While hyperventilating, I slowly peered around the corner again but the ghastly figure was nowhere to be seen. My cousin ran towards me to see where I was at. I asked if she saw anything and she said she did not. Looking back, I\u2019m almost certain what I saw was a figment of my imagination running wild while playing. But what strikes me is the sheer detail I remember of the grisly hand as well as the seemingly\u00a0graceful movement of whatever I saw.<\/p>\n
This vision, although very brief and obscure, haunts me to this very day.<\/p>\n
Similarly, I also remember how my mind used to conjure up other very strange sights when I was young. Sometimes at night I could\u00a0visualize ghastly faces in the wood-grain panelling of\u00a0my bedroom. Once in a while in between dreaming and waking up, I swore I could see terrifying skeleton-like apparitions with enlongated craniums lingering in the doorway of my room, glaring and smiling at me so dauntingly while I lay helplessly. There was something about lying in bed at night that made me feel extremely vulnerable. It was as though I could be abducted and swept off into the night by some hellish entity. I can\u2019t say that I\u2019ve ever experienced sleep paralysis, but these visions could easily be dismissed as half-dreaming hallucinations.<\/p>\n
Praying The Rosary For Comfort<\/h2>\n
As a child, when it came to dealing with these\u00a0fears, I used to say the rosary for comfort. While I didn\u2019t usually have the beads conveniently in my hands while lying in bed, I would often keep track of the prayers by counting them on my fingers as I would recite them. Like counting sheep, repetitious prayer was a means of distracting my mind when it was spinning out of control. There was something especially soothing about praying the Our Father and Hail Mary prayers as though I was replacing any unwanted entities with a Fatherly and Motherly presence in my room.<\/p>\n
Admittedly as I grew older, the rosary began to lose its attraction. Sometimes I only recited it out of obligation because it was just something we did. I remember when I was 11, the priest told me in confession to say 50 Hail Mary\u2019s for my penance. It seemed on-par with writing lines on the chalkboard in detention at school. Realistically it was\u00a0almost the equivalent of reciting the rosary in its entirety.<\/p>\n
I think it was that era of my life when I started to view\u00a0the rosary as\u00a0a form of punishment.<\/p>\n
But everything I once found comforting about the rosary was ripped apart\u00a0when I was 17 years old. After opening up my life to a guest speaker at a Christian youth camp I attended one summer, I was manipulated into believing that the rosary was a form of idolatry. I was told by this man (whom I soon found out was staunchly anti-Catholic) that it was a recycled pagan occult ritual used to deceive people into worshipping Mary\u00a0instead of Christ. And so my impressionable mind ate it all up, all under the guise of believing it was completely unbiblical.<\/p>\n
My decision to convert to Protestant Evangelicalism\u00a0was largely done out of fear, and not one I took lightly. Despite growing up in a Catholic home, I had absolutely no understanding\u00a0of what the foundations of my faith were. Nor could I grasp\u00a0why the Catholic Church teaches what it does. I refrained from praying the rosary in fear of invoking the wrath of God upon myself.<\/p>\n
Vain Repetition?<\/h2>\n
In all fairness, Protestant Christians are right to be hesitant\u00a0to embrace the Catholic understanding of prayer. But after realizing that there is a reason\u00a0to every teaching, I decided to start digging into my old roots. While most Christians believe that\u00a0prayer and worship are synonymous, the Catholic Church teaches that prayer\u00a0is apart<\/em> from worship.<\/p>\n In my bachelor days after high school,\u00a0I often cycled between living alone and having several roommates. While I preferred having a place to myself, I sometimes experienced strange and eerie moments. I would walk into a room to find the air had turned cold and the hairs on my neck stood on end. I often avoided any place or situation where I felt even slightly creeped-out. Because of my drastic conversion out of Catholicism, my method of prayer was completely overhauled. I went from so-called \u2018vain repetition\u2019 to relying on the Holy Spirit to give me the words to speak on the spot. What was once a meditative calming technique to ward off the darkness suddenly became a means of invoking it\u00a0because I was taught supposedly behind every idol is a demon.<\/p>\n Granted\u00a0this, I often felt like I had very few words to say. Sometimes I would fill in the blanks with, \u2018Lord God Lord Father oh Lord Father God Lord Jesus.<\/em>\u2019<\/i>\u00a0Some could say that my lack of improvisation is evidence\u00a0of a Christ-less void\u00a0in my heart. But I would argue that in some ways, vain repetition isn\u2019t limited to robotically reciting the same prayer. But also babbling empty phrases to make myself appear pretentiously holy to those who might be listening.<\/p>\n One of the most common misunderstandings about the rosary is whether it exalts Mary above Jesus. Most Christians would argue (often by quoting 1 Timonthy 2:5) that people shouldn\u2019t pray to Mary or any dead saints because they can pray to Jesus directly as the only mediator between God and man. But if God hears all of our prayers, then why do we feel it necessary to ask others to pray for us? Are our sole personal prayers not sufficient enough to acquire results? And if God hears the collective prayers of the living, why wouldn\u2019t the saints in heaven be aware of the events on earth? And why wouldn\u2019t they pray for us as well?