Phantoms and Monsters |  |
- The Croglin Grange Vampire Mystery
- Fortean / Alternative News: Disappearing Airliner! Pope's Holy Organs and Randi's Homeopathic Challenge
- Paranormal / Spiritual News - Historical Exorcisms, Defending Vodou and Facebook Curse
| The Croglin Grange Vampire Mystery Posted: 06 Feb 2011 11:04 AM PST  This particular account dates from just after the English Civil War in the 1650's. The owners of Croglin Low Hall in Cumberland (now Cumbria) were a family named Fisher and the story was told to one Augustus Hare by a descendent of the family in 1896. For some reason of their own, the Fishers decided to go and live in the south of England and rent out the farm. The new tenants were two brothers and a sister named Cranswell. The new family stayed in their remote farmhouse through the first winter without event. The summer came and, that year, it was stiflingly hot so they slept with the windows open. At that time the Hall was only one storey high - the upstairs has been built subsequently. Near the Hall was a chapel and a small graveyard which once belonged to the Howard family, who were great landowners in these parts. One airless summer night the men sat with their sister watching the moon rise. After a time they decided to go to bed. The sister lay in her bed, the bedclothes cast off because of the heat. She had closed her window, but not fastened the shutters. She gazed out of her window, propped up on her pillows as the long summer day faded out and night took its place. In Cumbria at midsummer, because it is quite far north, it does not get very dark at all between sunset and sunrise.  Miss Cranswell soon became aware of two lights in the belt of trees some distance from the house which separated the lawn from the graveyard. She watched and, after a while, she made out a dark shape moving towards the house and towards her window. A terrible horror seized her. She wanted to get up and leave the room, but to go to the door would have meant she had to go closer to the window. Besides she had locked the door from the inside and so would have to stand there and unlock it...all the while clearly visible to whatever was out there. Frozen to the spot, she stared at the shape...but then it turned and instead of moving closer to her window, it started to move around the house. She jumped up and ran towards the door. Her hands were shaking so much that she found it hard to turn the key. And then her heart nearly stopped. Behind her, close to her though she didn't dare look, she heard a scratching at the window. It was outside...just feet away. She stood there petrified with fear still not turning her head. Then she heard the sound of it unpicking the lead which held the glass in place. She forced herself to look and saw that one pane of the mullioned glass had come away and a long bony hand stretched in and turned the window catch. Whatever it was, it came in through the window with a rush and grabbed her...its fingers in her hair, its mouth at her throat. It bit her neck and forced her onto the ground. As it bit her she screamed.
Her brothers heard the noise and came and battered at the locked door. The creature looked up as the door was broken open...it turned and fled out of the window, leaving her lying on the floor, bleeding profusely from a wound at her neck. One brother clambered out of the window and went after it. But it was fast and before he could catch it...perhaps it was lucky for him that he didn't. It disappeared into the inky blackness around the graveyard. Trying to explain the incident afterwards, the girl rationalized that the creature must have been a dangerous lunatic. But she was still horribly shocked and her brothers took her away from Croglin to recover. They stayed away for a while, but then, as autumn came, it was she who urged them to return to Croglin. They had paid for the tenancy, and besides, she joked, it would be very bad luck to come across two escaped lunatics. They returned to Croglin and spent the winter there. She had the same room, but always closed the wooden shutters. The brothers took to carrying loaded pistols with them around the house. But nothing happened until one night in March.  The sister was lying in bed when she heard a terribly familiar scratching at the window. She struggled to get fully awake and scrabbled for a candle and something to light it with. When she got a flame she saw that the shutters were opened. Staring in at her was a brown shriveled face...she saw its long bony hands picking at the lead of the windows. This time she screamed immediately. Her brothers rushed in with their pistols. She pointed to the window, but the creature had gone. The brothers ran out of the front door and saw it moving across the lawn towards the graveyard. They fired and one of them hit it in the leg. It scrambled away into the darkness and they lost it. The next day the brothers summoned their neighbors, and with their help they went into the graveyard. The tenants of nearby Croglin High Hall had also been suffering visits from it and their young daughter had bite wounds at the throat. The father had thought that she had been bitten by a rat, but when the Cranswells said what had happened to their sister, they feared the worst and the father joined the party as it made its way to the graveyard.  