>I am happy with the warnings aired by Fr. Jose Francisco Syquia against indulging into seances such as spirit of the glass, ouija board and other tools for contacting dead people’s spirits because as the priest himself said “spirit of the glass is an occult means to get in touch with fallen angels.”

In fact, in my previous columns in Balita I warned people against doing these practices because demons or should I say “fallen angels” as Fr. Syquia called evil spirits could disguise themselves as the spirits of the dead people, dead relatives, angels etc. http://misteryo.blogspot.com/2005/04/babala-laban-sa-paggamit-ng-spirit-of.html

I always advice people not to summon the souls of their dead relatives but let’s just give them open chances to communicate with us if they have something to tell us that could help us in our daily lives.

Nevertheless, souls can be contacted thru seances though people involved must know the pros and cons of the practice to avoid demonic possessions. Other form of mediumship like channeling could contact the dead and even higher spirits like GOD could also be communicated by these means of spiritism.

Dead people could also manifest thru dreams wherein our physical body is completely at a very relax state. During sleep state when our body and the conscious mind rest, the subconscious part is very active, a way spirits whether dead relatives or other entities could communicate and send us messages.

In fact, not only souls of the dead but also GOD and other higher beings such as good angels could contact or communicate with us while we are sleeping because it is the time that our conscious mind and these disembodied spirits meet. My opinion at this point is contrary to the statement of Fr. Syquia when he said “neither God, the holy angels nor the souls of the dead use occult practices like Spirit of the Glass to send messages to the living.”

As the priest declared occult practices used by the New Age people are all for contacting evil spirits, I would say it depends on what the intentions are for executing such acts because in fairness to other practitioners, they used seances as the last resort to help people especially those relatives of the dead but should be done with extra caution by the experienced individuals.

Now, about the practice of New Age, what is evil about them? Is meditation as one of the new age practices evil? How about holistic healing, is it evil? The Wikipedia defines New Age as “the alternative spiritual subculture interested in such things as meditation, channelling, reincarnation, crystals, psychic experience, holistic health, environmentalism, other fields associated with pseudoscience and anomalous phenomena, and various “unsolved mysteries” such as UFOs, Earth mysteries and Crop circles. Typical activities of this subculture include participation in study or meditation groups, attendance at lectures and fairs; the purchase of books, music, and other products such as crystals or incense; and patronage of fortune-tellers, healers and spiritual counselors.”

As an ordinary citizen and a paranormal researcher, I can’t question the authority of the Church people involved in spiritual battle against evil but I know I have the right to air my own personal views and I would like to appeal to Church to please refrain from saying “sweeping statements” and don’t label all practitioners of the New Age as “evil” and only those in the Church are “holy.”

For our readers information, New Age people are those engaged in occult practices never recognized by the Church or should I say not publicly acknowledged which for them are ways to contact the forces of evil. Though there are some priests could see nothing wrong with New Age practice.

But in fairness to many good New Age practitioners, they do some of these spiritual practices to help people and the spirits as well especially those “soul roamers” to ascend to higher levels of consciousness on the other side of this life.

Occult practices earned its bad connotations mostly associated with evil thru Church campaign but in fact when you look for its true meaning, the word “occult” is derived from the latin “occultus” means clandestine, hidden or secret. These practices were hidden because the Church declared them as evil and not to be practiced.

I would like also to clarify and maybe the Church people would listen that not all nature spirits like elves, dwarves, kapre, tikbalang and fairies are bad. Most of them I would say are “naughty” but not evil. Please let’s respect their existence because they themselves are also living in duality like us in this plane of existence – good and bad. Take note: GOD created them ahead of the physcial realm and not all are evil.

Fr. Syquia even attacked Faith Healers (Herbolarios) saying “herbolarios themselves had powers coming from doubtful sources because they had no divine authority to drive away evil spirits.”

As far as I know, most Faith Healers are asking for GOD’s intervention to assist them to heal the sicked and wicked people, of course we can’t deny the fact that there are other practitioners, who abuse their inner powers.

I hope any member of the Church would respect other people and other entity’s rights to evolve their spirituality and not just making sweeping comments that those engage in New Age practices are unholy, maybe some but not all.

Instead of airing such negative comments against a sector (new age), I would suggest the church people should cleanse first their ranks from “unholy” priests, who are accused of sexual acts and abuse.

The Church should admit the fact that many of their members are maybe “possessed” by evil spirits. That’s why I may suggest the Church should exorcise first their members before labelling others as demon practitioners.

For Fr. Syquia’s Story:
http://newsinfo.inq7.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view_article.php?article_id=29896