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All Sorts of Angels
by Dwight Longenecker
Hope Price is the wife of an Anglican minister. She had what she thought was an encounter with an angel and decided to put together a collection of angel experiences. She advertised in the press and was overwhelmed with letters from individuals who claimed they had some sort of angelic experience. The stories fell into three different categories. There were those who experienced an angelic ‘presence’, those who actually saw something supernatural, and those who experienced what looked like an ordinary person, but, because of the unusual circumstances, concluded the personage could only be explained supernaturally.
The first sort of angelic encounter is when someone senses a ‘presence’ of angels. We have an incident like this in our family. My grandfather stepped in front of a runaway truck to shield his two young sons. He was crushed by the truck, and later in hospital my grandmother stood at his deathbed. He was a godly Christian man, and the atmosphere was peaceful though tragic. Suddenly he opened his eyes and looked up. He smiled and said, 'Don't you see them? They're so beautiful.' Grandmother didn't see anything, but she felt a wonderful presence in the room. In a moment he passed away, and although my grandmother didn't see angels, she was always convinced that her husband saw them and that she had felt their presence.
Carl Richards' story is of the second sort. He was playing the drums at an Evangelical children's praise service when he saw a ring of angels about seven feet tall standing around the singing children. He said they wore 'simple wrap-around robes tied at the waist. Their hair was shoulder-length, light-coloured and wavy. In their hands they each held a long-two-edged sword which they leaned upon. Behind their backs there were two huge folded wings. ..They were whispering to each other, and occasionally smiling and pointing out certain children.'
In Price’s book a witness called Kerry Cole explains an angelic encounter of the third kind. Kelly took her infant son out shopping. She accidentally let go of the pram and looked up to see it six inches from the curb where the road surged with three lanes of heavy traffic. Suddenly a tall man in a brown coat stepped in front of the pram. 'Oh Praise the Lord!' Kerry cried. The man smiled, 'Yes indeed.' As she ran up her first instinct was to check the baby. When she looked up to thank the old gentleman he was gone. Only later did she realise that he had appeared almost out of nowhere, and vanished into thin air. Doubters will say it was simply a man out of the crowd of shoppers, but Jane was convinced that a guardian angel stepped in at her hour of need.
Are these encounters with objectively real spiritual beings? The jury is still out, even amongst those who accept the supernatural and believe in the reality of angels. One of the problems with angelic experiences, and the reason the Vatican has recently warned caution, is because the whole topic is a swamp of subjective and unreliable experiences.
Its not only Christians who collect angel stories. Angels seem to be in fashion throughout our culture. If you really want to get into angels you can buy angel statues, angel crystals, go on angel seminars and learn how to work with your angels for healing and self-improvement. Some new age teachers claim to be clairvoyants and say they are receiving messages directly from the angels. What's going on? Angels make plenty of appearances in the Bible so angels can't be automatically impossible or evil. Are modern angels really demons disguised as beings of light? Should Christians work with angels?
The Archangel of New Jersey
Denise Cooney is a spiritual teacher, counsellor and healer based in New Jersey. She also claims to be a channel for the Archangel Michael. For over ten years she has claimed to be receiving messages directly from the Master of the Heavenly Host--Michael himself. The messages are often full of homely wisdom. They give spiritual advice and insights into human nature. They purport to be from a supernatural being of light and wisdom; but underlying the messages is a belief system that contradicts Christianity.
Denise Cooney's messages from 'Michael' sound far more like the Prince of Darkness than the Prince of Light. 'Michael' says to Denise, "What I'm going to ask you to do this week, if you can… is to take the time to really see that you are a God-Goddess on this Earth . . . . You are the High Priestess, You are the High Priest. You have been working towards this for lifetimes. Claim your power, claim your rightful place . . . ." The Scriptures say Satan's original sin was that he wanted to be like God. 'Michael's' words to Denise Cooney sound like he is tempting her with the same desire.
Its also important to see how the angel channellers treat Jesus. Usually he is categorised merely as a good human teacher. Like many New Age messages, Jesus isn't mentioned by name in Cooney's messages. Instead 'the Christ' is spoken of. 'The Christ', according to Cooney's spirit master, is the same spirit which inspires all enlightened spiritual masters. So 'Michael' says to Denise Cooney, "you have the lighted consciousness of the Christ, of the Buddha, of the Krishna, of the Om, of the I Am, of the One who has no name, you are individuals in Truth, you are individuals in light."