In his book Legends of the Lake District, J. A. Brooks tells that in the early years of this century the tenants of Croglin Low Hall had to deal with a fire in the dining room chimney. When the fire died down and they were rebuilding the chimney, they found an ancient burnt corpse in there. Though the tenant wanted to rebury the corpse in a churchyard with proper Christian rites, he died before he was able to do this. Some people think that the corpse is still there in the chimney.  Adaptations on the Croglin Range Tale Augustus Hare, who had the story printed, said he heard it from a Captain Fisher who leased the property after the Cranswells. He dated the events to around 1875. This immediately aroused suspicion that he had actually adapted certain sequences in a 'penny dreadful novel' possibly by James Malcolm Rymer: 'Varney the Vampire' published in 1847. Penny dreadfuls were deliberately sensational. The books sold for a penny, often authors did not want to admit they wrote them. In 1924, Charles G. Harper decided to challenge Hare's account of the vampire. He went to Cumberland and could not find Croglin Grange, although he found both a Croglin High Hall and a Croglin Low Hall. There was no church nearby. The closest was a mile away. There was no vault as described by the brothers and the villagers. Later a man called F. Clive-Ross visited the area and in turn challenged Harper's findings. He interviewed the local people and deduced that Croglin Low Hall was the Grange. He also noted that a chapel had existed near the house and its foundation stones were still there in the 1930s. Then in 1968, D. Scott Rogo, a writer, using a book published in 1929 that contained both stories concluded that it was likely that one story was based upon the other and therefore Croglin Grange was most likely a hoax. However some years later F. Clive-Ross found a witness, Mrs Parkin who lived at Slack Cottage in Ainstable who said she had known one of the Fishers. However this gentleman was born in the 1860's had heard the story from his grandparents. Mrs Parkin also said that according to the deeds of Croglin Low Hall, it was commonly called Croglin Grange until 1720". So Hare had made a huge blunder. If the story had taken place it was two centuries earlier in 1680-1700 not the 1870s. Clive-Ross published his research in 'Tomorrow magazine, spring 1963'. More recent research by Lionel Fanthorpe also suggests that the events took place in the late 1600s. A vault close to the Grange was demolished during Cromwell's time. Hence these findings, place the events before the publication of Varney the Vampire. So what exactly happened? We shall never know. It is possible that Varney's author heard the legend and decided to write about it as a Penny Dreadful. It was said the book was based on events that took place during the reign of Queen Anne (1702-14), near the time of the incident. Maybe Hare used Varney the Vampire for his book or perhaps he heard about the legend independently and wrote his own account. Whatever the truth, the Croglin beast will remain a mystery. ----------  The Beast of Croglin Grange - Augustus Hare - 'Story of My Life' Captain Fisher also told us this really extraordinary story connected with his own family: Fisher may sound a very plebeian name, but this family is of very ancient lineage, and for many hundreds of years they have possessed a very curious sort of place in Cumberland, which bears the weird name of Croglin Grange. The great characteristic of the house is that never at any period of its very long existence has it been more than one story high, but it has a terrace from which large grounds sweep away towards the Church in the hollow, and a fine distant view. When, in lapse of years, the Fisher's outgrew Croglin Grange in family and fortune, they were wise enough not to destroy the long-standing characteristic of the place by adding another story to the house, but they went away to the south, to reside at Thorncombe near Guildford, and they let Croglin Grange. They were extremely fortunate in their tenants, two brothers and a sister. They heard their praises from all quarters. To their poorer neighbours they were all that is most kind and beneficent, and their neighbours of a higher class spoke of them as a most welcome addition to the little society of the neighbourhood. On their part the tenants were greatly delighted with their new residence. The arrangement of the house, which would have been a trial to many, was not so to them. In every respect Croglin Grange was exactly suited to them.  