Yesterday was an historic day. At five o’clock in the evening Vatican time, on the solemnity of the Annunciation, Pope Francis led a beautiful prayer consecrating Ukraine and Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, in order to bring about world peace. The whole Church prayed with him. There were prayer services all over the world to coincide with the official consecration in Rome. Even I, cynic that I am, stopped what I was doing and prayed “Most Holy... Read more
I want to draw your attention to an excellent piece by my friend Scott Eric Alt over at “To Give A Defense.” It’s about yet another attempt at mass hysteria concerning Pope Francis’s consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Virgin Mary scheduled for today. The Fatimaniacs are attempting to gin up a conspiracy theory that one of the titles of Mary, “Earth of Heaven,” is either a mistaken translation of “queen of Heaven” which would invalidate the consecration, or... Read more
It’s been hard to sleep the past few nights, and then the nightmares started. I kept waking up with a start, but every time I fell back asleep I would find myself in another active shooter situation, trying and failing to protect another pack of children. In one dream I was hiding in the house of somebody I didn’t know, trying to protect their sleeping daughters from a burglar who’d broken in with a gun. In another, Rosie, Michael... Read more
Hello everyone, this isn’t a real blog post, this is just my usual reminder that Steel Magnificat and my family run entirely on tips. I get a tiny paycheck from Patheos for clicks in the United States. Sometimes that’s as high as three figures, and sometimes it only comes every two months. I get royalties for my books once a year but they don’t go very far. Ninety percent of my income so far is just gratuities from readers... Read more
I want to say a couple of things to people who have been spiritually abused in Charismatic settings: particularly to people like me, who are recovering Charismatics that still want to practice religion and find their own ways of talking and listening to God, but might not be sure how to go about doing it. If you were Charismatic for a long time or since childhood, you might not realize the ways healthy boundaries have been violated or what’s... Read more
When I was a little girl, I heard a Chinese myth, about a day when the sun didn’t rise. I don’t know why I liked it so much. Maybe because it’s another story about supernatural darkness and a pack of noisy demons, but much more hopeful and interesting than those hideous three days of darkness. The story concerns a phoenix who lives somewhere to the east of everything. In China it’s a phoenix who carries the sun on her... Read more
I woke up under that terrible weight– the fear that I am going to hell. I’m nearly used to the feeling now. I’ve had it for a long time. It started last April and got decidedly worse over the winter. Now, after the events of last week, it’s the worst it’s ever been. And yesterday was particularly terrible. For so many years, I’ve been determined that they couldn’t chase me away. I was going to go to confession even... Read more
I sincerely hoped that I would not have to write about Fatima and Fatima conspiracy theorists again, but here we are. The Pope is going to consecrate Russia, and Ukraine, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary later this month, just as the Fatima visionaries said that the Virgin Mary wanted the Pope to do. He’s even going to have a bonus consecration said at the Fatima shrine in Portugal simultaneously. This isn’t the first time Russia was consecrated to the... Read more
I don’t know were to begin. My head is still spinning with the events of the weekend. People have told me that it’s narcissistic of me to be traumatized by the Morrier case, and they’re probably right, but I can’t help it. I was already suffering from religious trauma before I saw the news of his indictment last April, and I am worse off now. The only thing I know how to write about is me: my experiences, my life,... Read more
In case you have not heard, David Morrier, whom I will not call “Father” ever again, has pleaded guilty to sexual battery. Shockingly, he only received probation, but at least he will have to register as a sex offender. It happened today, a few days ahead of the upcoming trial, which had been put off with continuance after continuance for about a year, just downtown in the Jefferson County courthouse. My long-term readers will remember how closely I’ve been... Read more
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