Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And welcome back to Coast to Coast George Nori with you.
Speaker 2: Dan eckerdback with us psychic medium, occultist, expert, seance host.
Speaker 2: He loves interesting books on spirit communication, magic and ritual
Speaker 2: workings and the ways in which the occult has influenced
Speaker 2: everyday life. He hosts seances with his wife Kat, performs
Speaker 2: psychic readings, enjoys lecturing on all things related to the occult, Crossroads,
Speaker 2: entities and spirit communication websites linked up at Coast TOCOASTAM
Speaker 2: dot com. Dan, welcome back.
Speaker 3: How have you been George. It's great to hear from you.
Speaker 3: Thanks so much for having.
Speaker 2: Me looking forward to this. How did you get started
Speaker 2: in dabbling with the occult?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I grew up in a haunted house and
Speaker 3: it seemed like maybe the easiest way, or the best
Speaker 3: way to get some results in dealing with the things
Speaker 3: that were terrifying me was to learn more about them.
Speaker 3: And that started in a reader's digest book The Great
Speaker 3: Mysteries of the twentieth Century, which of course you know,
Speaker 3: featured Alistair Crowley and the Pyramids and spontaneous combustion and
Speaker 3: and all of those things. And that's what started my
Speaker 3: journey of thinking like, well, wait a second, what is
Speaker 3: this magic that people are talking about, and will this
Speaker 3: help me with my ghost issue?
Speaker 2: I think I read that same Reader's Digest issue and
Speaker 2: it was fantastic, wasn't.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, I mean it totally captured my imagination.
Speaker 2: And you do exorcisms as well. I thought that was
Speaker 2: just relegated to a Catholic priest.
Speaker 3: Yeah. You know, that's a really great question, and that's
Speaker 3: really the thing that people think of. I think of
Speaker 3: that nineteen seventies horror movie The Exorcist, and I think
Speaker 3: there's a lot of drama in that certainly, And the
Speaker 3: Catholic Church has always been one of the louder Christian
Speaker 3: proponents of exorcism, but there are a great many different
Speaker 3: traditions that deal with exercising or removing spirits, and occultism
Speaker 3: or the practice of Derek or a cult philosophy is
Speaker 3: one of the main bedrocks of where we get our
Speaker 3: kind of technology that we use for exorcism.
Speaker 2: Dan tell us a little bit about your understanding of
Speaker 2: possessions and what that is and who is the possessor or.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, when we talk about stuff like you know,
Speaker 3: you mentioned the Catholic Church. There's a tendency for people
Speaker 3: to think that possession is purely some kind of Satanic
Speaker 3: entity or maybe even Satan himself in the in the
Speaker 3: Exorcist horror film. But when we talk about possession, we
Speaker 3: really look at this from the lens of well, what
Speaker 3: are spirits and what do the spirits that are involved
Speaker 3: in a possession or involved in taking up space where
Speaker 3: they should not be? Why are they there and what
Speaker 3: specifically are they Now there are a great deal of
Speaker 3: spirit lists that have been accumulated by people studying the
Speaker 3: occulta or studying demons and angels and trying to figure
Speaker 3: out a cosmology of where these things sit, like who's
Speaker 3: in charge of these beings or entities. But that logic
Speaker 3: begins to break down even further when we begin to
Speaker 3: kind of reckon with this idea of an animist framework
Speaker 3: for magic. An animist framework being that anything kind of
Speaker 3: has a spirit or an essence about it that has
Speaker 3: a will. So to break that down and make it,
Speaker 3: you know, kind of easy to understand. That means that
Speaker 3: not only could you know an angel or a demon
Speaker 3: or a spirit that we traditionally think of as spirits
Speaker 3: that might move objects in houses or you know, frighten
Speaker 3: people or even possess them. Ideas can become those sorts
Speaker 3: of things. A belief that we have can become oppressive
Speaker 3: or possessive. I've spoken with many indigenous individuals who practice shamanism,
Speaker 3: who believe that there's a kind of spirit of possession
Speaker 3: within you know, modern society of greed, if you will,
Speaker 3: or something along a more kind of moralistic framework. So
Speaker 3: that's why when we talk about like an occult perspective
Speaker 3: on exorcism, what that really is talking about is well
Speaker 3: accurately determining who and what it is we're dealing with,
Speaker 3: rather than just kind of trying to like rubber stamp
Speaker 3: it with a one size fits all kind of banishment
Speaker 3: or exorcism process.
