These are strange times, and it's difficult to sift through the barrage of the mystical. There was the report of a prayer group experiencing visions of "Jesus" and "Mary" at St. Paul's Catholic Church in the glitzy Cote d'Azur resort of Cannes (in France). The problem: witnesses say the visions usually begin with the building trembling in the middle of a prayer meeting; then various worshippers fall off their seats shaking violently or vomiting. They go into convulsions. That, noted a newspaper, sounded more like a scene from The Exorcist. At the same time, word came that an alleged stigmatic from the U.S. had died after the devil took him over, or at least attacked him. A suffering -- or simple possession to begin with?

Strange stuff, and now we discern the word from a good woman in Virginia who says she has been having mystical experiences since childhood and taught Catholic school before being "called" to be a hidden "victim soul."

She says she now suffers invisible stigmata -- feeling the pains of Crucifixion -- and among those she suffers for is the actor-director, Mel Gibson.

We have no idea in the world if there is a smidgeon of legitimacy to her or so many other claims of mysticism (there are certainly major parts of such "revelations" that sound improbable), but we are supposed to try to take from prophecy what is good (leaving behind the rest) and some of the issues raised are interesting ones, including this warning that Gibson has treaded onto dangerous ground with his new movie. It's called "Apocalypto," and you'll be hearing about it any moment, if you haven't already.

It's a movie about Mayans and the drama of a mass sacrifice. It is this alleged mystic's concern that Gibson -- who she says she has tried to warn on numerous occasions -- was deceived into a project with occult connotations as a way of the devil leading those he had enamored with The Passion of the Christ into now a dark production. That's quite a claim -- and one we really can't yet support.

But it does raise a question: when an occult ritual is portrayed -- a deeply occult one, such as a blood sacrifice to a pagan deity -- is there a residual effect? Are there pitfalls in even viewing such?

We won't know until we find out more about the movie. The "trailer" did not leave us with comforting feelings. According to a description of the plot in Time Magazine's March preview, a ruler orders the mass sacrifice of hapless captives to appease the gods and avert a drought. In the drama, a man tries to save his family from that ritual.

"Mayan Gods Star In Gibson's Apocalypto," says the headline of one recent article about it, explaining that it is a $50-million epic which will open on the Marian feast day of December 8  (produced by Gibson's Icon productions, which uses a beautiful portrait of the Blessed Mother as its logo) and was filmed in Veracruz, Mexico.

Rivaled only by the ancient Egyptians, the Mayas reached their peak during a period that roughly spanned 250 to 900 A.D. and were prevalent in Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, and El Salvador, along with Mexico -- where the Blessed Mother appeared at Guadalupe (also in December) and broke the back of Indian paganism there.

The Mayas worshipped corn and rain deities and pierced their lips, tongues, and genitalia -- as we now see so frequently in our own culture.

Their cities included towering pyramids and their culture included astrological calendars -- which only go to the year 2012, leading many to believe that apocalyptic events will occur before or during that year.

Such has added to the occult flavor of the Gibson movie -- at least to the hype -- but let's hover over the danger of portraying human sacrifice. Where The Passion of the Christ presented Gibson's view of a Divine Sacrifice, this time he is presenting a portrayal, to some degree, of an occult one. Is that harmless?

We have to leave that for you to decide.

Whatever the truth of that, it is a fact that Mel has fallen into the toughest times of his career -- after his arrest for drunken driving, and his diatribe against Jews, he went from polls showing him to be the "most powerful" man in Hollywood to most recently one showing him as the "least powerful" -- and during filming the star, one of Hollywood's most glamorous, and also one of its more cerebral,  encountered any number of problems. The film was originally set for release last summer but was delayed by unusual storms.

In Mayan sacrifices, those killed were typically children, slaves, or war captives. A victim was painted blue and then slain during a ceremony on top of a pyramid, either by arrow or having his heart cut out as his or her arms were held and a "priest" cut open the chest. Some were beheaded.

Was it a religious ritual or the stuff of a slasher movie?

During the movie, which is R-rated, Gibson, sporting a beard reportedly visited Catemaco, Mexico, which is a famous center of witchcraft. Myths and legends flourish there as lushly as the water lilies in the lagoon: tales of water spirits. Tales of the devil. So say the reports about a spot that serves as the annual site for a magic convention. "Black" and "white" witches both practice here (as if there is a difference), and it is where curses are served up. It is not far from where the filming took place.

"Almost everyone in Catemaco claims that Gibson 'was here,'" said The Houston Chronicle, "and maybe he was. It's a dime-sized town, divided by winding roads and houses with peeling paint. At the center of social activities is Lago de Catemaco, a massive bowl of water formed millions of years ago by now-extinct volcanoes. With peaks poking through gray mists, the sierra casts an eerie aura over steel-blue water."

Mysterious indeed. The mother of one brujo (psychic, or witch) claimed to the newspaper that Mel "came seeking his advice."

We have no way of knowing the accuracy of that, although it is certainly the case that his luck plummeted after the filming. No one but God knows why trials happen. We pray for everyone in distress. We all have our dark moments -- our trials. And we urge those who make tremendous amounts on Christian movies to invest it back into purposes that are Christian. If nothing else, the very ambience of the area may have affected the famous actor.

Admittedly, the trailers for the movie seem a bit on the dark side, and therefore we urge Catholics and all Christians to deeply pray before deciding if they should see this movie. Whether movies, books, or songs, anything that taps into the occult or brushes up to it too closely or even portrays it "artistically" can carry a certain baggage -- sometimes, even a danger.

A difficult time. A strange one. Gibson certainly has our prayers. But graphically portraying a blood sacrifice, if this is in fact what the movie does, is baffling to us and can be described as unwise.

[resources: Prayer of the Warrior and Catholic Spiritual Warfare Prayers]

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