"On the seventh day of this disaster of biblical proportions," is the way the local newspaper in New Orleans began a recent story.

And so language long reserved for websites such as this have broken into the "mainstream."

It was as if the saints and angels were gone, and yet speaking to us louder than ever.

Said that newspaper, the New Orleans Times-Picayune: "In the city they finally left behind, churches were empty, bells did not peal, Sunday services were not held and the Saints, the football version, were said to be pondering their own evacuation, possibly a permanent one, to San Antonio, Texas."

Ironic, the name "saints," in this place of great spiritual warfare.

There are St. Charles and St. Ann and St. Peter and St. Philip streets and St. Bernard Parish and the Hotel St. Marie -- all kinds of such names rubbing against an occult and pagan underworld.

Indeed, ironic. Will they still carry out the Babylonian-like Mardi Gras? Will there still be a "decadence" parade? Ironic it was how some saw the image of an eight-week-old fetus in photos of the Hurricane.

Many ironies here. Many juxtapositions. At least 17 parishes had perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in an attempt at evangelization.

There is also the fact that the most famous statue in the United States having to do with protection from disasters is in, yes, New Orleans -- and, yes, at least according to early reports, and although there may have been some damage, it survived. We anxiously await reports, while most means of communication are still down.

That's Our Lady of Prompt Succor on State Street, which was originally in a convent founded by Sister Angela Merici [left] in the French Quarter and is considered miraculous.

Perched unusually high in a chapel attached to the oldest Catholic school for girls in the United States (as if anticipating the storms), it is ironic how a famous statue associated with disasters has figured so prominently into this city's history and how now  statues and crucifixes are being found intact across the zones of devastation.

In Biloxi there is the St. Michael statue that still stands atop a church despite the destruction around it.

There is the statue of Mary that was all that remained on a slab in another nearby town.

There is the photo of Our Lady of Grace rising from the floodwaters in a backyard in the Ninth Ward.

There is Leah Tucker of Pass Christian in Mississippi, who took pictures of her church. St. Paul's, and remarked, "The entire church was gutted, but it was amazing how one of the only things left was a crucifix hanging above the altar, and it is only being held by two pieces of invisible line. It was an incredible sight" .

At St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Long Beach, Mississippi, a statue of the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus was still there in the sand, with a strange sense of serenity.

"The symbol of the cross was unscathed on the dome of the church," a reporter related. 

We just received another of Madonna and Child statue that survived in a church that didn't -- again, on the obliterated coast of Mississippi.

Ironic? So many "ironies."

It was a year ago that this up-cycle in purification commenced, just as famed Catholic seer Maria Esperanza predicted. She saw the U.S. in store for a "lash."

Esperanza had said that matters in the world especially natural disasters would intensify in the second half of 2004 and continue in that intensification for years, leading to a glorious reawakening.

Ironically, she died on August 7 -- right after the midway point of 2004 -- and within a week, the great flurry of hurricanes began to strike Florida.

Esperanza had prophesied that going to war in the aftermath of September 11 would lead to a "tragedy," and now  we are left to figure if she meant the standard tragedies of war (soldiers and civilians both) or whether she was referring to a tragedy such as the New Orleans Deluge -- which, rightly or wrongly, some blame on a lack of resources due to the war in Iraq.

We won't get into the politics of such matters but to say that the deluge should make America take a second look at its out-of-control consumerism, especially of oil -- which seemed like a special Katrina target.

Ironic it was how the storm washed away many toxic fields around New Orleans (one of the most cancer-ridden cities in the U.S.) at the same time that it shut down refineries at a time when many blame some of the weather on greenhouse gases caused by petroleum hydrocarbons (again, we won't delve into politics).

Does it relate to the secrets of Medjugorje (the famous apparition site in Bosnia-Hercegovina that had the belief of John Paul II)?

Apparently, not yet: those secrets are supposed to be announced beforehand. But we appear to be edging closer. Something is up. We will have more of this soon as the prophetic begins to play a stronger role, even in that mainstream.

Does that mean that they will be larger than what we have seen in Louisiana?

Some of them must be larger -- although through prayer we can protect ourselves.

According to one seer, Mirjana Soldo, the secrets involve a series of events sent as warnings to mankind, followed by chastisements.

The warnings, she said, would be events that would be heard about around the world, events that some would try to explain away as natural happenings.

When asked about the first one, and whether it would cause people to rush to see it, she replied. Well, father, surely no one wishes to watch disasters, distress, and misfortune. I don't think that this kind of thing attracts people at all. Why would people go to see something of that sort? Who would, for example, go to Italy to see a dam collapse?"

In her last message, Mirjana quoted Mary as warning, on August 2, that she cannot help us "as long as your heart is filled with false glitters and false idols."

And in the last monthly message, this one delivered to seer Marija Pavlovic-Lunetti, the Blessed Mother allegedly said, "Dear children! Also today I call you to live my messages. God gave you a gift of this time as a time of grace. Therefore, little children, make good use of every moment and pray, pray, pray. I bless you all and intercede before the Most High for each of you."

Is there any significance to use of the word "gave," which is past tense?

Oh, the ironies! One street shown under floodwaters is called "Humanity." Meanwhile, when CNN pans the French quarter, we see the celebration of voodoo in a desolate downtown where the witch doctors used to practice surrounded by neighborhoods that will now cope (as did Galveston) with a black sludge.

Call it a witch's brew.

The word Deluge means "a severe flood, a great quantity of something arriving at the same time; from the Latin word deluvium, the word diluere  means "WASH AWAY."

Right now, in New Orleans, as one pastor points out, there are no abortions being performed, no crack being dealt, no pornography sold in the stores, no voodoo stores open, no bars open, no strip clubs operating, no fortunetellers on the byways, no drunken revelry on Bourbon Street.

That has been all been washed away, for the time being, by a storm (look up the name "Katrina") with a name, as we have pointed out, that means "purity."

Ironies. Yes, ironies. Just like in Florida last summer. When is mainstream Catholicism going to return to its role as a prophet?

One bishop -- in fact, the spiritual leader of New Orleans, Archbishop Alfred C. Hughes -- already has. Asked by The New York Times whether he still had hope, the archbishop replied: "Absolutely. Absolutely. That is the root of our faith. The most important thing is to not doubt God's presence and God's saving and transforming grace. I'm convinced that God is going to purify us through this."

09/06/5

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