Become Who You Are
What’s the meaning and purpose of my life? What is my true identity? Why were we created male and female? How do I find happiness, joy and peace? How do I find love that lasts, forever? These are the timeless questions of the human heart. Join Jack Rigert and his guests for lively insights, reading the signs of our times through the lens of Catholic Teaching and the insights of Saint John Paul ll to guide us.
Saint Catherine of Siena said "Become who you are and you would set the world on fire".
Become Who You Are
#575 "Freedom From Darkness": Teresa Yanaros Journey Back From The Occult
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Teresa Yanaros, a seasoned journalist and devout Catholic, takes us through her dramatic spiritual journey from the throes of New Age and occult practices to finding deliverance in Christ. She unpacks the concerning trend of people turning away from organized religion, diving into the realm of "spiritual but not religious." Teresa shares how her personal encounters with these practices led her to spiritual deception and how her return to faith now fuels her mission to help others break free. Through her insights, learn how to discern between false spiritual practices and the true path to faith in Jesus.
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I am excited to be with Teresa Llaneros. Teresa is a journalist, devout Catholic, dedicated to addressing the growing trend of dissatisfaction with, disaffiliation with religion, where many turned to spiritual but not religious ideologies, leading to New Age and occult practices. Earlier in her career, llaneros was a successful author and speaker, exploring modern American spiritualism and attempting to reconcile it with Christianity, before experiencing a radical deliverance from the cult deception. Now she coaches ex-New Agers returning to Christ and provides Catholics with the tools to resist cultural traps Through her growing ministry of online resources, classes, youtube and her blog Spirit Sanctified, yoneros helps Christians stand firm against deception In her new book Freedom from Darkness. It's very interesting too, teresa. I can't wait to talk about that. She offers a practical roadmap that explains how people become ensnared in the occult and provides a path to freedom through repentance, conversion and the sacraments Teresa welcome.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me, Jack. I'm excited for our conversation today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you. This is a very interesting book and I have to tell you we are with the John Paul True Renewal Center. We're out speaking all the time and this new age and occult practices, spiritual type thing. It's bigger than most people think. It's not some little tiny thing in the corner anymore, is it? Teresa?
Speaker 2:The awareness that needs to be raised around this is insurmountable, like we really do need to be talking about this and I appreciate that you have the awareness because more of us need to be jumping on this. When you look at the statistics on this I was just looking at a 2024 National Public Opinion Reference survey 28% of adults in the United States consider themselves as nuns or not religiously affiliated whatsoever, and this has increased from 16% in 2007 to that 28% in 2023. So this is drastically increasing this concept of people saying, oh, I'm spiritual but I'm not following any sort of organized religion.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there's a danger in that. I think that there's probably people that are having some type of demonic influence over their lives that would not consider themselves have anything to do with any kind of occult practices or not, and I meet them all the time. I mean, you know, I have these people in these emotional screaming things when I'm just talking about Christ or whatever, it's almost like ooh, and I feel that, you know, it's almost like the weeds in the wheat are coming out right now. This is a weird time, do you feel that, like people are choosing a side? And the last thing I'll just say before I throw this back at you People think we're born into this kind of a neutral zone. Right that we're just. Hey, I come into the world, I kind of make it up as I go, but this is not neutral zone, this is a world at war, isn't it? And you have to be a little careful out there.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and this is how Satan wants it. He wants everyone in the gray area right, thinking that this isn't one or the other, so I he wants everyone in the gray area right, thinking that this isn't one or the other. So I appreciate that classification and it's the truth. Even people that are in these destructive worldviews that are engaging in the occult, they're engaging in New Age beliefs. They would not even consider themselves New Age or occultic. They would distance themselves from those labels.
Speaker 2:But this is why I created the ministry I created was to get in the weeds on defining what these things are, so that a person can assess their own belief systems and practices and go oh wait, I actually am engaging in the new age. That is occultism. We need to start defining these things so that people can get really clear themselves on how to discern the difference between these destructive belief systems and following Jesus, because there are plenty of people out there that do what I call the blend. They're Christians and they're going to church on Sunday, but they're actually engaging in the occult, and this is a very large demographic that's growing, even in Catholicism, where Catholics are engaging in syncretism and believing it's okay to follow multiple forms of religion.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, unfortunately and I know this isn't part of your book, at least I don't remember when I was reading it but this is. You know, this is these weak shepherds too, we have a. You probably don't want to go there, but we have some weak teaching, and that weak teaching is leaving us lukewarm. You know, christ said hey, I'd rather have you hot or cold. If you're lukewarm, I'll spew you out. And I always thought when I was younger you know that doesn't sound very fair. You know, wouldn't it be better if I'm lukewarm than cold? And he goes no, because at least if you're cold you're just like you, and this is why I want to get into your story you'll kind of bounce off the bottom, probably, and he can catch you again. But you can be lukewarm, you can be average and endanger your whole life if you're not careful. So let's talk about you a little bit. You're you're not talking about these things just because you went out to research them, even though that's how you started. But you actually got caught up in this, didn't you?