The winter was spent most happily by the new inmates of Croglin Grange, who shared in all the little social pleasures of the district, and made themselves very popular. In the following summer, there was one day which was dreadfully, annihilatingly hot. The brothers lay under the trees with their books, for it was too hot for any active occupation. The sister sat in the verandah and worked, or tried to work, for, in the intense sultriness of that summer day, work was next to impossible. They dined early, and after dinner they still sat out in the verandah, enjoying the cool air which came with evening, and they watched the sun set, and the moon rise over the belt of trees which separated the grounds from the churchyard, seeing it mount the heavens till the whole lawn was bathed in silver light, across which the long shadows from the shrubbery fell as if embossed, so vivid and distinct were they. When they separated for the night, all retiring to their rooms on the ground floor (for, as I said, there was no upstairs in that house), the sister felt that the heat was still so great that she could not sleep, and having fastened her window, she did not close the shutters - in that very quiet place it was not necessary - and, propped against the pillows, she still watched the wonderful, the marvellous beauty of that summer night. Gradually she became aware of two lights, two lights which flickered in and out in the belt of trees which separated the lawn from the churchyard, and as her gaze became fixed upon them, she saw them emerge, fixed in a dark substance, a definite ghastly something, which seemed every moment to become nearer, increasing in size and substance as it approached. Every now and then it was lost for a moment in the long shadows which stretched across the lawn from the trees, and then it emerged larger than ever, and still coming on - on. As she watched it, the most uncontrollable horror seized her. She longed to get away, but the door was close to the window and the door was locked on the inside, and while she was unlocking it, she must be for an instant nearer to it. She longed to scream, but her voice seemed paralysed, her tongue glued to the roof of her mouth. Suddenly, she never could explain why afterwards, the terrible object seemed to turn to one side, seemed to be going round the house, not to be coming to her at all, and immediately she jumped out of bed and rushed to the door, but as she was unlocking it, she heard scratch, scratch, scratch upon the window, and saw a hideous brown face with flaming eyes glaring in at her. She rushed back to the bed, but the creature continued to scratch, scratch, scratch on the window. She felt a sort of mental comfort in the knowledge that the window was securely fastened on the inside. Suddenly the scratching sound ceased. And a kind of pecking sound took its place. Then, in her agony, she became aware that the creature was unpicking the lead! The noise continued, and a diamond pane of glass fell into the room. Then a long bony finger of the creature came in and turned the handle of the window, and the window opened, and the creature came in; and it came across the room, and her terror was so great that she could not scream, and it came up to the bed and twisted its long bony fingers in her hair, and it dragged her head over the side of the bed, and - it bit her violently in the throat.  As it bit her, her voice was released, and she screamed with all her might and main. Her brothers rushed out of their rooms, but the door was locked on the inside. A moment was lost while they got a poker and broke it open. Then the creature had already escaped through the window, and the sister, bleeding violently from a wound in the throat, was lying unconscious over the side of the bed. One brother pursued the creature, which fled before him through the moonlight with gigantic strides, and eventually seemed to disappear over the wall into the churchyard. Then he rejoined his brother by the sister's bedside. She was dreadfully hurt and her wound was a very definite one, but she was of strong disposition, not given either to romance or superstition, and when she came to herself she said, 'What has happened is most extraordinary and I am very much hurt. It seems inexplicable, but of course there is an explanation, and we must wait for it. It will turn out that a lunatic has escaped from some asylum and found his way here.' The wound healed and she appeared to get well, but the doctor who was sent for to her would not believe that she could bear so terrible a shock so easily, and insisted that she must have change, mental and physical; so her brothers took her to Switzerland. Being a sensible girl, when she went abroad, she threw herself at once into the interests of the country she was in. She dried plants, she made sketches, she went up mountains, and, as autumn came on, she was the person who urged that they should return to Croglin Grange. 