From John Ensign's college introduction to the Promise Keepers movement, through the Senator's current membership in a Las Vegas church within the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel denomination, to his current residence in a house owned by Youth With a Mission, a parachurch evangelical organization founded in 1960 by Loren Cunningham - who espouses a doctrine of Christian infiltration of key societal sectors, Senator Ensign has throughout his political career associated with charismatic Christian religious entities in the forefront of promoting a radical and new approach that is redefining Christian evangelism, which now includes a heavy emphasis on the exorcism of demons as a key to a healthy, productive, and moral life.

In the vanguard of the now international demon-deliverance movement is pastor Jack Hayford, who co-authored the 1997 book "Loving Your City Into the Kingdom" together with former National Association of Evangelicals head Ted Haggard. According to Journalist Max Blumenthal, writing for The Daily Beast, Ensign is a confident of Jack Hayford, and other evidence substantiates John Ensign's strong ties to the denomination, which Hayford has headed for five years.

In 2003 the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel paid for Senator Ensign to travel to Philadelphia, where Ensign addressed the Foursquare denomination's yearly convention. In 2006, Ensign addressed the Foursquare Gospel yearly convention via a videotaped speech.

Ensign's connection to Hayford is further underlined through the mutual involvement of the two men in The Promise Keepers, a movement that during the 1990's drew crowds of hundreds of thousands of men to Christian rallies. According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Ensign addressed a 2003 Las Vegas Promise Keepers rally, and Jack Hayford has played a substantial role in the Promise Keepers movement. GOP Senator Ensign's recent disclosure of an extramarital affair is particularly damaging because Ensign has campaigned on a family values platform, and the Promise Keepers seven vows include the following:

"A Promise Keeper is committed to practicing spiritual, moral, ethical and sexual purity.

A Promise Keeper is committed to building strong marriages and families through love, protection and Biblical values."

A lesser-known aspect of the Promise Keepers is the ministry's promotion of charismatic doctrines, as evidenced in its promotion of Dove Ministry founder Bill Subritzky, who teaches demon deliverance practices.

In late June 2009, a YouTube video from a Bridgeport, Connecticut black evangelical church, showing an attempt to exorcise a "homosexual demon" from a sixteen-year old teenager sparked national controversy, as well as condemnation from the left and from gay rights advocates.

But at least one report suggests that a program which seeks to exorcise gay demons was during the 1990's institutionalized at Ted Haggard's Colorado Springs New Life Church. Beyond promoting dubious attempts to banish homosexual demons, former head of the National Association of evangelicals Ted Haggard and current president of the 5-10 million member strong (estimates vary) International Church of the Foursquare Gospel Jack Hayford have each promoted exorcism, nationally and worldwide as well.

As reporter Richard N. Ostling described, in a May 9, 2003 Associated Press story, Cleansing Stream Ministries originated at Jack Hayford's Van Nuys, California Church on The Way, and Hayford still presides over the entity - which is part of a controversial but growing "demon deliverance" movement (sometimes just referred to as "deliverance"), that, according to Ostling, teaches "do-it-yourself exorcism" methods. Ostling's AP story described controversy within the American evangelical community that new "spiritual warfare" doctrines were provoking in the early part of the current decade:

"Evangelical Protestants, who generate many of American religion's notable innovations, are at war over one of them, known as "spiritual warfare." This expanding movement believes that Christians regularly become captive to indwelling demons, which are often said to specialize in particular sins, geographic locations, objects or age groups. The believer is taught to rebuke the demon and command its departure in Jesus' name, sort of a do-it-yourself exorcism.... Spiritual warfare proponents include the international Cleansing Stream Ministries, at the Church on the Way in Van Nuys, Calif..."

Richard Ostling's story focused on criticism of the new demon-centric approach to health care from conservative evangelical Christian Hank Hanegraaff, a Christian Research Institute member popularly known as the "Bible Answer Man", who charged the new approach derived from secular pop-culture:

Hanegraaff charges that the "deliverance industry" mimics secular pop culture. He says major Christian emphasis on demons and deliverance emerged only after the 1973 movie "The Exorcist" and other entertainment vehicles."