Speaker 2:I did and I want and I want to respond. Really, we'll get into that. I do want to respond to what you just said, because I think it's really critical this concept of clergy needing to be equipped on these concepts as well as laity, because this is the reality. We live in a new world now with, after the internet and how all of these things have really cracked open as far as being able to access information on how to engage in the New Age and the occult. It's massively gone so viral that the nomenclature, the words that people use around these practices and beliefs, has expanded so much that there is a gap in the church's response to how to equip not only laity but clergy as well on what these things are, which is why I create all the definitions I create, Because for me and this is tying back to my story now as a journalist, as a researcher, as someone very curious about spirituality, I wish that I had had what I'm now giving to the world back then, Because even when you go to newadventorg, you go to these Catholic resources it's still very confusing when you're trying to assess what's available out there.
Speaker 2:With the data that's being put into the world on the occult, it's really hard to figure out. You know what is divination, when do we sit on this? What does this even mean for the church? And so, because of that sort of gap in education, I think that's a large reason why a lot of Christians are getting drawn into these practices, because they're just not really clear on exactly what's what it's kind of.
Speaker 1:where I'm coming from on that, yeah, no, that's awesome, and I think some of it, unfortunately, is on purpose. Pope Paul VI was very clear on this. The smoke of Satan has actually entered the church. We have to take this up, don't we? As the laity, we have to be talking about these things and we have to prod. To your point, we have to prod these good shepherds and the good priests to say, hey, don't be afraid to talk about these.
Speaker 1:Something that you addressed in your book are these portals. You know these ways of opening these gateways. You call them into the occult. I was talking to an exorcist, teresa, not too long ago, and he was talking about these portals and he said Jack, you know, these are common portals. We open up pornography and and and the Ouija boards and the chariot cards to you know that that you brought up, and so these are. These are things kids think they can play with. But to your point about TikTok or being online you didn't probably mention TikTok, but I'm just thinking about it. It's so easy, it's at our fingertips, all these young boys. You talk about addiction in here and I just see how this transfers over onto other things pornography, addictions. Everything that you said in there. We can use in a in a lot of different ways, can't we? But it starts with those portals of our heart, opening our hearts up to the to, to real evil there.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and TikTok is a huge one. Glad you brought that up. I mean, the hashtag witch talk has billions of views on it, or you?
Speaker 1:have these, bring that up. Bring that up, you know.
Speaker 2:Stay there for a second because I think that's something like 20 billion, didn't you say? Something ridiculous will grow so fast with it.
Speaker 2:It's wild that the amount of views that people get on tiktok. I mean, the concept of virality has completely shifted in our culture today. Like things used to go viral, they get a million views. No things that go viral now. I mean, it's just it's changed. The whole world has changed here, and so you have like, with hashtag, witch talk specifically, you've got older practitioners jumping on TikTok and teaching the young ones how to do it, and then it just creates this feedback loop where they're sharing all of their quote unquote insights about witchcraft. It's a cesspool for it. You know, youtube used to be the thing. Now TikTok has surpassed YouTube as far as what people are really engaging in, like it's. Those numbers have drastically increased. It's so easy and quick to get information on this stuff now. Because the videos are shorter, People are getting to the point faster, and so the concept of teaching those beliefs and those practices it's it's actually easier to get into it now than ever before. So we need to be rising up to respond, and I want to.
Speaker 2:I wanted to talk about the portal thing that you brought up because for me in my life I was raised Roman Catholic, very strong Catholic got confused about religion when I got to college because I went to a secular university where they're teaching lots of postmodern views, those sorts of things. So I start to get tripped up and confused over the validity of the Bible, things like that, that the professors are really pushing these anti-Christian views, things like that that the professors are really pushing these anti-Christian views. And so I started to think okay, well, I do believe in God, I believe in Jesus, but I'm scared about this authority structure of men and I think it's probably just being used to manipulate people. So I'm going to detach myself from organized religion. I'm going to go off into the world and follow spirituality however I'd like. And this is where you get into that spiritual but not religious thing which, over time, the further and further you step away, the deeper and deeper this goes into your worldview.
Speaker 2:And for me, my partner at the time he's a physicist and my dad, who had divorced my mom, started dating this woman who was a past life regressionist, which, for those of you who don't know it's essentially a person who puts another person into an altered state of consciousness and allegedly regresses them into a quote-unquote past life in order to work through some kind of trauma. This is demonically fueled. It's channeling, is what it is. It's an occult practice, but it's not called that. There's a ruse behind it. And so my dad says you know, you got to read this book called Journey of Souls by Michael Newton. And so I start to read this book on reincarnation and my significant other at the time was like well, I'm a scientist, I want to figure out how this works, I just want to do this. And so he goes on YouTube and he just finds a video that's like you can go into a past life regression, you can do this on your own. And I was like, even though I was not a practicing Catholic at the time, I thought this sounds like a really bad idea. I still, at that point, had to check, in my spirit at least, on that.