'We have taken it,' she said, 'for seven years, and we have only been there one; and we shall always find it difficult to let a house which is only one story high, so we had better return there; lunatics do not escape every day.' As she urged it, her brothers wished nothing better, and the family returned to Cumberland. From there being no upstairs in the house, it was impossible to make any great change in arrangements. The sister occupied the same room, but it is unnecessary to say she always closed her shutters, which, however, as in many old houses, always left one top pane of the window uncovered. The brothers moved, and occupied a room together exactly opposite that of their sister, and they always kept loaded pistols in their room. The winter passed most peacefully and happily. In the following March the sister was suddenly awakened by a sound she remembered only too well - scratch, scratch, scratch upon the window, and looking up, she saw, climbed up to the topmost pane of the window, the same hideous brown shrivelled face, with glaring eyes, looking in at her. This time she screamed as loud as she could. Her brothers rushed out of their room with pistols, and out of the front door. The creature was already scudding away across the lawn. One of the brothers fired and hit it in the leg, but still with the other leg it continued to make way, scrambled over the wall into the churchyard, and seemed to disappear into a vault which belonged to a family long extinct. The next day the brothers summoned all the tenants of Croglin Grange, and in their presence the vault was opened. A horrible scene revealed itself. The vault was full of coffins; they had been broken open, and their contents, horribly mangled and distorted, were scattered over the floor. One coffin alone remained intact. Of that the lid had been lifted, but still lay loose upon the coffin. They raised it, and there, brown, withered, shrivelled, mummified, but quite entire, was the same hideous figure which had looked in at the windows of Croglin Grange, with the marks of a recent pistol shot in the leg; and they did the only thing that can lay a vampire - they burnt it. NOTE: Charles G. Harper's version of the story can be found at "Haunted Houses - Tales of the supernatural with some accounts of hereditary curses and family legends"...Lon Click for video Sources: myths.e2bn.org www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk lookaroundcumbria.yolasite.com www.shroudeater.com www.whitehaven-news.co.uk www.guardian.co.uk Charles G. Harper - "Haunted Houses - Tales of the supernatural with some accounts of hereditary curses and family legends" - Chapman & Hall, London, 1907       | ||
| Posted: 06 Feb 2011 09:05 AM PST  Date 2-5-11: Time 5:23 p.m.: almost no clouds, sunny afternoon I live on a mountain (3K+ feet OSL) east of Asheville NC. I was casually standing out on my deck observing 3 hawks circling to the south of me. Then I noticed what at first I thought was a jet liner in the distance behind the hawks, moving east to west at a lower-than-normal rate of speed. But it seemed different in shape (as the wings were not discernable) and speed and was south of me maybe 5 miles. I quickly got my binoculars and observed what appeared to be a craft CHANGING from an airliner (with a solid red tail, and that may be important) to a long cigar-shaped and bright silver craft. For maybe 5 seconds the craft disappeared behind some branches of trees in my view and after that the craft was nowhere to be seen in its ongoing trajectory/flight path. It had literally disappeared. I'm a former pilot (with over 25K hours of flight time in ALL kinds of weather conditions) and I know ALL kinds of aircraft. This craft, again, CHANGED, into something else completely and then disappeared! That was a first for me, as I've seen MANY UFO's in my personal and flying career. - MUFON CMS ********** Too stupid for sex? telegraph - The 41 year-old had been in a relationship with a man whom he lived with and told officials "it would make me feel happy" for it to continue. But his local council decided his "vigorous sex drive" was inappropriate and that with an IQ of 48 and a "moderate" learning disability, he did not understand what he was doing. A psychiatrist involved in the case even tried to prevent the man being given sex education, on the grounds that it would leave him "confused". Mr Justice Mostyn said the case was "legally, intellectually and morally" complex as sex is "one of the most basic human functions" and the court must "tread especially carefully" when the state tries to curtail it. But he agreed that the man, known only as Alan, should not be allowed to have sex with anyone on the grounds that he did not have the mental capacity to understand the health risks associated with his actions. Under the judge's order, the man is now subject to "close supervision" by the local authority that provides his accommodation, in order to ensure he does not break the highly unusual order. The judge concluded: "I therefore make a declaration that at the present time Alan does not have the capacity to consent to and engage in sexual relations. "In such circumstances it is agreed that the present régime for Alan's supervision and for the prevention of future sexual activity is in his best interests." It is the latest controversial case to come before the Court of Protection, a little-known authority whose proceedings are held behind closed doors. Under the Mental Capacity Act 2005, its judges have the power to make life or death decisions for