Denise Cooney and other 'angel channellers' might think they are communicating with beings of light, but they should be careful. The Scriptures say Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Indeed he is named as the 'bright and morning star' (Isa. 14.12) The angel channellers are probably in touch with some sort of spiritual beings but what and who are they?
The Shining Ones
Andrew Collins is a specialist in angel theories. He is also an occultist who calls himself 'an urban shaman.' Collins has come up with an amazing theory about the origins of angels. In his book From the Ashes of Angels, he recognises that many primitive cultures have shamans who wear wings in their ceremonies. Collins thinks the winged shamans are mimicking winged gods, and that the winged gods are cultural memories of powerful flying beings who came to earth to civilise primitive humanoids long ago.
Collins has read The Book of Enoch --an apocryphal Jewish occult text-- and reports Enoch's visions of the 'shining ones'--mysterious beings with an advanced technology who bewitch Enoch and grant him knowledge. Collins thinks these powerful beings are also the 'shining ones' or 'sons of god' which are recorded in the book of Genesis. There it says the sons of god came down and had union with the daughters of man and a giant race was produced (Genesis 6:4). Collins thinks these super beings dressed as winged shamans and produced the living legend of supernatural winged beings. They are the ones who produced the pyramids of Egypt and all the great middle Eastern civilisations. He also thinks they travelled to Central and South America to establish the ancient civilisations there.
The Book of Enoch has long been a favourite of esoteric teachers. It reports how the shining ones came and taught humans all the black arts of abortion, making arms, wearing make-up and serving the demonic spirits. Collins says his angels are historic, physical beings, but he doesn't say where they come from in the first place. Other writers have lots of ideas where these angel beings originate. Rose and Rand Flem-Ath say they came from Atlantis, which they think can be found under the Antarctic ice cap. Other writers like Zechariah Sitchin and Von Daniken think these great beings came from outer space. Other new agers believe these super sophisticated beings are still in touch with the human race today.
Aliens and Angels
The increasing number of angelic encounters has co-incided with a growing interest in UFOs and alien abductions. While angel visitations seem encouraging, or at least harmless, alien encounters always have a sinister edge to them. Many commentators put the two kinds of encounters in the same category. They think angels and aliens are two different ways of speaking about the same paranormal phenomenon.
There are enough angelic and alien experiences to force us to admit that something strange is going on. It may not be easy to say exactly what, but people are meeting with some sort of supernatural entity. Traditional philosophy has always taught that both good and evil angels are capable of taking on various forms. So Proclus in Plato's Republic says,
"The gods exhibit many forms of themselves, and appear in a variety of shapes and sometimes indeed an unfigured light of themselves is held forth to view. Sometimes this light is held forth to view, sometimes this light is figured according to a human form and sometimes it proceeds into a different shape."
If this is so then angels may appear as a man dressed in a brown coat to save a baby from disaster. They may also take the shadowy form of grey humanoid aliens, or monsters who cause people to have dreams of abduction and torture. The Jews always considered the ancient pagan gods and goddesses to be demonic entities, and in Whitley Streiber's allegedly true story of an alien abduction entitled Communion, Streiber associates the alien female who abducted him with the Babylonian goddess Ishtar. Another 'abductee'--the Swiss writer Billy Meier-- claims he met entities called, Semjase and Ptaah. Shemyazeh is the name of one of the primary fallen angels in the Book of Enoch, and Ptah is the name of an ancient Egyptian god. Similarly, UFO writer Philip K. Dick recounts an alien abduction and claims he met Aphrodite.
In the meantime, the so-called, 'space-age channellers' claim to travel out of their bodies to other planets or receive messages from alien beings. Many 'channels' download messages from 'Ashtar' or the ‘Ashtar Command’. The name is chillingly similar to the ancient Mesopotamian creating-destroying deities: Ishtar, Athatar, Astaroth, and Astarte.