Demon deliverance ideas have been widely promoted in a range of contexts that include a Christian approach to mental health known as "Theophostic Ministry." According to a 2001 Christianity Today article one of the key proponents of the demon-based mental health paradigm, Ed Smith, founder of Theophostic Ministries, teaches that, "demons, sometimes numbering in the hundreds, may inhabit and influence even a Christian's mind. These demons often work to keep people enslaved to what Smith calls the "lie-based thinking" causing their pain. He teaches that these demons have to be expelled for a client to see full relief."

Megachurch pastor Jack Hayford has contributed chapters to, and co-written with, a number of books by top leaders in C. Peter Wagner's New Apostolic Reformation (such as the 1997 Loving Your City Into The Kingdom, which Hayford co-wrote with Wagner's close working associate Ted Haggard). Hayford currently provides a booklet, available for free download from Hayford's personal website, that advocates the contemporary practice of exorcism (link to PDF file of 19 page booklet).

As explained in Hayford's booklet, "The Finger of God",

This matter is not "some new doctrine," nor is it a fringe area of arcane preoccupation. The doctrine of exorcism is as old as the Scriptures and the ministry thereof as ancient as the Church. That sectors of the Church have largely neglected or denied this ministry certainly should not be accepted as an argument against its place or validity. Church history reveals that there has always been an ecclesiastical inclination to retreat from the most demanding realms of spiritual pursuit; such as the passion of prayer, the evangelistic spread of the Gospel, the welcome of the Holy Spirit's fullness for all ministry, the acceptance of the gifts of the Spirit, the expectation of signs and wonders--and as well, the willingness to confront the dark powers of hell oppressing a believer.

"The Finger of God" booklet is derived from a book by Jack Hayford by that name, and the booklet serves as part of the "Cleansing Stream" ministry empire Hayford has developed over the last two decades, which has many hundreds of "Cleansing Stream" ministry nodes worldwide, including in Hong Kong, The Netherlands, Canada, and Germany.

Cleansing Stream ministries is now pastored by one of C. Peter Wagner's International Coalition of Apostles apostles, Chris Hayward and concerns, as Jack Hayford explained in his 1993 booklet, "deliverance" from demonic possession:

"...it is a peculiar fact that hosts of pastor-shepherds withdraw from, or choose disbelief toward, the ministry of confronting the demonic in either prayer's spiritual warfare or in the personal ministry of deliverance, usually as much due to fear of professional criticism as to doubts about the need of these ministries... There is a definite potential of losing status in the eyes of ecclesiastical critics or of fellow-servants, who are so trapped by the materialistic mind-set of a non-discerning, demon denying society that such ministry is deemed archaic or superstitious."

Hayford then goes on to elaborate some of the obstacles which have stood in the way of the proliferation of Christian ministries based on casting out demons from believing Christians:

- Deliverance ministry is too seldom defined clearly.

- Demonic matters seem to incite some to fanaticism.

- The nature of "spiritual bondage" is often confused and poorly expressed.

- The means to spiritual freedom from demonic oppression are too often stereotyped in a way that removes many leaders from even imagining their own involvement.

- There too often arises a preoccupation with this aspect of ministry as a "cure all," or as being "superior" to other ministry areas, or as being only the ministry of a "gifted few."

As described on the Cleansing Streams Australia website which provides professionally designed materials, such as trifold flyers, promoting the ministry, Cleansing Streams Australia is implemented through a 12 week course that provides intense small-group therapy. The description, below, avoids mentioning the basic premise - of expelling demons which, per the name of the ministry, are like dirt to be washed off, or from, participants:

"When we commence our journey as children of God we carry with us hurts of the past, bondages and burdens. These can hinder us in living the life that God has planned for us and being effective in serving Christ. Cleansing Stream is a 12 week course that empowers, encourages and releases believers into the fullness of their kingdom inheritance. It takes place in a small group setting. The course includes 5 video sessions (45 mins), with workbook, audio teachings and reading material. An essential part of the Cleansing Stream course is a weekend retreat (Friday night and Saturday) where believers can experience and apply the truths they have been investigating."

Here's the complete version of this story, at the Huffington Post

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