people deemed to lack the intelligence to make them for themselves – such as ordering that they undergo surgery, have forced abortions, have life-support switched off or be forced to use contraception. In the latest case, the man known as Alan was described as "sociable" and "presented as an able man" but who was "seriously challenged in all aspects of his mental functionality". He lived in a home provided by the council, where he developed a sexual relationship with a man called Kieron by the court. Alan was also accused of making lewd gestures at children in a dentists' surgery and on a bus, although no police action was taken. In June 2009 the town hall began court proceedings to restrict his contact with Kieron on the grounds that he lacked mental capacity, and an interim order was made to that effect. "Since then Alan has been subjected to close supervision to prevent any further sexual activity on his part," except when he is alone in his bedroom. However he told representatives of the Official Solicitor, who acts in the Court of Protection, to tell the judge "I want to kiss them again". Mr Justice Mostyn highlighted the fact that the court cannot prevent people from merely making "unwise" decisions, and that a simple test can be carried out to see if a person is capable of consenting to sex based on the act itself rather than the proposed partner. The judge said it requires an understanding and awareness of the "mechanics of the act", "that there are health risks involved" and that sex between a man and a woman may lead to pregnancy. He said that the psychiatrist thought Alan "believed that babies were delivered by a stork or found under a bush", and that "sex could give you spots or measles". On that basis the judge ruled that Alan did not have the capacity to consent to sex, but also ordered that the council should provide him with sex education "in the hope that he thereby gains that capacity". ********** Pope's organs are too holy to donate to mortals, says Church independent - Benedict XVI has tried to scotch rumours that he carries an organ donor card after his secretary revealed that his ascension to the position of Holy Father means he is no longer able to bequeath his body parts to lesser mortals. On the pontiff's instructions, Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, Benedict's personal secretary, fired off a letter to quell the rumours that started in the Pope's native Germany. "It's true that a simple cardinal can have an organ donor card but, despite public declarations to the contrary, it ceased to apply when he was elected head of the Catholic Church," Mgr Gaenswein said. In 1999, the then-Cardinal Ratzinger said he was on an organ-donor list. "I am available to offer my organs to whoever might need them. It is an act of love, of affection and generosity," he said at the time. And as recently as 2008, three years after being elected pontiff, Benedict attended an international congress on donor transplantation where he repeated his support for organ donors. "It's a special way of showing charity," he said, though he added that donations had to be "free, voluntary [and] respectful of the health and dignity of the donor". Mgr Gaenswein did not specify why the Pope is not able to donate his organs. But Archbishop Zymunt Zimowski, a member of the Vatican health council, said it was because the body of the Pope effectively belonged to the entire Catholic Church. "It's understandable that the body of the Pontiff should rest intact because, in his role as successor to Saint Paul and universal pastor of the Catholic Church, he belongs entirely to the Church in spirit and body," he told La Repubblica. But pontiffs' bodies have not always been kept intact. Until the end of the 19th century, it was traditional for a pontiff's organs to be preserved after his death and kept in an urn in the Church of Saints Vincenzo and Anastasio near Rome's Trevi Fountain. In 1958, after the death of Pope Pius XII, an Italian doctor devised a new method for conserving the body without extracting the organs. Unfortunately it was not a success; the body turned green and began to putrefy. In other health matters, the Corriere della Sera newspaper reported that the Vatican is preparing guidance for health workers in relation to HIV/Aids. Last year, Pope Benedict said that condom use by male and female prostitutes could be a good thing because it indicated the user's intention to protect others from a deadly infection. His comments appeared to back the use of condoms by sex workers to prevent the spread of the Aids virus. ********** Randi's Challenge to Homeopathy Manufacturers and Retail Pharmacies randi.org - To expose a scam industry that endangers and rips off millions of consumers a year, world-renowned conjuror, escape artist, and skeptic James Randi has put one million dollars on the line. In a video statement released at 10:23 a.m. (ET) today, Randi joined hundreds of consumer advocates in more than 25 countries in exposing so-called homeopathic remedies—scam medications with no active ingredients that are sold by major