Speaker 2: Have you ever been hurt or attacked in your work?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, people go to this pretty quickly, and
Speaker 3: I think there is a lot of drama there. But yes,
Speaker 3: things have been thrown at me. I've seen things apperate
Speaker 3: in front of me in the middle distance coins Most commonly,
Speaker 3: of course, I've been threatened by individuals both individuals who
Speaker 3: are involved in the exorcism as the people afflicted by
Speaker 3: that spirit or entity. But I have also been physically pushed,
Speaker 3: never scratched, fortunately, but my wife has been exorcism in
Speaker 3: a building that's pretty close to us. We were actually
Speaker 3: covered and made the front page of the paper for it.
Speaker 3: She actually was tossed like someone picked her up and
Speaker 3: like gently, well not gently, picked her up, and threw
Speaker 3: her back from a room she was trying to enter.
Speaker 3: She didn't, not land on her feet, but still it
Speaker 3: was one of those moments of oh, there's something real
Speaker 3: here and physical here that's pushing back against us.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: I know Kat works with you on sciances, but is
Speaker 2: she either the psychic realm too.
Speaker 3: Yes, And honestly, this kind of exploration into the world
Speaker 3: of seance is the world of spirits ultimately led her
Speaker 3: to take a step back from doing exorcism, in particular
Speaker 3: because the we'll call it the emotional drain of the
Speaker 3: work was a little bit too heavy. So while she
Speaker 3: still does mediumship, and while she still practices magic and
Speaker 3: you know, leads retreats and teaches with me, the exorcism
Speaker 3: thing is something she tends to stay away from and
Speaker 3: I don't blame her, it is right.
Speaker 2: Well, Russell Crawl, the actor who we know is got
Speaker 2: a movie coming out called The Pope's Exorcist where he
Speaker 2: plays the part of a real exorcist, the late doctor
Speaker 2: Gabriel Lamoreth, father of Morth, who claimed he claimed Dan
Speaker 2: to have performed Get this fifty thousand exorcism? Is that conceivable?
Speaker 3: I mean I always raise my eyebrows when I see
Speaker 3: anything kind of associated with a Hollywood film production, because
Speaker 3: they do have to prioritize drama. That seems a little
Speaker 3: high to me. But I also know that if that
Speaker 3: is your main job, that is the main thing that
Speaker 3: you are doing, of course it's going to take up
Speaker 3: all of your attention, and of course you're going to
Speaker 3: get all those cases. I mean, let's just face back here.
Speaker 3: The Catholic Church has not been as aggressive in their
Speaker 3: pursuit of exorcism as the United States and Europe have modernized.
Speaker 3: As modernity has kind of taken hold this idea of
Speaker 3: spirits possessing a space or God forbid, a person becomes,
Speaker 3: you know, something that feels too much like superstition, and
Speaker 3: so we try and push it out of our minds
Speaker 3: and say that can't.
Speaker 2: Happen even if he did it. Over thirty years, we're
Speaker 2: talking about sixteen hundred plus exorcisms a month. That's got
Speaker 2: to be exhausting.