Speaker 2:But he goes and he experiences what he refers to as a passive regret. He had a vision and he believed it. This is the thing about the demonic. This is where I get into how people get tripped up in this stuff. I call it occult snapping.
Speaker 2:There will be something that will happen to a person, whether it's from their own human imagination, how they assign some meaning somewhere, or if a demonic response comes in and there's a demonic sign or wonder, this gets into 2 Thessalonians. But Satan does have power on the planet right now to show distractions, to show these things, to draw people into this interest in the power and into that spirit of delusion and that spirit of antichrist. And so this was the initial point in my story where this demonic portal opened in my life, because after he did this regression quote-unquote and he really believed this thing, the demons started to come in. I didn't know they were demons at the time, but I started to have spontaneous out-of-body experiences and things started to get really weird for me as the demons were trying to draw me also into these belief systems, which eventually did work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's amazing. Think about young people, teresa, when you go away to college Part of this, I would imagine. You have a Catholic upbringing. A lot of people don't have a Catholic upbringing, but you mentioned divorce in there and I know that probably affected it too, because you start to think well, I wonder if this is just a religion that they gave me, was passed down to me. Is this really true? So we have a natural curiosity, which I don't think is bad, really, just to say, is Catholicism really true? Is this faith that was handed down to me really true? And these professors are pretty good, aren't they, at sowing doubts, you know, is that really your parents that said that? You know, it's kind of an old-fashioned thing. I went through it with my own kids. I sent them away to college and they came back as atheists, you know, and I just go holy cow, you know, back as atheists, you know, and I just go holy cow. You know it's amazing. So we let these portals in, right, and you mentioned something else and I'll throw it back to you.
Speaker 1:You know, scripture talks about this all the time. I think sometimes, again, we come into this world, we think it's neutral and we think, ah, we're just going to. You know this is just all hunky-dory, everything's going to be fine, but Scripture talks about it over and over. Jesus himself talks about it, st Paul talks about it. This is real Teresa, and it seems like this is what I'm getting the idea as I look around. I've been doing this for a long time with the John Paul II Renewal Center and it seems like people are very they're being very clear today. It's like evil is just standing up mocking us in some way, and I think it's easier to fall for these things than people think.
Speaker 2:Absolutely and, I think, a core scripture that I like to pull in on this concept because it's going to help people to discern what's really going on. To tell the difference here is that when you get into 2 Thessalonians, chapter 2, it talks about Satan with all power and false signs and wonders. That first part just even the false signs and wonders you can see something happen. Like, using this as an example, my partner who did the meditation and had that vision right To him. He believed that as true. What was the belief attached to that lie? Reincarnation. What's the core of that belief? It's a spirit of antichrist, because reincarnation is one of the most destructive belief systems. That goes against the need for salvation in Christ. Right, so it's a sign and wonder from Satan. So it's something that a person believes because it's a vision. So it's something that occurred. However, what's important here is that active word false. What does false mean in this regard? It means it's drawing people away from the truth. That is Christ that saves the soul and that's a really critical distinction here.
Speaker 1:For you. Let's talk about your personal experiences, because I mean some of the things that you describe and also you describe some other people in there. You tell me where you want to go with that, but I want to give people a little idea of what you're expressing in this work that you did and in your book, that this is very, very real. So talk a little bit about that, because I want to give our audience a little taste of this. Is a real power that comes in, isn't it?
Speaker 2:The power is real and I think that the core of this and anyone coming out of the occult, like I did will know what I'm talking about when you start to experience the unexplained, it starts to happen to you. It can draw people in through the paranormal. It can draw people in through direct witchcraft, things like that. For me, when I started having spontaneous out-of-body experiences, like waking up next to my body, I can see my body and there's this cord going from the middle of me to my body and I'm floating around the house and I'm seeing things in the house that I didn't know were there before. And then I wake up in my bed and my body again and then I go over to that part of the house and I see, oh yeah, I didn't remember that was there. So you're starting to have these experiences where this power to come out of the body, to detach consciousness from the body. This is a demonic trick, by the way, but when people get so yeah, tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 1:I mean, what, what is going on there exactly? Truce, do we know?
Speaker 2:well, I mean, there are a lot of different theories, but like this is kind of getting into the concept of like astral projection or remote viewing there are a lot of kind of different words for this but I believe what probably is happening is it's not like me actually traveling like that. It's a demonic vision that feels very, very real and these things that will happen, whether they're in dreams or waking life, feel almost. There's like a glimmer to it that feels even more real than this waking reality. You can see you have hypersenses so you can see more vividly and all of these are demonic tricks to draw a person in deeper into the curiosity of what the power is and a lot of people describe this kind of like the senses that are greater. And when you get, even when you're reading things about exorcists and you get into the concept of demonic possession and people trying to get free of it, you have like the super strength right.
