MENTION the words faith healing, and the most recent example of it in the public eye that comes to mind involves the wrangles that former England football coach Glenn Hoddle found himself in.

With all the fuss and furore that ensued in the media, anyone could end up thinking that faith healers, or healers, as they prefer to be called, are all clairvoyant bead-feelers who follow David Icke.

Not so with Caitlin Walsh from Leathley, who is trying to explode some of the popular myths about healers. Our Caitlin is no bead-feeler or religious zealot, she even plays the trombone for Otley Brass Band.

Caitlin says: "Healers are trying to get away from the religious connotations because it puts

people off, or that you have to believe in God and have to have a religious view because it is so untrue. It is about energy and energy transference."

The relationship between Hoddle and his faith healer, Eileen Drewery, and the whole

controversy, was recently explored in a TV documentary.

Caitlin says: "People like Eileen Drewery have loads of spiritual beliefs, but spiritual beliefs are not necessarily anything to do with healing, but that's OK if it helps people get better.

"It is associated with many things. Glenn Hoddle said on that programme that if it works, it works. The healing energy only activates the body's own healing medicine. Healing energy will speed up that process.

"People make associations with healing in all sorts of directions, with God, with football. At the end of the day, it can be used to help people achieve a better state of health."

Caitlin explains that far from being something that is 'New Age', although there has recently been a resurgence of interest in it, healing is really something probably more correctly associated with the 'Old Age'.

She says: "There is a long history to healing, most people would say it came from the ancient Egyptian era with the laying on of hands, and it is believed that is where massage came from.

"Before orthodox medicine came into being, they had to use other things and that was one of

common ways. Healing is either associated with God or with miracles and that is another thing we are trying to get away from. Miracles do happen, but it is not the aim.

"The aim is to help the person get better, just like any other treatments, whether it be orthodox or whatever. People say healing is a last stop - they have been to the doctor, chiropractor, and then the healer. Most people are looking for a miracle cure, although that is now changing."

Caitlin, 26, has been practising healing for two years full time, but discovered it as a teenager.

She says: "When I was younger, the cat used to bring in birds and she would leave them lying on the floor. I used to pick them up. I noticed an incredible energy coming through my hands and the birds would be revived.

"Later on, when I was about 18 or 19, I discovered that there was something called spiritual healing. I looked into it and started practising on friends and family.

"It is quite easy, I feel, to train in healing and learn the techniques and I feel somebody who is a good healer is someone who has compassion and cares about the person they are healing. That is something that can't be taught. If you have an intention to heal somebody and help somebody, then the healing energy will flow through you."

While Caitlin will be the first to say she is not a miracle-worker, she counts among her successes the treatment of a woman suffering from Multiple Sclerosis, who recovered her ability to write.

Recalling other cases, she says: "A woman who came to my clinic had a hip replacement and wasn't able to walk properly. After about six or seven treatments, she was able to take the dog for a walk and things like that.

"People with the ME virus have come and received positive results. It hasn't cured their ME, but it is eased through positive energy.

"Healing is particularly good with ulcers and especially good with depression. The energy

centres, the shakras, can get blocked, the swirling vortices of energy."

So what exactly would take place in your typical healing session?

Caitlin says: "The body of the healer is used as a channel. A higher energy comes through the healer's body and is transferred into the patient's body. That energy is then distributed along the nervous system.

"Typically, I talk to them first and then they sit on the table and then, depending on their

problem, say they had a stomach problem, they would sit on the table and I would put my hands on the top and bottom of the spine. Then I would lie them down and put my hands on the area that needed attention.

"I suppose it goes alongside things like acupuncture and herbalism and other treatments that use natural energy systems. That's not to say it can't be used alongside conventional

medicine."

Despite the recent ruckus over Hoddle-isms, which probably didn't do much for either healers or English football, Caitlin finds that her healing is greeted with increasing interest and acceptance.

She says: "Some people are sceptical, and probably sceptical about a lot of things, but most people are really interested and they often already know somebody who is into it because it is becoming really popular.

"I am writing a book on the subject and I am trying to unravel some of the myths of healing so people don't think we are lunatics.

"I heal animals as well, but they are not as easy to do as you don't get any feedback, unless, of course, it's a talking parrot."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.