't use it because of the possible blowback that could come about from you. Like you are not ready for what Satan is about to throw at you. Exactly. If you use that. Yeah. Also, and it's because you don't have the authority in Satan, such an authority rules guy. Yeah. And what I would say is that what I would say is this. There are like more qualified theologians out there that we all know who would say that is ridiculous. Dave should not put any limit on what a lay person can say, okay, a lay person should be able to command demons no matter what. Then there are people who say on the opposite end, the more traditional side, like no, there are all these rules and you know if you can pray over this person, if you have this or if you're this authority or if you have this and it's ridiculous too. The real answer is somewhere in the middle, right? That like, what should we do? What is prudent to do? And what's prudent is to just pray fervently. You don't necessarily need to use language that you've seen in a movie or something like that. You don't have to repeat prayers three times. Right. Do an incantation. Because the apostles did say, Lord, we saw somebody casting out demons in your name. He's like, well, what about your own, like if you're in a state of sin? Like, should you be praying deliverance prayers to a sin? Deliverance prayers? No. And certainly what I would say is like, if it were to your child, the bonds of charity would say, yeah, you should respond, right? But yeah, no, you shouldn't be doing deliverance ministry if you're in mortal sin. There's no, no question. And in fact, what we would say is like, you would want to hit like kind of a level of stability where it's been a while since mortal sin has been a part of your life, right? So like you would want to have a serious prayer life. You would want to be pretty separate from moral sin. It's like, in fact, you'd want to be at the level where deliberate venial sin is not really a big part of your life. So we're also seeing you a lot worse than a stolen dinosaur from the museum. You know, I know what you did behind the barn. Oh, no. I always think like, man, is that what you're going to pick out? Like, thanks, right? Yeah. I know that makes you look so good. Dean was like, looked through your entire life and then they were like, you were five. So I think we need to start kind of wrapping things up. We've talked for like an over an hour, well over an hour. We're going to have to have Dave back. We have to have Dave back. Dave, let, how can people find out how to book you for a speech? Where can they follow you online? Sure. The Catholic truth about angels and demons has everything and yeah, I'm happy to, happy to have you. And you're also on other podcasts too, such as every knee shell bow with sentient press. You can run it there. Press.com, yeah, lots of stuff coming out. Awesome. Anything else you want to say before we wrap it up? Pray for me. We'll do that. All right. Thanks, Dave. We're very glad you came. Thank you. Let's go. Let's go eat chili. [Music] [MUSIC PLAYING] [BLANK_AUDIO]