Speaker 3: And I wonder too, how they're counting those spirits. So,
Speaker 3: you know, an exorcism process can take place. You can
Speaker 3: do an exorcism in a building or for a person
Speaker 3: and there might be more than one entity attached to
Speaker 3: that space or attached to that person. I mean to
Speaker 3: use that kind of animist perspective we talked about a
Speaker 3: little bit earlier. Consider, you know, if someone if the
Speaker 3: indigenous peoples are correct, and you know we are possessed
Speaker 3: by a spirit of greed, well what other things come
Speaker 3: with greed? Well, avarice, you know, sometimes lying these things,
Speaker 3: and there are certain entities that rule over those particular
Speaker 3: you know, actions that people take, so divining whether or
Speaker 3: not this is truly a spirit versus you know, just
Speaker 3: the actions of a person versus the actions of many
Speaker 3: spirits or entities. That's really where you know. Having in
Speaker 3: occult framework I think allows you to be a little
Speaker 3: bit more precise in the operations you're trying to perform.
Speaker 2: If we were to give you one title with what
Speaker 2: you do. What title would you prefer to be called
Speaker 2: on there?
Speaker 3: I prefer occultist because it covers a vast variety of
Speaker 3: my research and the work that I do. You know,
Speaker 3: as a spirit medium, certainly I connect with people's you know,
Speaker 3: departed loved ones. But then also I do ritual workings
Speaker 3: for clients, or I do ritual workings for my own
Speaker 3: purpose that might aid in manifestation or higher self knowledge. Exorcism, alchemy,
Speaker 3: these things all kind of traffic and trade amongst each other.
Speaker 3: So the term occultist, I feel, is general enough to
Speaker 3: kind of give me latitude, while specific enough in letting
Speaker 3: people know, no, I am coming at this from a
Speaker 3: perspective that is other than, you know, one of the mainstream,
Speaker 3: top tier, big religions.
Speaker 2: Well, with Dan Eckert, we're talking about occultism. Why is
Speaker 2: it that the word ac cult seems dark and dangerous
Speaker 2: and scary and evil to so many people?
Speaker 3: Well, George, here we are talking about exorcism. And even
Speaker 3: though I'd like to think I'm one of the good
Speaker 3: guys quote unquote helping people, it still is scary. And
Speaker 3: you know, the vast amount of people we've helped in
Speaker 3: performing exorcisms. Their constant refrain has been I'm afraid people
Speaker 3: will think I'm crazy and no one will ever believe this,
Speaker 3: and that's kind of an alienating factor. I don't think
Speaker 3: people are prepared to engage with this type of work,
Speaker 3: and so when they hear the term a cultist, they
Speaker 3: think of all the dark things associated with it, and
Speaker 3: I think sometimes they confuse that term with the term cult,
Speaker 3: you know, a cult of you know UFO, like you know, murder,
Speaker 3: suicide or something like you've read about in too many
Speaker 3: countless papers, or you know, small religious sects gone awry.
Speaker 3: Those those kinds of cults, I think reflect on the
Speaker 3: term a cult, which simply means hidden. But not everyone
Speaker 3: knows that.
Speaker 2: With exorcisms, do you invoke the name Jesus to get
Speaker 2: rid of the demon?
Speaker 3: It depends on the spirit some entities, some demons have
Speaker 3: a direct relationship with a kind of Christian pantheon, others
Speaker 3: seem to come from outside of that, you know. To
Speaker 3: use the Bible as an example, we're told in the
Speaker 3: Book of Kings how Solomon allegedly erected the temple, and
Speaker 3: he does so by binding and commanding demons. Now they're
Speaker 3: not listed in the Bible, but the Bible specifically references
Speaker 3: a book called the Acts of Solomon, which is all
Speaker 3: about where Solomon found his demons, and those demons the
Speaker 3: Acts of Solomon reveal actually come from an entirely separate kingdom,
Speaker 3: the Kingdom of Babylon. So the idea of certain spirits
Speaker 3: having certain home ecosystems, where some entities are more effective
Speaker 3: than others is a primary tenet of the kind of
Speaker 3: occult view of exorcism. So, yes, Jesus is a powerful
Speaker 3: name to use, but so it is a bebeloi, which
Speaker 3: means a way away. All ye profane in Greek.