retailers with no warning to customers. Demonstrators around the world swallowed homeopathic products by the handful, in a worldwide day of action inspired by a lecture by James Randi in which he downed an entire bottle of homeopathic sleeping pills to show they had no effect. In his message, Randi issued a one-million-dollar challenge to the manufacturers of homeopathic products to prove their claims, and challenged major drug retailers like CVS, Rite-Aid, and Walgreens to stop tricking consumers into paying real money for fake medicine. "Consumers have the right to know what they're buying," Randi said. "No one should walk out of a drugstore with a homeopathic product without knowing these basic facts: there is no credible evidence that the product does what it says; there is not one bit—not a single atom—of the claimed "active ingredient" in the package; and no U.S. health agency has tested or approved the product. It should be a crime for retail corporations to profit by denying the public this critical information about the products on their shelves."     | ||
| Paranormal / Spiritual News - Historical Exorcisms, Defending Vodou and Facebook Curse Posted: 06 Feb 2011 07:56 AM PST  The Exorcism of Clara Germana Cele Young people are some of the most vulnerable candidates for demon possession, and most of the infamous cases deal with teenagers and young adults. In this article, you will encounter the details of Clara Germana Cele from South Africa, who was in need of an exorcism. A Christian woman named Clara Germana Cele was deemed possessed by a demon at the age of 16 years old. Cele was attending school at St. Michael's Mission in Natal, South Africa during 1906. She was an orphan when she was baptized as an infant. When she was 16, it is said that the girl made a pact with Satan, which was the cause of her demonic possession. This information is said to have been later revealed to her confessor, Father Horner Erasmus. A nun wrote an account that stated Cele was able to speak languages of which she had no previous knowledge. Others witnessed this skill. It was recorded that she understood German, Polish, French, and other languages. The nun documented that Cele had clairvoyance powers that she demonstrated by telling intimate secrets about people she had never met before. She could also reveal the sins of complete strangers. A disturbing habit of Cele was that she could not stand to be in the presence of blessed objects. When she was, the girl displayed great power and intensity. It is said that she could hurl nuns across convent rooms and often beat them up. When the girl cried, one nun likened it to a "savage bestiality." The nun said that she hadn't even heard an animal make such sounds. The attending nun at St. Michael's Mission said, "No animal had ever made such sounds. Neither the lions of East Africa nor the angry bulls. At times, it sounded like a veritable herd of wild beasts orchestrated by Satan had formed a hellish choir." Some people reported that the girl had levitated five feet into the air – both vertically and horizontally. If she was sprinkled with holy water, it was said that she would come out of her state of satanic possession. This was stated as a sign of true possession and not that the subject was suffering from a mental illness. It is said that Cele's exorcism took two days to complete. During this time, the girl's first reaction was to knock the Holy Bible from the hands of the priest and grab his stole in an attempt to choke him with it. At the end of the exorcism, it was said that the demon was forced out of her body and she was healed. - Unexplainable.net ********** Priest Defends Vodou stuff - Vodou isn't about sticking pins in dolls, sacrificing chickens or casting black magic, says New Zealand's highest ranked Hatian Vodou priest. But it does involve daily rituals, secret ceremonies and spirits possessing humans. "There are no vodou dolls, there are no pins, Vodou doesn't do zombies," says Palmerston North's Liam Richard-Howes. "We do use magic and we have spiritual work that we can do to improve your situation. You want more money? There are things we can do. You want a new lover? There are things that we can do." There are several forms of Vodou, the most famous being New Orleans Voodoo. Various forms are still practised in Africa, where it originated. Mr Richard-Howes was ordained a senior priest, known as a Houngan Assogue, in February last year, just after the devastating earthquake struck Haiti. "The streets of Port-au-Prince when we arrived reeked of death. It was heartbreaking, the level of destruction that was there." But he was inspired by the way Hatians got on with life, he said while holding an asson, a gourd draped in beads, used to call spirits. "It's a powerful tool and probably the most sacred object we have." It takes more than a week of ceremonies to become a senior priest. A two-day ceremony full of singing and dancing determined what spirits were with him. Then he went into seclusion, but he can't divulge details. "What happens in that week is a secret. It's a series of