Holy Water

Holy Water can be use to clean or protect a location or person. It draws power away from evil spirits and Demons. This next part was written by www.fisheaters.com and monroeparanormalresearch.com.

Where to get it

To get holy water to use in your home, bring a clean flask to your parish church and look for a faucet that will probably be labelled "Holy Water." If there is no faucet, it might be kept in an urn of some sort. If you can't find it, don't be shy; just ask! Unlike votive candles, there is no real cost to the church in making holy water, so there is no offering expected. You can also go to any local christian book stores to buy holy water.

How to use it

You can keep it in decorative bottles 1 for storage at home or in little flasks, made for this purpose, to carry with you. Most Catholics keep at least some in holy water fonts.

Holy water fonts for the home come in all sizes and shapes, some tacky and plastic, others quite lovely and made of alabaster, marble, porcelain, sandstone, or metals -- as inexpensive or as expensive as you like -- some resting on tables, most hanging on walls (one example is shown at right). You can buy one from most Catholic gift shops or make your own (consider using bivalve seashells as basins, or the shell motif in design. The seashell is a very ancient symbol of Baptism, and the shells of large molluscs -- weighing up to 500 pounds -- have been used in churches as basins for holy water). Tip: putting a thin sponge inside the font is said to make the water evaporate less quickly.

Catholics often keep a font near their front door, in their bedrooms' doorways, and near the family altar. Use the water in the same way you do at church, dipping your fingers into it and making the Sign of the Cross. Bless your children with it as you tuck them in at night, using your thumb to sign them with a cross of holy water on their foreheads.

Most Catholics pray "In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost" when blessing themselves with Holy Water, but this is another beautiful prayer:

By Thy Precious Blood and by this Holy Water, cleanse me (him/her) from my (his/her) sins, O Lord.

Another use of holy water is to give tiny sips to the sick or spiritually oppressed. It shouldn't be consumed as a beverage, mind you, but the ingestion of small amounts, or adding a few drops to foods, is common.

How to dispose of

Holy water is usually made with a touch of salt which is a preservative, but if your holy water were to go a little, um, green, the proper way to dispose of it is the same as for any sacramental: you want to return it to the earthly elements. You should dig a hole and pour it into the earth.

Easter Water

Easter water, or baptismal water, is the water that is blessed on Holy Saturday (the day before Easter) and is used to baptize Catechumens. This water receives a more solemn sort of blessing than "regular holy water": the Easter Candle is dipped into it three times, and the priest blows his breath over it thrice, recalling the Spirit over the waters at Creation, and the Spirit causing the waters of Noe's flood to subside, and how the Spirit appeared as a dove over the waters at Christ's Baptism.

Mind you, any clean water can be used in Baptism, and often is, as in cases of emergency; but the use of Easter water is the normal way of doing things.

Gregorian Water

And finally (on the liturgical level), there is "Gregorian Water" -- holy water mixed with wine, salt, and ashes -- which is used in the consecration of churches, altars and altar stones.

Non-Liturgical "Holy Water"

There are also waters derived from holy wells and from places associated with Saintly apparitions, said waters having special curative properties by the grace of God. The most famous of these sites is Lourdes, where Our Lady appeared to the young girl who was to become known as St. Bernadette and instructed her to dig. St. Bernadette did so, with her hands, and revealed a spring whose waters have cured many.

Thanks, MonroeParanormalResearch.com