"Here and there on the internet" (from the recent mailbag) there are a number of issues about which viewers write.

Let's start with Blessed Salt.

In our times, that sacramental seems especially potent against the enemy. It is certainly a legitimate Catholic instrument.

Why?

Notes a website: "According to Strong's Concordance, there are forty-one matches in thirty five verses which reference salt in the English translation of the King James Bible, the earliest being the valley of Siddim which is the Salt Sea followed by the story of Lot's wife, who was turned into a pillar of salt when she disobediently looked back at the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. In the New Testament, Matthew 15:3, Jesus speaking to his disciples: 'You are the salt of the earth.' It is commonly believed that He was telling them how valuable they were. Their real value lay within them, as spirit or soul. He was reminding them not to pay too much attention to the physical body, but give higher regard to their spiritual essence. Interestingly, what remains when a human body is cremated is nothing but a pile of salt. Salt has a long history of use in rituals of purification, magical protection, and blessing. Salt has been used throughout the ages as a ward against negative energies or evil spirits. It has even been used to seal covenants! In Germany, salt was put into the corners of the home where newlyweds were to reside to dispel any 'bad' or negative energy."

Added a viewer: "Father Alphonseus Joseph-Mary August Montague Summers explained: 'Salt never appeared at the witches' table and Jean Bodin [a sixteenth-century Catholic scholar] apparently gave the reason:  it is an emblem of eternity'. Philip Ludwig Elich emphatically drew attention to the absence of salt at these infernal banquets. At these meals, remarked Henri Boguet [another renowned Catholic of the same period], 'salt never appears'... [Sister] Madeleine de la Palud [de Demandolx at Aixen-Provence] declared that she had never seen salt, olives, or oil at the devil's feasts.' (The History of Witchcraft, p. 145, Barnes and Noble Books)."

Thus: have we finally solved that mystery?

Against the enemy, there is also -- powerfully -- the Blessed Sacrament. (Urge your parish to institute it.) To the left, can you see an image in one monstrance at St. Peter of Alcantara in Port Washington New York.

These seem to be signals to us and as far as "signs":  too many times we look for spectacular, overt ones instead of the small things that console us, affirm something, or prompt us in one direction or another. Are there -- as signs -- even "good accidents"?

Margaret Dixon of Norwell, Massachusetts recounts that:

"The other day a co-worker Michael, went to the copier machine to put his document in to be copied. It did not copy! Out of the copier came the prayers Prayer to the Blessed Virgin and Prayer O’ Most Holy Apostle St. Jude! He kept trying to print his document but it would not copy; the only copies coming out of the copier were the prayers.

"We looked at the 'copies' indicator on the machine and it said '1.'  So, he kept giving out the prayers to the people in the unit. Then I went and told some folks and they came over and they tried to copy his document. But they could not adjust the number of copies of the prayers that came out. We even cleared the machine and it did print his document. 'It’s a sign for me to have these, I guess,' Michael said. 'I have to give them out.' Next day, he even told a couple of managers what happened."

"Big" signs might include the photograph at the top of this article, which was taken from Apparition Hill at Medjugorje when a daughter was snapping a photo of her mother and noted nothing unusual until they developed the picture and instead of people posing next to the Cross, in the afternoon sun, reputedly saw a darkened landscape and the letters C-H-R-I-S-T in the sky. (For our discernment; we did look into this years ago, and it seemed credible, though incredible.)

Big signs, little signs. "A friend of my brother's former father-in-law committed suicide," writes another viewer, whom we will keep anonymous. "He had drug and mental issues. So when I found out, the first things I thought was to pray the chaplet of Divine Mercy for him and have a Mass offered for his soul. Later on that day I decided to browse Spirit Daily, and saw a link [in the announcements] for 'Divine Mercy for suicide victims.' This struck me and confirmed to me what I had done. God is good."

There are, as Dede Laugesen, editor of Angels Magazine reminds us, signs in nature. "Last night I was reading from my copy of Lives of the Saints," she noted. "About Saint John: The editor remarks that the Feast of Saint John the Baptizer used to be more fervently celebrated. It was celebrated beginning on the eve of the Feast, on June 23, with the lighting of 'St John's fires.' The book then quotes Dom. P.L.P. Gueranger: St. John's fires were lighted on the hills and mountains in many countries as they are still lighted in some places. 'Scarce had the last rays of the setting sun died away, when all the world over, immense columns of flame arose from every mountain top, and in an instant every town and village and hamlet was lighted up.' Yesterday morning, June 23, we were walking through a local farmer's market when we saw a small plume of smoke rise up over Pikes Peak in Colorado Springs. The fire is large and growing. As of one a.m., Manitou Springs, a significant area of Colorado Springs right near Garden of the Gods, was evacuated..."

This followed strange mammatus cloud formations a few weeks back and then an incredible hail storm [left].

What about an article we recently had alleging that a Georgia man, James Wilbur Chauncey -- a Baptist -- encountered a mysterious woman named Mary who massaged him one night while he was in a hospital as a boy suffering from near-fatal meningitis, apparently leading to his ability to walk the next day? It seemed odd, the Virgin touching someone, like a nurse. Was it the Blessed Mother?...