<\/p>\n Many people would condemn prayers to the dead as a form of necromancy. I would argue necromancy involves a\u00a0method of prying<\/em> information from the spiritual realm through the use of occult mediums \u2013 like an Ouija board for example. I remember trying out an Ouija board with a friend for the first (and last) time when I was 12. At the time, my\u00a0preteen self was only focused on video games and Star Wars. So I asked it if I would eventually get a Nintendo 64 gaming console. Of course, it replied \u2018yes\u2019. And sure enough, 6 months later I bought myself an N64 after\u00a0raising enough money for it by doing chores on my parent\u2019s farm.<\/p>\n Am I guilty of necromancy for asking an Ouija board about the future? Sure, I won\u2019t deny it. But, in my own opinion, there is a difference between asking for help and prying for answers. I could have prayed to God to help me get a Nintendo 64, but it certainly doesn\u2019t mean He would actually let me have one. Sometimes prying\u00a0for answers can be rooted in selfish motives like cheating on a written exam. In Catholic theology, asking the saints to pray for us is no different than\u00a0asking our living brothers and sisters to do the same. After all, the dead in Christ are more alive than they ever were on earth.<\/p>\n As far as the rosary is concerned, I\u2019ve written an article called Is Prayer Equal To Worship?<\/a> It explains how the Catholic view of intercessory prayer is deeply rooted in Scripture. I am in no way trying to convince people to pray to someone who isn\u2019t Christ Himself. But what I would like to emphasize is that prayer\u00a0is communicating an earnest request between living beings. Prayer requires some form of relationship, or communion. And if I ask a dear friend of mine\u00a0to pray for me, I am essentially \u2018praying\u2019 to them<\/a> to pray to God. And, like a relationship with a friend, the meditative qualities of the rosary not only reflect on a relationship with Jesus, but also with His Mother.<\/p>\n As Catholics, we are not required to pray to Mary. We can pray directly to Jesus anytime just like our Protestant friends. But the way we see it, getting to know Mary helps us better get to know Jesus.<\/p>\n Prayer has always been a habit I was absolutely terrible at maintaining. I\u2019ve grown up with the practical mindset that God gave me a brain and two hands to put to use. Though prayer\u00a0was always something lacking in my life and is (still) always the last thing on my mind.\u00a0I\u2019ve also developed a certain skepticism about whether or not my prayers were actually really effective. Sometimes I would think to myself, \u2018If the only time I talk to God is when I need something, why would He want to follow through?<\/em>\u2018 In some ways, I feel like the son who barely talks to his own father unless he needs money to bail himself out for some stupid choices. This goes back to the emphasis on prayer requiring some kind of relationship. If someone was disowned by their parents, asking for money for whatever reason would be kind of awkward. But, like the Prodical Son, we are always welcome to come into a relationship with God anytime.<\/p>\n After reconnecting with a few of my Catholic friends, they invited me to join a weekly rosary group. Unlike how I used to pray, nobody in the group was trying to get it done quickly. I\u2019ve always remembered the prayers being long and repetitious. But there was a sense of passion in everyone\u2019s words. Even though repetition can easily get old fast, there was a level of intensity in these prayers I had never experienced before.\u00a0I\u2019m convinced it had a lot to do with the people whom I\u00a0had been praying with. Their hearts were in their words.\u00a0I also have to admit, I was quite rusty. I messed up many times but nobody made a big deal out of it. There were even parts of the rosary I did not remember ever praying when I was young.<\/span>\u00a0This only\u00a0proved how out-of-touch I really was\u00a0with the church I grew up with.<\/span><\/p>\n As for myself, I am a man of few words when it comes to prayer. Sometimes, I don\u2019t really know what to say. And sometimes, it\u2019s okay to not\u00a0be a huge talker. Since I\u2019m awful at improvising, I\u2019m the kind of guy who needs a bit of structure in my life. I use the rosary for not only the meditative and reflective qualities, but also the \u2018spending quality-time\u2019 factor. Usually it takes me about twenty minutes to recite it. Sometimes I\u2019ll sit on the couch or lie in bed and pray it because I have nothing better to do. Sometimes I\u2019ll even fall asleep in the middle of it. Or sometimes I\u2019ll be going through an extremely stressful situation\u00a0where I need to distract my mind by immersing myself into the repetitive words when nothing else will calm me down.<\/p>\n Going back to the paranormal topic, the most recent experience I\u2019ve had with sensing a dark presence was in my own basement. There was a chill down my spine as I walked down the stairs. I felt as though I was not alone. It was like I was being watched. It was as though an unwanted house-guest had overstayed its welcome and started to become territorial. I called my Christian friends to pray for my household, then I stood in the middle of the basement and prayed the rosary. And strangely enough, the hostile presence I felt had lifted.<\/p>\n With the combination of my friend\u2019s prayers as well as Mary\u2019s intercession to Christ, there is sure comfort in knowing we are surrounded by a cloud of witnesses.<\/a><\/p>\nNecromancy or Intercessory Prayer?<\/h2>\n
Starting Good Habits<\/h2>\n
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<\/p>\nA Cloud of Witnesses<\/h2>\n