Speaker 2:I've witnessed it in an exorcism, I've worked with exorcists and watching. You know a little woman, a demon acting through her. Throw six priests off of her across the room, right, and so you can get into demonic power, right Into the concept of that where it can actually function through a person and this power that Satan has on the planet right now, he can grant it here and there right through people, and I think part of that is to draw people deeper into the deception and the delusion. People think that they can control that power, but they can't at all.
Speaker 1:While you're saying this, I could see Adam and Eve. This goes all the way back to Genesis 3. You can be like God. He appeals to your pride. This is that threefold concupiscence and pride. Satan appeals to that pride. He loves to come in there and say you're feeling that power, right? You're feeling that power. You're feeling that power? Right, you're feeling that power. You mentioned it with the tarot cards. You know that you start to feel this energy, almost like a power, like you can know things, and you actually mentioned in there that you actually did find information that you couldn't have known before. So this is coming. This is a little scary, you know. This gets a little discombobulating, to say the least.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'd like to draw the bridge there so you can kind of follow the path here. So you see, in the beginning, the very inception, point right is that my partner does. This YouTube video has this vision. This opens up this opening in the house where the demons are now starting to play with me, trying to draw me into the interest in it, so he took this pretty seriously.
Speaker 1:The person that you're describing here he very seriously.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah. And so when all of this started to happen in the house, I start to get curious about well, what is this whole consciousness away from the body thing which draws me into researching remote viewing and astral projection? And these occultists online are saying, oh well, you can actually do this on purpose. So what does that lead me into Researching? Well, what does that even look like? And so you start learning about channeling. Oh yeah, there's this like psychic power that people have that you can actually da-da-da. You see what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:So then this is when I started to write this book in 2014, going like, what is all this information I'm cracking open on the internet and how does this reconcile with Catholicism? So I start to try to compare and contrast what I'm dealing with here, because all of this stuff on the internet about the occult and the new age, I'm like there seems to be something to this, because I'm experiencing things that I'm then going online and they're saying, oh yeah, and they've got all these answers, they're not true, they're drawing you into the falsity. But I didn't know, I didn't understand. I wanted to understand. And so for me, the pride, the level of pride and curiosity, and turning my back on the protection of God and going I'm going to go deeper into understanding these practices led me to go and go on Amazoncom. Buy a tarot deck. You can get them, they're all over the place. Now I mean, it's easy to acquire.
Speaker 2:And so I got a tarot deck and I was just sitting there looking at this tarot deck like, okay, what is this? What does this even mean? So I start to learn how to read tarot cards. I'm learning about the archetypes on the cards and how to read the spreads and that kind of thing. And within the very first week of reading tarot cards, I started to experience signs of possession. I didn't know it at the time but looking back, it was very early on because of me engaging with this occult practice. There was one point in the very first week where I wake up and I've got the tarot cards around me. I didn't remember falling asleep, so I was just losing time and I was feeling really drained and I went online. I'm like does this happen to people? And people were like oh yeah, this happens with tarot cards it's draining your energy.
Speaker 2:This means that you need to do this special. You know they teach, you, start teaching you witchcraft. You need to do this spell for protection, and so it's drawing you into even more occult practices and within months, I was reading tarot cards for other people, which is double whammy of idolatry. It's not only the tarot card deck that's an idol, but it's now me stepping forth as an idol, an intermediary between a person and God. So bad news bears. But what would happen is I would start to get information that I couldn't possibly know. Now, for people who understand demonic possession and they read things about exorcism and things like that, and they know the marks, one of the marks is knowing the unknowable, and this occurs with tarot cards and other forms of divination practices. So the demons start to get involved, they start to fraternize with you, they start to give you visions and messages and information that you couldn't possibly know.
Speaker 1:So they have the power, teresa, to do that, to be able to. You know, before we go on too much longer, I don't want to just stop your train of thought, but you know you talk about the supernatural, that the supernatural can only come from God, but there's a pre amount of power. But I want you to, before you're done with this thought process, to define for people the difference between the supernatural which can only come from God and what type of power are these demons given here on earth? Which again is scriptural? The powers and the principalities. Ephesians 6, it's very clear. Anybody that wants to go read them, you can go. Verses 10 to say 20, right there in Ephesians 6, and it talks about it. Be careful, put the armor of God on.
Speaker 2:Demons are really smart, they're really intelligent, they've been around doing this deception thing for a long time and they can move really fast and they can interact and they can communicate with each other.
Speaker 2:And so can move really fast and they can interact and they can communicate with each other. And so, using this example of the tarot cards, you know, giving a reading for someone that I had never met before, and then having some information that a demon's passing me and I'm saying it out loud this man that I was reading the cards for he freaks out because he had never spoken these words out loud before, he had never disclosed this information to anyone. And here's this tarot card reader, just blah, blah, blah, saying it like it's no big deal. It freaked him out, he started yelling and he left the room and I never saw him again. And so what this does is a few different things. If you look at kind of this, the nature of the demonic interplay or interaction that's going on here, so demons can observe humans, right, it's not really that difficult to wrap your head around, okay, a?