So when we put together the heretical messages of the 'angel channellers', Collins' identification of angels with the fallen angels of Genesis, and the pagan-deity names which aliens claim, its not too difficult to conclude that many of the angel-alien encounters are actually encounters with demons. The fact that chanellers open their minds and souls to these beings is frightening indeed. That they are spreading this practice to vulnerable (often young) people and distributing their misleading messages under the guise of light-filled angelic guidance is a terrifying sign of our times.
Angels of Light
In the face of this occult activity Christians might be inclined to steer clear of angels altogether. But that would be to throw the angel out with the exorcism. From the beginning angels has been part of our revealed religion. It is an article of the Catholic faith that angels are real. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says, "The existence of the spiritual, non-corporeal beings that Sacred Scripture usually calls 'angels' is a truth of faith. The witness of Scripture is as clear as the unanimity of Tradition." (CCC para. 328) However, the Vatican has recently cautioned on the tradition of venerating angels and has limited angelic names to the ones revealed in Scripture.
St Paul believes in angels, but warns that they might come as messengers of light (Gal 1:8) preaching a false gospel (Gal. 4:14) and demanding people to worship them instead of God (Col.2:18) The best way of recognising good angels is to understand their role in the economy of redemption. To do this we need to know and understand not only that angels are real, but how they have interacted with the human race down through history.
Angels appear in the Scriptures from the first pages of Genesis to the final pages of the Book of Revelation. We learn from Jacob's dream (Gen.28) that angels are messengers of heaven. They give praise to God, and continuously through Scripture the angels protect, lead and guide God's people. The Scriptures teach that angels are servants of God sent to bring messages, give glory to God and protect his people. These three roles of the angels--messengers, worshippers and guardian-guides reveal the proper ways for us to interact with the angels.
First we work with the angels whenever we proclaim the message of God's love. The angels' message always points to Christ. Throughout the Scriptures the message of the angels is interwoven with the coming of Christ--either in the Old Testament salvation history or in the New Testament gospel account. We share with the Nativity angels the message, ‘Peace to his people on earth.' The archangel Gabriel is God's chief angel messenger and we do well to ask his help and blessing whenever we prepare to communicate the gospel in any way.
The second way we work with the angels is in worship. The angels' whole existence is to worship God and do his bidding. In the liturgy we sing with the angels in heaven; "Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Hosts." With the angels of the Nativity we sing "Glory to God in the Highest." Whenever we praise God we are coming alongside the angles, and they are joining with us in the worship of the ages-- the cosmic liturgy of the Lamb. As we worship the whole world is restored to glory because in worship our souls and the whole created order of heaven and earth is set in its proper relationship with the creator.
The third way we work with the angels is to ask for their protection, guidance and help. This is where Christian practice sounds a bit similar to New Age practice. But there are some important differences. We do not ask the angels to help us 'affirm the God that is within us'. Christianity always looks out to the God who is above and beyond. The Spirit dwells within us. We hope angels don’t. They simply walk with us in the journey. In this respect it is especially good to invoke St.Michael and our guardian angel. When we are in a time of danger or temptation we can ask their help as we would ask the help of an experienced guide while climbing a mountain. They are there to lend us a hand, point out the way and to help keep us from falling.
Sharing the message, worshipping God and asking for protection may not seem quite as exciting as visitations from aliens or messages direct from angels, but our faith is incarnational. That means it has to do with everyday physical things. Some ancient writers say the demons are jealous of our bodies--that's why they try to lure us into their spiritual realm through heresy and magic. If they can't do that then they will try to take over our bodies by infestation and possession. The demons despise us, but God's angels respect and admire our physical bodies. They love our physical-ness because their Lord took on human flesh and was born of a woman.
Angels do not wish for us to go above the physical and ordinary things of life. They know that it is in flesh and blood and sweat and tears that we find God. As the English poet Henry Vaughn has written, 'Here in dust and dirt, Oh here! the lilies of His love appear.' And it is in this dust and dirt of ordinary prayer and praise pleas for protection that we co-operate most powerfully with the angels of heaven rather than the Lords of Hell.
Dwight Longenecker’s latest book, St Benedict and St Thérèse—The Little Rule and the Little Way is published by Gracewing and Our Sunday Visitor.
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