The Work

When you get into this line of work, it is very hard for you to leave it, even if you do you always return. It’s not for the "fun" as there is no fun but something keeps drawing you back into it and you can’t ever leave.

There is some element of danger involved in this work, you never know when or where the opponent mainly the devil is going to strike next, it could just be against you or your loved ones. So you have to be on guard, every moment you cannot let your guard down, not even for a minute. Just when you are not prepared for it the enemy will strike and he will hit you good right at your weakest point.

Not too many years after initially getting into the work, Larry and I would encounter just what the enemy could inflict on us, just for helping someone in need.

Three years ago we had a really bad case that involved a child that was being bothered by an entity that the child called the bad life. This child would be shown and told things that no child would ever know from watching TV. The entity tortured this child by inflicting terror on him by threatening to kill the parents if they found out. This is a common "promise" from these kinds of entities on small children, this is something that the demon would know would cause this young child distress, no young child wants to be responsible for the death of their own parents.

We traveled a great distance to help this child and we were successful in helping him become free from this entity. Simple? Right? Not really, the entity retaliated not on the child but on us, on the way home our car began to act strangely. At first it stalled a few times at traffic lights or stop signs, then it began to chug as if there was no energy in it. All though we were on a major highway, we could not keep the car up to 50 miles per hour.

We finally pulled over and called road assistance. At first there was some confusion as to where we were broken down, even though I had pulled right next to a mile marker the dispatcher told me that there was no such mile marker in the state. I then told her the last exit I had passed still some hesitation on her part but finally after 45 minutes the tow truck came out. At first he was a welcomed sight, but it slowly turned into the beginning of a night mare when he climbed down from the truck’s cab.

In a look that can only be described as stepping out of the movie "Deliverance" he approached our car. He looked over our car and exclaimed: " I don’t work on no foreign cars" and then got back into his truck and drove off.

I had no other choice but to continue, we drove another 400 miles until the car stopped, dead on the side of the thruway. I kept trying to start the car over and over, it began to smell like I had flooded the engine.

Soon a state trooper stopped to see if he could be of assistance, since this thruway has a very strict rule about cars being stuck on the side, he offered to give me 30 minutes to get it started again. So again I cranked the engine, but it did not start. Soon a tow truck pulled up and Larry and I got out of the car. There all under the car was a large puddle of gas that had come out of our car somehow. The tow truck driver felt our gas line had ruptured. So he towed us into a local garage where we could rent another car and make the last 200 miles of our trip home.

The next week was filled with calling the garage. First the mechanic could not find what had happened to the car. Then another phone call from him told us that the tail pipe and exhaust system had filled with gas, somehow. Still another phone call informed us that the engine was also filled with gas but that there was no logical explanation for this occurrence.

He went over every inch of the car, did a complete engine rebuilt, three oil changes and still could not figure out what had caused the car to do what it did. He explained that Volvo’s are not built to be able to do this and that with all the gas in the engine, on the ground, in the exhaust system and with me continually cranking the engine to start, it was a miracle that we did not get blown sky high from a spark igniting the gas. His last words to us were; " someone must have been looking out for you"

We would soon find out that someone would be called on once again to look out for us.

It was the Lenten season in 2003 and Larry being a deacon was busy with Friday’s stations of the cross, doing his communion calls and helping our parish priest with home calls and such. To add to this turmoil a fellow parishioner was diagnosed with cancer and was to have surgery on a Monday, April 7 to remove the tumor.

After mass that morning we walked with to her son’s car to offer some encouraging words. We had only just about said good morning to her son when there was a sound of a car engine revving up followed by the sound of metal hitting metal. I had the feeling of falling backwards as if I was caught in a throng of people that were pushing me back until I fell on the ground. I have a fear of falling and hurting myself so I immediately thought Oh God no I fell. I looked around to see where Larry was and saw him pinned under the car, which was still backing down the drive way. Larry was caught under the tailgate portion of the Chevrolet Station wagon. He seemed to slip and the car ran over him, now he was caught in the under carriage of the car, and still the car backed up.

Next the car ran over Larry on the passenger side and the driver seemed to come to some kind of sense and he turned the wheel and the driver side wheel ran over Larry and this caused him to be flung up on the grass of the rectory. He hit that area but rolled back down in front of the car where he laid seriously injured. He was run over a total of three times as the car careened down the driveway of the church.

At the time we did not know the extent of Larry’s injuries, I never knew that he was given practically no chance of living. But two weeks later Larry was able to leave the hospital, the doctors that took care of him said it was a miracle that he survived. Once again we were saved from the onslaught of the devil by God.

Two years have since passed since the accident, the devil has tried his little tricks to get us angry at each other, to loose things on us and to try and make our life unpleasant, but through our faith and a genuine desire to help people, we have survived. But we always wonder what the devil has in store for us, we found that answer to that just two days ago the next move in this chest game between good and evil.

We came home from work as usual and immediately smelled smoke in our kitchen. At first it was an alarming thing as our landlady’s son smokes and we figured that he was over helping her. But as we got farther into our apartment the smell of smoke was more prevalent.

We both ran around looking for the cause, I ran into the den and found that Larry’s altar was terribly burned. The hob nail candle sticks were completely melted and unrecognizable, his pewter chalice had a huge hole in it, as if some metal piercing missiles had been fired through it. The paten that holds the Holy Eucharist was melted over the top of the chalice. Sacramental linen that was on the altar was destroyed. The top and front were charred as was the wall behind the altar, but the amazing thing was that most of the holy items on the altar were not damaged, almost as if the fire went around them.

Larry has a true relic of the cross that is kept in a large wooden cross, which was not touched, not even scorched, it looked as if the fire was diverted around it by some unseen protective barrier. His mass prayer book was also untouched and the area that it was in also looked as if the fire went around it.

There is an icon of Jesus and Mary that was barely scorched as well as the pix that holds the body of Christ. Also on the altar was a relic of the Virgin Mary, the back still had the sacramental linen attached to it where the fire had burned around it, we pulled off the linen and found that the relic was intact just a few scorch marks on the back between the medal of the frame and the linen that was left on it. Also the wooden stand that the relic usually stands on was not touched, the fire once again looked as if it were diverted around it.

The altar has a drawer in the front all though the front of the drawer both inside and out were charred by the fire, none of the religious books inside was touched by the fire.

What had caused such a bizarre fire? There could be many causes. Larry could have left the candles burning, but the candles would have been burned out near the bottom, and could candles left burning have generated enough heat to turn hob nail candle holders to liquid so they could melt? And could this kind of fire also melt pewter as it did with the paten or generate enough heat to burn a hole through one side of a pewter chalice and out the other side.

And how can you explain the damage to some areas and not to other areas, as well as no damage to anything surrounding the altar, except for the small fire damage to the wall. There were very combustible things on either side of the altar that were not touched. It was as if the altar was the fire’s prime goal.

You can find an explanation for the fire like leaving the candles burning that could have ignited the linen, but can you find an explanation in why some things were destroyed, the candle sticks, the chalice and the linen, but why didn’t the wooden cross, the relic, the wooden stand or the religious books not burn. If the fire was hot enough to melt glass and pewter than with all logic the whole room should have gone up in flames.

We feel that this was once again an attempt by the evil realm to try and destroy our work, and that once again Devine intervention was sent our way. We will continue to do the work and we will continue to be on alert to anything the devil might send our way.

Check out pictures that we took.