Speaker 2:demon witnessed this thing, that this human did Very easy to pass that information to me, to create and generate chaos and this violation of his rights and his privacy. To do what? Well, a few things. To draw this person, this man, into a belief that tarot cards work right. It becomes about the idol, even though there's this deeper, sinister, occulted reality that it's the demons having a heyday. It doesn't really matter the object. All of these things together, they're tools for the enemy to come in and use. That's why you stay away from them.
Speaker 2:That's why you stay away from witchcraft because you know people will say oh, did you do the spell right? You know occultists. It doesn't matter what this. You can flip flippity, flop your lips and say whatever you want. If you're engaging in that practice and the intention behind it is, you're trying to seek some kind of knowledge or power, that's a cult. The demons are going to come in and play with you. You're inviting them at that point into play with you and you're giving over your rights to them. And this is where we get into pacts and agreements with the demonic. They gain more license to access you through your mind and it can even get to the point where they can even control your body, the more license you're giving them. That's just the reality. That's how it plays out in many, many stories across the world and people engaging in these practices.
Speaker 1:John Paul II spoke a lot about self-determination and he said it's through your actions what your choices are every day. And it sounds like the more you choose this, the more I'm choosing this route for myself, whether I realize it or not. There's a lot of things we don't realize that we do, but the reality is, teresa, that I almost can create myself in a way, you know, and when I say that, create the type of person I become. I can choose good or I can choose evil. We go down these paths, not realizing the danger, and I think your work is so important because we need to get this down to young people.
Speaker 1:I feel that young people are just being left like pawns out there in this big game, just to be pushed around right now, because you at least and I want to talk to you about this you at least were given a foundation in your Catholic faith. So it's like running up a sand dune and you start to fall down. You, at least, were given a foundation in your Catholic faith. So it's like running up a sand dune and you start to fall down. At least you had a foundation. How many people, teresa, that you talked about the nuns earlier on? It's getting bigger and bigger. They have no foundation. What do these young people do? What would you have done, do you think, teresa, if you were a young person that gets caught up in this and you don't know where to turn? I mean, this can really mess up your life big time, can it?
Speaker 2:It actually breaks my heart Just even hearing you talk about this. It breaks my heart. I've worked with people from across the world, some of which had no foundation, and they found a YouTube video or something of mine. Right, they stumble across my content and because I have avenues where people can reach out to me, they'll reach out to me, and I've gotten on the phone with hundreds of people and talked from all over the place. And when they don't have that foundation, they don't have that support system. They don't have that foundation, they don't have that support system, they don't have that infrastructure. They are just starting from square one. They're being saved by Jesus because Jesus has had this supernatural encounter with them. So they know they're being drawn into relationship with Him, but they're very disoriented and because of the gap in people's understanding in the churches of how to handle these people, this is why I started my ministry, because they'll go into the churches.
Speaker 2:People don't know what to do. There's a red letter attached. They go okay, you were into witchcraft, that's weird. Like, okay, well, you follow Jesus now. So you just like move on with your life. You're Christian, now, everything's okay. That's not how it works. It takes years to get freed from the belief system. I say it comes down always to one word worldview. It's a worldview that has to be detangled over time with theological grounding and understanding the sacraments and yielding over to.
Speaker 2:It's a whole process, you know, and before we get too far away of it, I do want to answer something that you asked earlier that I didn't get to the concept of inspiration. You know there are three places where inspiration comes from. We've got God and the good angels, we've got Satan and the bad angels and just human inspiration, so things that we come up with through our own conscious will. So, in that regard, you've got those three different places. You were talking about young people getting drawn in to these practices, right.
Speaker 2:And again, I'm going to bring it back to 2 Thessalonians 2, because the concept here is where we have Satan with his false signs and wonders, right. And deception of wickedness for those who perish because they actually did not love the truth to be saved and they turn away from that truth and over time, of choosing these things over and over again, God gives them over, says okay, I'm going to give you over to this delusion, because they're choosing over again and again with their actions to believe what is false, Right. So there's a huge factor in, like you brought this up, through action, right, the concept of the choices that we make and the actions that we take over time is critical.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is critical. I mean, you actually become what you do, your actions. You know, I think of it like this Today a body and a soul, right, a person comes into the world and the default state of that person without baptism and grace is sin and death. That's just reality. You know, I had a conversation with somebody not too long ago I just wrote an article about this and they said oh Jack, I think you're being too dramatic. I said, hey, just have enough patience, you're going to find out, right? I mean, death is there.
Speaker 1:You know, the six-foot hole, chisel poised. You know, to put your name and your date on there. Dude, where do you think this is all going? You got to make some decisions here. So he said well, what are you talking about? It's body, soul. You have to be infused with grace, don't you? And this is the way we were. This is why jesus points us back to the beginning. He says in the beginning, before sin, it was not so. You were. You came into the world full, full of grace. We breathed that out, didn't we? And that's what you're saying here. You know, we kind of, when we give it over to this occult or the demonic, all different ways, we're kind of breathing out the spirit, you know, and and and there's a vacuum and what you're describing you're being filled with some really bad stuff.