Speaker 2: Now, how do you prepare for an exorcism? And the
Speaker 2: person who's possessed, how do they come to you for help?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so often we get referrals after people have been
Speaker 3: kind of exhausting every other outlook. So by the time,
Speaker 3: and this comes up a lot when we talk about, like,
Speaker 3: you know, what is an exorcism? And I think, as
Speaker 3: we've discussed on this call, sometimes people feel like either
Speaker 3: it's superstition or it's something that's exclusively Catholic. But no
Speaker 3: matter what's happening there, most people feel very alone. They
Speaker 3: feel very isolated and they feel as though no one's
Speaker 3: really taking them seriously, and so they pursue the standard
Speaker 3: channel of friends. Sometimes historians, if they live in a
Speaker 3: historic area and are experiencing haunted phenomena or hauntings, they
Speaker 3: will explore often psychologists, you know, because people do worry
Speaker 3: that they're losing connection with what we would consider to
Speaker 3: be sane, and so by the time they end up
Speaker 3: with us, it's often been a referral through either I
Speaker 3: would call them spiritually aware therapists who maybe have a
Speaker 3: view outside of just like traditional we can recommend this
Speaker 3: therapeutic technique, and then also parapsychological organization. So you know,
Speaker 3: ghost hunters who maybe go into a space expecting a
Speaker 3: really exciting investigation come out with more than they've bargained for,
Speaker 3: and that's when we show up.
Speaker 2: Dan, what do you use in an exorcism? Do you
Speaker 2: have a Bible with you? Any special tools or instruments,
Speaker 2: cruci effects?
Speaker 3: I like to I take it all. I'll tell you.
Speaker 3: The biggest tool that we tend to use is a pendulum,
Speaker 3: because pendulums allow for some degree of communication with what
Speaker 3: is around us and the spirits of the space. But
Speaker 3: it's also very safe. Unlike something like a Oija board
Speaker 3: or channeling, where you open a pathway of communication that
Speaker 3: feels more two sided, the pendulum is more one sided.
Speaker 3: All that happens is the pendulum moves. So we'll use
Speaker 3: that sometimes to diagnose who is most afflicted by this phenomena,
Speaker 3: where the phenomena resides trying to get yes or no names,
Speaker 3: so we can apply the spirit to a list. So
Speaker 3: of course I'll be bringing my grim wires with me often,
Speaker 3: the Lesser Key of Solomon, the six and seven Books
Speaker 3: of Moses, and these are again books that have large
Speaker 3: indexes of entities and spirits. So once we start deducing
Speaker 3: who we have on the line, we can figure out
Speaker 3: what effectively removes them, what ecosystem they're a part of.
Speaker 3: It becomes it's more than just carrying a crucifix in
Speaker 3: a bag. Although I keep my crucifix with me.
Speaker 2: You don't splash holy water on the subject.
Speaker 3: No, I don't use holy water. Holy water, any purified
Speaker 3: with water can be very useful. I tend to like
Speaker 3: using Florida water, which is a wash that evolves out
Speaker 3: of like a hoodoo tradition, and actually after the fountain
Speaker 3: of Youth that supposedly exists within Florida, but it's always
Speaker 3: been used as a good banishing agent, so I'll use
Speaker 3: that also, Candles and statuary reliquaries from any kind of
Speaker 3: saint or shrine, and I have quite a few relics
Speaker 3: that I'll use, especially if we come up against a
Speaker 3: spirit that's identifying as exclusively Christian or within that frame.
Speaker 3: And then things like pieces of iron, iron, coffin, nails,
Speaker 3: glass bottles which we can use to buy into spirit
Speaker 3: or create a spirit trap.
Speaker 2: Was the Fountain of Youth water found by Ponce de Leon.
Speaker 3: Allegedly, You know how it is. I have not seen
Speaker 3: signs of the Fountain of Youth in Florida, but I
Speaker 3: will say Florida is a strange place, so it wouldn't
Speaker 3: surprise me.
Speaker 2: He did go looking for it, that's for sure he did.
