Cleansing your home and removing evil from it

Every home is exposed to negative energy — evil thoughts, judgement, fear, chaos — seeping through cracks in the walls, beamed by satellite into your television and radio, and mingling wherever people live.

Negative energy hanging over a house can strain relations, breed tension, deepen disagreements, invite accidents, and corrode mutual understanding and health. It can foster insomnia and weigh the whole house down with a heavy, unwholesome atmosphere.

When such things happen, the house must without fail be cleansed of negative influences.

If you have moved into a flat where others lived before you, or a flat in a new building that missed its completion date for one reason or another, be sure to cleanse that flat or house.

Many people say: we invited a priest and had the house blessed, yet little changed for the better — for some it even grew worse. And that happens for a simple reason: “blessing” and “cleansing” are wholly different rites in action and in energy. Priests do not believe in cast spells or the evil eye — so how would they deliver your home from them? And laying a blessing over an uncleaned space can aggravate matters further.

Cleansing the house every month will greatly reduce negative energy. Best of all is to cleanse as the Moon wanes. But if the need arises, do not wait for the right phase — simply cleanse.

However thoroughly you clean your home, however often you vacuum, wash, scrub, dust and polish, an unseen “grime” may remain that no brush or cloth can remove.

If quarrels and conflicts, tension and mutual incomprehension have grown frequent in your family, try this ritual.

Best perform it alone, when none of the household is home.

First brew herbs, taking about three bunches each: St John's wort, wormwood, mint. Saying as you do:

“I brew, I brew my brew — from cast spells, woes and quarrels I free my home! I bring cleanliness and lead fretfulness away! I wash off all filth, and forbid spirits and demons of malice to dwell in my house! Amen!”

Strain the brew, add holy water, pouring it crosswise, and say:

“The Cross of Christ, hallowed for all the world by the grace and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, is given us as a weapon against all our enemies, visible and invisible, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

Now drop twelve 50-kopeck coins into the water and say:

“I shall wash and clean, drive demons and spirits of malice from my house, wash my home free of woe and spells, and wash myself wealth, happiness and love. Amen!”

It must be said that demons and spirits of malice cannot abide fried salt. Put this natural remedy to use.

In the kitchen, set an old frying pan over medium heat and pour salt onto it — Thursday salt (salt prepared on Maundy Thursday), three handfuls for each person living in the house. If you have no Thursday salt, use any salt bought on any Thursday before noon, without taking change.

Give the house a thorough cleaning, and wash with the prepared water everything you can reach — above all the legs of tables and chairs, every threshold, door, window and door handle, and the floor, of course.

As you wash and clean, open the casements and doors to air the rooms. Remember: the salt stays on its own over medium heat, roasting in the pan — do not stir it.

As you clean, speak this charm:

“Mire-slime, out of here, or I shall cast you onto the dung-heap! On the dung-heap sits Baba Semeniha, brewing mischief from the slime, and selling it to the furnace! Amen!”

When you finish cleaning, switch the salt off and, once cool, flush it down the toilet. Wash the pan and use it as usual.

Then walk every room with a church candle, starting at the front door and moving clockwise, crossing with the lit candle everything in your path and reading the prayers “Our Father”, “Let God Arise!” and “He Who Dwells in the Shelter!” (Psalm 90).

Afterwards walk through again with the lit candle and silently ask God for health for your loved ones, for peace and quiet in the house, for love, and so on.

Walk the whole space a third time, saying the prayer:

“Rejoice, O Virgin Mother of God, Mary full of grace, the Lord is with Thee; blessed art Thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, for Thou hast borne the Saviour of our souls. Amen.”

With the same candle, walk around all nearby outbuildings too. Close the windows and doors.

Take a cleansing shower. Pour plain water into a glass, throw in a pinch of salt (Thursday salt is best). Light a match and cross the water with it three times. Then say three times:

“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit! Amen!”

Break the burnt match in two and drop it into the water. Then read this charm over the water nine times:

“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit! Amen! Pure blood, heavenly blood! Save and keep God's servant (name) from every evil eye, from the ill hour — from woman's, from man's, from child's, from the joyful, from the hateful, from the whispered, from the twice-boiled!”

Sprinkle yourself or your kin with this water. Drink (or give to drink) what remains each morning for three days.

A bath with holy water also helps against cast spells and other ill influences. How is such a bath prepared? Pour holy water crosswise into warm water — about a litre of holy water per bath.

The healing effect grows stronger if you add a pinch of blessed salt, or Thursday salt. The effect is strongest if the bath is taken weekly, overnight from Wednesday into Thursday. And it turns truly medicinal if you add seven tablespoons of baking soda to the bath.

A bath brewed from thistle also helps wonderfully against spells. To prepare it, pour boiling water over the plant — about a handful of herbs per litre of water. Steep for fifteen minutes. Then pour the infusion into the bath and bathe in it.

At once after this bath you will feel your wellbeing lift and your mood level out. Such baths are also worth taking after a hard, emotionally draining day, or after dealing with someone disagreeable.

Now you may invite a priest to bless the house — or bless it yourself, so that God's blessing descends upon it. There is nothing difficult in it.

Prepare a clean vessel — never one animals have drunk or eaten from! Best of all a new one with a lid, bought specially for holy water. Pour a little holy water into it. Begin at the icon corner (the “beautiful corner” where the icons hang) or wherever your icons stand. Sprinkle every room with holy water, flicking it crosswise in all the rooms as you move clockwise, saying:

“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

“O Heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of Truth, who art everywhere and fillest all things, Treasury of blessings and Giver of life, come and dwell in us, cleanse us from every stain, and save, O Good One, our souls. Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us. Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen. O Creator and Maker of all things, O God, prosper speedily by Thy blessing the works of our hands begun for Thy glory, and deliver us from all evil, for Thou alone art almighty and lovest mankind. Swift to intercede and strong to aid, stand forth now by the grace of Thy power, bless and strengthen us, and bring to fulfilment the good intent of Thy servants' undertaking: for all Thou willest, Thou as the mighty God canst accomplish. Amen.”

Note: the toilet is never blessed with holy water; if bathroom and toilet share one room, that room is not blessed. In a bathroom separated from the toilet, you may sprinkle the corners with holy water.

Take a sprig of thistle or St John's wort, set it alight and after a minute snuff it out. In this way, fumigate the rooms one by one with smoke, walking each room crosswise, from corner to corner.

Thistle smoke will scatter all the negative energy in your dwelling. It will drive dark, unfriendly forces from your soul and heart. If the evil eye or a cast spell lies upon you, thistle fumigation ranks among the surest remedies for defeating these afflictions.

The same fumigation of flat or house may be done with heather — especially where small children live, or where fears haunt you.

Oh, and those twelve 50-kopeck coins that lay in the charmed herbal water you washed the whole house with — do not forget to take them out before tipping the dirty water into the toilet. Rinse them under running water.

Visit a church soon. Spend them on three candles. Light the first before the icon of St George the Victorious, in a joyful spirit, feeling and thinking that you have conquered evil and the spell. Light the second before the icon of the Mother of God, for your own health. And set the third before the image of Jesus Christ, for the health of all your enemies and ill-wishers, saying:

“All who harm me and wish me ill (name them), and those who harm me whose names I do not know — I sincerely forgive. From now on, God is your judge! Amen!”

With this cleansing you will clear your home of cast spells, the evil eye and other negative energy. My strong charms may even help you banish demons and spirits of malice on your own. But often, where demons and spiteful spirits dwell in a house, an ordinary person cannot master them alone. You will feel it. In that case, call in a specialist.