Speaker 2:Well, and the gap. So I want to close the loop on the last thing we were just talking about the people that are coming out of the occult. They don't have that infrastructure right, like they don't have that support system. They don't have that foundation of Christianity. There's a lot of confusion. I talk about this in the book. I call it the in-between, because you have these moments in a person that's coming out of the occult where I call it the gigas up moment, where they have this sort of repelling of the lie. Something will happen. It's an intervention, it's a Holy Spirit intervention coming to wake them up out of the delusion and what can happen.
Speaker 1:So God's still trying to get in there, isn't he? Teresa, God is still trying to save you, isn't he? I mean, that's what you're talking about here, aren't you?
Speaker 2:Absolutely Well, and it's interesting because when people get in the weeds on their stories as they're coming out, they find that God was with them the whole time, it's like through our actions and that sinful nature and that just giving over.
Speaker 2:And then it's beautiful to hear how God starts to really intervene, but there's a free will factor where, even if you know Jesus knocking on the door, you still have to make that decision to yield. And so I talk about the in-between, which is after that gig is up moment and before what I call the Colossians, one moment which is like someone actually yielding, taking action to yield their lives to Christ, what you can find in people who don't have that Christian support group. It might be a little bit more time for them to kind of come around to the because it's disorienting, and so, if they're kind of trekking through this, there are cultural traps that can grab people that Satan will throw at them to keep them locked in a form of the delusion, even if at that point they're going. Okay, there's something wrong with the occult and I need to step away from this. They can get tripped up commonly in conspiracy.
Speaker 2:Media is a place that the enemy will hold people into that paranoia of the world and all of the authority systems to keep people out of the church. That's what I see, to keep people out of the Catholic church specifically. But so you can see that kind of in-between phase but then hopefully, and the people that I work with you see them go through that okay, now I'm going to take that action to shift and really surrender my life to Christ, and that's really when the hard work begins right. So the reason why I lay out my book the way I do with the Deliverance Roadmap, showing how people get in to the occult through five steps and then five steps out, it's because through working with people all over the world, I found that there was a pattern in their stories that you know it's going to look different story to story, but there's a certain pattern of progression that they take from one stage to the next and it really helps to understand just how difficult it is to get out of these belief systems and what that actually looks like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your reason, our reason, gets very unreasonable, doesn't it? Again, it's scriptural. I mean you can get very dark. Your reason, your intellect and your reason are supposed to be searching for the truth. Getting back to our earlier thing, that's why I think young people can get caught up in this, because they are actually seeking the truth. What is the truth? They just don't realize the power when they open themselves up to these practices.
Speaker 1:You mentioned Teresa, when people come back into the church right, they're trying to come back there's a difference between and look it, I have a lot of, I work with a lot of Protestants and a lot of evangelicals and I love them and some of them are on fire more than many of the Catholics that I know. So this is no way of put down of any of that, but I was speaking again to an exorcist not so long ago and I said you know, what can these families do? And they said just do normal Catholic things. And we don't realize in the Catholic Church how many normal Catholic things we have that you won't find in other churches and you get into that. Can you talk a little bit about that? The sacraments, a prayer, when you're starting to come back in. There's a difference. You have to be careful. In fact, an exorcist will say many of the people actually now coming to him are not Catholics. It's Protestant and evangelical pastors that realize this is out of their realm, sending them to a Catholic priest. There's some power there, isn't there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I also work with people in all different denominations and I agree with you, I think all denominations are beautiful and there's something there with that particular sacrament that is so tremendously valuable and healing that I have personally experienced. And so you know, helping other people out of these things like I wasn't ever trying and I'm not ever trying to like tell people what to do, I'm just sharing my own experiences and then pulling data from other people's experiences and saying take it or leave it Like if you choose that you want to go become Catholic, here is something that will be very useful to you. And then getting on the weeds on explaining why and how, and so watching some of these women come out and choose Catholicism and also start to go to confession.
Speaker 2:It was so beautiful to watch how the Holy Spirit will raise up things for a person to see in their own lives as far as sin goes. As they're coming out of the occult, they're understanding their moral culpability in the actions that they took. The closer they're getting to Jesus, the better they're able to discern the difference between the actions that Jesus calls us to take to conform our lives to Him and the actions that draw us away from Him and as that process occurs, as people get clearer, they get more clarity and awareness over these things, there's a big bunch of sorrow that comes up in their spirit over, oh my goodness, lord, like I am so sorry because this grieves you, this causes distance between us, and being able to lean into the sacrament of confession and really go through that surrender of leaving that at the cross and experiencing that active grace, that sanctifying grace received through the sacrament. It's just amazing and incredible to see the stories of transformation that I've witnessed across the board, specifically with confession. It's beautiful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree. All the young people that I work with and I love working with young people, that's one of the most powerful things They'll say they'll come out of the sacrament of confession and sometimes it doesn't hit them right away. Sometimes I'll talk to them and say, how are you feeling? Oh, I'm feeling good. And then it's a couple of weeks later they go holy moly, right, it starts to dig, it starts to work. There's a grace there.
