Evidently the fire started just after midnight and had been burning solidly for two hours before the fire department managed to get it under control. Residents of nearby houses suggested it might have been started by a freak lightning strike, as a rare storm had passed over the area that night.
The thunderstorm made the news as it moved through the Coachella Valley on Sunday, leaving minor floods in the area and a few people in Downtown Palm Springs startled by loud thunder and lightning flashes.
The only problem with the lightning theory, I found out from the detective assigned to the case, was that if the lightning strike had caused the sand outside the structure to fuse into glass, based on the location, the fire would have started at a different part of the church.
If the blaze had not been caused by the lightning, then to cause the glass to form the heat would have had to reach about 3090°F, which was not an option. Again, according to the detective.
My wife and I arrived at the scene at approximately 3 AM, after a nearby neighbor came by to tell us about the tragedy. He offered to drive us over, so of course we accepted. We stood there, caught in the flickering glow and swirling smoke. Embers glowed in the soft spray from the firefighter’s hoses, slowly drifting towards us from the edges of the fire.
The police on scene allowed us to grab a few things that had been pulled out of the building but warned us that it was still not safe to go inside.
The church had been under our watch for the past two years. We’d noticed nothing wrong, until last year. It was around mid-July, with a freak thunderstorm. That’s when we the rumors started. Objects moving, things appearing where they shouldn’t be, and people seeing strange shapes and shadows flitting through the sanctuary.
These reports from our parishioners came across my desk regularly after that. My wife, who was more attuned to the paranormal than I, noticed they’d increase after each full moon. She convinced me to take it more seriously, so on more than one occasion I found myself at the church later than normal.
At first, other than a few shifts in temperature and one night where I had to chase two crows out of the sanctuary, things didn’t seem too bad. Then about three months ago the altar candles were found completely melted at the start of a morning service. My pulpit robe had been torn to shreds and the church held an odor reminiscent of rotting eggs. The police found no leads at all, and we were assured it was a random act of vandalism.
Still, my wife worried it might get worse the following month. Then she found the book, which did not help.
It was a copy of the Dictionnaire Infernal, chained and locked in an iron cabinet in the sacristy along with a yellowed notebook outlining the capture of various demonic entities. She was almost inconsolable. I told her they were spiritual references with no physical existence in our world. She wasn’t convinced.
She insisted I should read a passage describing how for eons, certain demonic entities have been trying to break down the boundaries between this realm and the one in which they preside.
It laid out a scenario where certain routes connecting these worlds could be revealed by natural phenomena, such as under the light of a specific full moon or during certain thunderstorms. Once freed, these entities are driven to attach themselves to objects in our realm.
She said there was a connection, and we shouldn’t take any of this lightly. Especially since another full moon was approaching.
I didn’t really believe her until I remembered an experience I’d had. One night about a month ago. The sound of wings coming from beneath me, carrying up through the drains. The slight melting of the stained glass along the edges of the lead strips. The feeling of eyes watching me and whispers from some unseen mouth behind me. There had been an uneasy stuffiness to the air around me, and a slightly acrid smell permeating the chapel.
After that, and the weird passage she’d read from that damnable book?
I believed her.
I also believed her when she told me she felt a new presence in the church, and not a welcome one.
One that was unclean and dangerous.
It’s been a month now, and we’re still working with the community on rebuilding the church. We didn’t think the damage would have been so extensive, but that lightning had seemingly come out of nowhere, adding a new level of damage to the fire.
It had been a stormy evening, but we hadn’t sensed anything else unusual. We had been trying to not let any of the strange occurrences phase us and had been acting as if it was all our overactive imaginations. But behind it all, my wife and I had come to a mutual decision. We knew there was something else going on, and we had to come up with a plan.
So, we did.
We were a few feet past the entrance, moving down the hall, when I lit the flare and threw it into the waiting puddle of Kerosene. That was supposed to be the end of it, but things quickly escalated.
First, the lightning struck, almost as if it was an otherworldly response to our flame. My wife noticed a smell I instantly recognized as sulfur. Then the heat emanating from the building began to rise intensely as sparks and flashes appeared in a dark corner by the altar, against the east wall.
I could have sworn I saw an unshapeable blackness rise and move towards us from the conflagration. The fire expanded, the smoke billowed, the cracks in the ceiling widened.
We made it out to the churchyard unscathed as the falling timbers behind us helped the blaze grow and stopped to watch the blaze for a few seconds. Then, before we could leave, my wife stopped me. Her eyes wide and mouth open. The lightning had hit the cross, knocking it from its perch at the top of the church, and it was now burning its shape into the surrounding desert sand.
I made the sign of the cross; In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, Amen. And then we stood, still and holding each other, for a couple of minutes. We looked at each other, took a deep breath, and with the fire growing behind us, we left, heading for home.
My wife was pretty sure the fire destroyed whatever had been haunting the nave. The pews were unsalvageable, but we did manage to rescue some of the liturgical objects. There’s a box of charred bibles in our garage, along with the chalice, a few crosses, and the collection plate.
The stained-glass windows that weren’t shattered will be restored, but the altar, unfortunately won’t.
My wife kept that damned book and reads it every night. She says there’s no way anything could have survived that, but last night a few storm clouds slowly passed over our house. They dissipated before the sun rose, but I can see them gathering on the horizon now.
I asked my wife if she thought that perhaps this time it might have worked.
She said, “Perhaps.”
I nodded. As I looked up and saw the storm clouds forming over our house.
I think we’re going to have to burn down this one too.