Speaker 2: How long does an exorcism normally last?
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, it depends on the number of spirits involved,
Speaker 3: and it depends if we need to get anything else. So,
Speaker 3: for example, if there's a spirit that fits very well
Speaker 3: within certain astrological timings and conditions, we might want to
Speaker 3: wait until the moon is in a certain phase, or
Speaker 3: we might want to create a certain seal or sigil
Speaker 3: or spirit trap that will require astrological timing, like a
Speaker 3: hakate spirit trap will generally need to be fired or
Speaker 3: created on a new moon. So we do have that
Speaker 3: timing constriction sometimes to think about. But in terms of
Speaker 3: showing up to the space and working through it, it
Speaker 3: can generally take quite a long time. Three to four
Speaker 3: hours seems to be the normal amount of time for
Speaker 3: an exorcism. Not only do you have to tend to
Speaker 3: the people who are involved, also the space and the spirits,
Speaker 3: and then there's this great deal of after counseling or
Speaker 3: just checking in with these people after they go through
Speaker 3: something like that.
Speaker 2: Now, you're not a doctor, Dan, but how do you
Speaker 2: know whether you should refer somebody to a psychiatrist as
Speaker 2: opposed to just do the exorcism?
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and that's I'm so glad you brought that up, George,
Speaker 3: because yeah, Kat and I we are not doctors. We
Speaker 3: are not professional medical figures in any way. However, most
Speaker 3: of the individuals that we work with have already come
Speaker 3: through a vetted network of traumas, formed therapists or psychologists,
Speaker 3: so by the time they've arrived with us, they have
Speaker 3: a kind of case history that they're willing to share.
Speaker 3: If someone comes to us, though, and is saying that
Speaker 3: they have a you know, a troublesome spirit or they
Speaker 3: feel like someone around them might be possessed, we do
Speaker 3: refer them immediately to someone who's in our network with
Speaker 3: therapy and psychology, just to ensure that there is nothing
Speaker 3: mundane happening that could be explained away or treated more
Speaker 3: effectively than exorcism. However, I will make it clear that
Speaker 3: we tend to in modern society view exorcism and mental
Speaker 3: illness as explanatory of each other. So if someone is
Speaker 3: claiming to be possessed or that they're haunted, they're just really,
Speaker 3: you know, they need their medication up or something they
Speaker 3: need to go up a dose. And when we look
Speaker 3: at the literature or the history of this work, there
Speaker 3: does seem to be not a causal relationship. But certainly
Speaker 3: these two things exist together, and that's been something that
Speaker 3: has come up in the work in the past that
Speaker 3: just because someone might exhibit a mental situation that can
Speaker 3: be diagnosed accurately and treated accurately, does not also mean
Speaker 3: that they could not be having paranormal phenomena or spirit
Speaker 3: phenomena as well.
Speaker 2: Do Sometimes these people come in screaming and yelling at you.
Speaker 3: You know, the people who are doing the screaming and
Speaker 3: yelling are often the ones who are most afraid of
Speaker 3: what's happening, and their biggest fear is always you're going
Speaker 3: to make this worse. And that's generally because everything that
Speaker 3: they've tried up until this point has made it worse.
Speaker 3: I e. They have a friend who's into ghost hunting
Speaker 3: who told them to like, you know, break out the
Speaker 3: weedge aboard and see if it has a name, or
Speaker 3: they have some friends who are just making fun of
Speaker 3: them for it, so they try to ignore it and
Speaker 3: they just press it down and you know, try not
Speaker 3: to acknowledge it while secretly dreading it all the time.
Speaker 3: So generally, when someone approaches us and is really whipped up,
Speaker 3: it's because they are they are anxious, they are feeling afraid.
Speaker 3: Kat and I are generally very very good at calming
Speaker 3: them down and explaining clearly.
Speaker 4: What it is we're doing that's important on your floor
Speaker 4: to some and Lucifer, we're actually very very method methodically
Speaker 4: going through a list of solutions and trying them.
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