Speaker 1:You know, nobody that goes to confession on a regular basis in the church ever asks me, why do you go to confession? You know it's only people that don't go and say, yeah, why do I have to go to a priest, why do I got to do this? Nobody that goes ever asks Jack, why do I have to go? They know there's a power. There isn't there. It's really a power that God instills in us. Right over here is the picture of the divine mercy. You have the water and the blood coming out, and the water, of course, is baptism, and then going to confession and reconciliation. It's that nuptial bath because I want to go back to what you said Christ is bringing you into a relationship, into an intimacy. This is what we miss so often, and that nuptial bath right, that baptism washing me to get me ready for what the red, which is the Eucharist, god Jesus himself, and so this is like a marriage proposal. This is what God wants with us, right?
Speaker 1:And this is the sadness. You know, you said, you know your heart goes out to these young people. They don't know that intimacy. You know they need that so much, don't they today? You know you see these young people floundering and it's the coolest thing today because we could start to see these shoots coming up with young people. Now there's questioning the culture. I think, teresa, I think this is a great time for your book. I think this is a great time to be talking about these things, because we've got to the point and I want to get your opinion on this. I think it's worse than it ever was. It's amazing. As much as we could talk about the evils all over the world, I've never seen such a mass uprising of the demonic, almost, and at the same time, another side of this, which is you seeing people really feeling and this intimacy with God at the same time on the other side but we're going to there's a war happening right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and two things on this. The first is the Blessed Sacrament. I mean that this it's quite I mean I can't even put a word profound to see the shift that the world is making toward catholicism, toward the eucharist and the converts and the reverts and and all these beautiful testimonies of people being drawn to the catholic faith. It's like the, the concept of. We're talking a lot about spiritual warfare in this conversation and the difference between following the enemy or following Christ.
Speaker 2:And when you talk about the Eucharist, it is the stark contrast between the litany of worldviews in this world that are oriented toward control and the self and power, and this failure to yield. And then, when you turn toward the Eucharist, this beautiful promise that God gave us, this way of engaging with Him, conforming ourselves to communing with Him, and what it means, what it is, is radical surrender. It is radical surrender to the truth and our inheritance that we receive and the identity of who we truly are, and that, to me, it's just, it is the most beautiful design. I'm just so grateful that God gave us the design he gave us, because it's perfect, it's so perfect, and the grace received in it in that moment, those moments of just radical surrender.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:It's perfect.
Speaker 1:Yes, and you bring it up a number of times in the book and we know this is true. It's the difference between pride and humility. And when you see Jesus come into the story, he's the most humble of all. We call him the lamb, the sacrificial lamb, the God of the universe who comes in and humbles himself. Right, this is my body given for you, right, and you see the difference, you, you know.
Speaker 1:I know I'm going to go off a little bit here, but just for a minute or two. You know, when I see, you know the political class and the culture today, the way it is, I mean, you know you could see how I I would call it. You know, spiritual warfare, the demonic has influence over these people because again, it gets down to power, money, control, sex, all these things. And I think, you know, I see some of these politicians that just seem to be brain dead, right, spiritually dead, brain dead, and I wonder how do they get like that? Right? And I think it's just these choices over a lifetime, of being pulled into this pride. You know, people putting them up on a pedestal, starting to get money, starting to get power, starting to find pleasures in different places and over a lifetime. Teresa, this is really dangerous. You look at some of these people and you go, whoa, how did they get here?
Speaker 2:And you know, you know, unfortunately, probably slowly and then and then accelerating, you know at the end, you know, yeah, it's like jesus's burden is light, you know, his yoke is easy and I think that when, because I used to live my life this way, you know, I used to be, you know, and the pre-deliverance I was a a very popular conspiracy media pundit and you know it was getting picked up for TV shows and traveling and doing the conferences and all those things.
Speaker 1:People will pay you for that kind of stuff won't they?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, there's a lot of money in that. It's not so easy.
Speaker 1:It's not so easy to come out of that sometimes, is it? Well, I mean it's like God's I mean just because of the money and you go. This is a pretty good living here. I can just play this game for a while, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was like the—I mean I had to crash my whole life to the ground because of what God had revealed to me in the darkness of these practices. I gave it all up and the way that I live my life now is just very, very different. And it's the worldview shift right From like you're constantly living your life for gunning and pushing yourself as far as you can and you're blind. You get blinded. You know you're talking about politicians. You get blinded to God's voice because you're pushing so hard for whatever that worldly idol that you have is. You know success, power, whatever yada yada name it. But on the other side of that, when you're living your life with Jesus, it shifts.