life-changing experiences." Speaking to the Manawatu Standard yesterday, Mr Richard-Howes was dressed in white and wearing a string of beads, called a kolye, over his shoulder. The beads represent all the spirits and can only be worn by priests. A room in his Palmerston North home has been converted into a temple, full of figurines representing the 401 spirits. He has just returned from a three-week stint in the Caribbean nation where he attended fellow Vodou priest ordination ceremonies and a memorial service for earthquake victims. The lack of progress in rebuilding the country was shocking, he said. Rubble had been pushed from streets on to footpaths to enable aid agencies to drive brand new vehicles on the road, he said. "It was so disappointing." Mr Richard-Howes began practising vodou in 2006 after a "spiritual journey" which saw him dabble in a number of religions including Paganism and Buddhism. "I also personally needed a religion that wasn't fatalistic because what's the point if everything is predestined." He originally wanted to be a Catholic priest but his decade-long journey led him to the often misunderstood and largely unknown Vodou faith. However, he still acknowledges God and goes to church on Sundays. "We acknowledge all spirits, the saints, Buddha, everyone because you can't be a spiritual person and ignore them." Mr Richard-Howes now runs a business from his home via www.kiwimojo.com and has clients all over the world. He conducts workshops, spiritual baths and communicates with spirits who possess. ********** Facebook curse on politician gets Nigerian man arrested guardian - A man who used Facebook to put a curse on a Nigerian politician has been jailed, raising fears of a crackdown on freedom of speech ahead of crucial elections. Moukhtar Ibrahim Aminu was arrested in the northern state of Jigawa for being a public nuisance, police spokesman Abdul Jinjiri said. Aminu was held in prison for several days before appearing in a local court, where he was charged with defamation and sent back to jail pending trial. Jinjiri said Aminu's crime stemmed from a comment he posted on Facebook on 18 January. Writing in the local Hausa language, Aminu asked that divine punishment be levelled against Sule Lamido, the governor of Jigawa and a co-founder of the ruling People's Democratic party. "Allah curse Sule Lamido and all his useless friends," the posting said. "Allah make Sule Lamido and his friend useless." Such curses can carry tremendous importance in Nigeria, a nation of 150m people where animist beliefs mix with Christianity and Islam. Some believe the curses can damage them for life, while others take them as an insult. The case has prompted furious comments on governor Lamido's Facebook wall. One protester, Gerald C Azike, posted: "Your excellency, if what I read about your detention of a young man was because of what he said on your face book [sic], then that is being so callous. How can you arrogate such a power to yourself in this present world? It is only because it is in Nigeria where anything goes that you can do that." Aminu's arrest came despite laws protecting freedom of speech. Femi Falana, a lawyer and civil rights activist, cited a 1983 court decision clearly showing that politicians and others cannot demand the arrest of individuals who slander, libel or defame them. But he added: "In Nigeria, a lot of illegalities are committed by the government." Umar Kyari, a spokesman for Lamido, insisted the governor's office had no hand in the arrest. "This story is between the police and the boy. This story is not between the governor and the boy per se. It is left to the legal system to either free or detain him," he told the Associated Press The Nigerian president, Goodluck Jonathan, who is bidding for re-election in April, announced his candidacy on Facebook and has made great play of using it to connect with young voters. He has more than 450,000 fans on the social networking site. ********** Paranormal / Spiritual Links Exorcism Cases: 1778 England & a Saint What is an Exorcism? Part I and Part II The Rhine Research Center Ghost of Les Paul Haunts Pete Townsend of The Who The Battery Carriage Inn Yeddyurappa fears Opposition witchcraft The Little Boy in my House Spiritual belief, practices differ in religion Inmates still haunt old jail, paranormal probers say Going Bump Speak of the Devil -- Having the 'Rite' Take on the Demonic Physicists have 'solved' mystery of levitation Salisbury group isn't spooked by eerie events Woman claims literal witch hunt in dead cats case Send us an email Phantoms and Monsters Now Available on Kindle   Spirit Rescue International™ Providing no-cost professional spiritual help, personal support and guidance Take the first step towards genuine peace of mind
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"In Cumbria at midsummer, because it is quite far north, it does not get very dark at all between sunset and sunrise."
ReplyDeleteDon't you mean the nights are short? I can assure you it DOES go dark at night, even here, though only for a few hours between 11 pm and about 3:14 am