Speaker 2:And I'm not saying that I'm not a gunner now. I enjoy work. I work hard. You know I have a good work ethic. But it's a different way of life. You know it's like this peace where you know that God has you because you are consistently in prayer and continuing to want to make sure that you're walking in alignment with the plan that God has for you to build up the kingdom. It's a shift from it's not about the kingdom on earth that you're building, it's about God's kingdom in heaven that he's building and our participation in that, and so it orients the actions differently. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Yes. So here, as we start to wind down, I'm cognizant of your time If I'm struggling with these things and I want to reach out to you, teresa, and give us a little idea of how I do that and maybe just a taste of how I start to maybe come out of this, because I know you have specific examples you talk about in the book, so you're actually really able to help people. This isn't just a news information work that you're doing, is it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, news information work that you're doing, is it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so the book that is coming out Freedom from Darkness I'm so glad which is not out yet, just so people know. But you can pre-order right now. I know you can pre-order right?
Speaker 2:Yes, january 21st will be when it's released, but yes, you can pre-order it. I'm glad the book is coming out because I wish that I had had this book when I was coming out of the occult, and so I'm really excited to see that there's going to be a book like this out there that people coming out can go okay what is happening to me and even if you're a Christian who's not coming out of the occult, it's going to help you be able to minister to other people and gain an understanding of what the heck to say or do.
Speaker 2:So it's twofold mission there. But as far as other resources, I have a website, spiritsanctifiedcom. The reason why I created that was really to be able to reach people with free resources to help them get grounded in understanding what could be happening to them. So you can go to spiritsanctifiedcom and there are articles and topical research out there that you can just kind of look at. As far as, like whatever subjects, I have authors that have come out of the occult in the new age that are educating through there as well, sharing their testimonies and also the different nuances of what they've learned as far as the deception. And then there's a contact form. So if a person needs to get in touch with me, they can just fill out the contact form that comes to me.
Speaker 1:Okay, so that's the best way, spiritsanctifiedcom, that's the best. That's where they should start, you think.
Speaker 2:Yes, and then you'll— Get the book, get this.
Speaker 1:But if they want to reach out and ask questions, or—are you coaching them? Is that kind of how it works a little bit? Or you know, look, if I don't have this foundation, I run into these young people all the time. If I don't have a foundation, you know, I just want to make sure I can steer them to some places that they could find the truth.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And so you have a solid and I think you need to talk about this before you go you have a solid background. You're leading them to Catholicism, right, you're leading them to the truth, and because we don't want to send people off on some any more goose you know goose chases because they've had enough, right, some of these people are really coming to the end of the rope here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I used to do a lot of one-on-one work with people and I got very overwhelmed by that because it was a lot, and so what I've done to try to streamline this for myself and others, to get them the help that they need fast is I actually created an online course that you can go to spiritsanctifiedcom. It's called the New Age to Jesus Boot Camp and anybody can get this course. It's a like a video course that has like all of my research and helping people through this all in one place, and so it's just like a step-by-step video course that you can follow in order to get like exactly the help, one step-by-step out of like kind of the early stages of the new age.
Speaker 2:And I did that because the one-on-one work was bogging me down and I'm like okay, well, I have all this information because the one-on-one work was bogging me down and I'm like, okay, well, I have all this information, I can help people, but how can I get it to them faster than having to work one-on-one with me? So that's there. And then also, I have a YouTube channel so people can watch. There's a Faith Under Fire series right now that's talking specifically about how the New Age and the occult comes against Catholicism specifically. So it's very Catholic-centric and it's some of my new material that I'm excited about, but that's Faith Under Fire.
Speaker 1:So you can find that on YouTube. Faith Under Fire Okay, very good. And then the other thing find a good parish. Right, find a good, and it's not always so easy either. Find a good parish, find a good Orthodox priest and again, they're not all the same out there. You know, I'm in the Chicagoland area, therese, and there's some pretty watered-down Catholic churches, parishes even. But you'll know the difference. You'll know the difference.
Speaker 1:Ask around a little bit. If you see a lot of young people in that church, you know something good is happening there. You'll look around and see some young families, got some kids. You'll see some reverence there. You'll look around and see some young families. I got some kids. You'll see some reverence there, maybe some noise, right, because they bring their kids. But I love those masses. I was talking to a group of people not too long ago and they were asking me the same thing when should I find it? I said go find the vibrancy. Go walk in and you'll experience the energy just from the vibe of the people that are there, and start to talk and ask around a little bit. So what's your daily practice, like Teresa, as far as your faith, and how do you keep you know any recommendations to people? We got the sacraments, we got prayer, anything specific or anything special that you would recommend to our audience?
Speaker 2:Rosary, rosary, baby, all the way. Thank you, thank you, thank you yeah, daily rosary.
Speaker 1:huh Meditate on that you know yeah. Yeah, and scripture is so important huh yeah. Yeah, thank you for that. And then, of course, if we just throw in, you know, the sacraments of confession and mass, you've got a pretty good start there. Hey, god bless you, teresa. Thank you so much. Thanks for your time, spiritsanctifiedcom, and go find you on a YouTube channel. If there's anything else that you want me to put in the show notes, send it to me, will you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Jack. This was an awesome conversation. Thank you for having me on.
Speaker 1:Hey, thanks everybody. Thanks for joining us today. Talk to you again soon. Bye-bye.