If the basic tenets of homeopathy are correct, then the water becomes more and more holy as it is diluted!!! :eek:
Considering all the water that’s been blessed for ceremonial use over the centuries, any water you drink or wash with surely has a few million molecules of holy water in it. There is no new water on the earth, so theoretically there’s no need to ever bless water again. It has all been blessed before.
All that need be done to make any given amount of water ‘Holy’ is to drop a crucifix into it…
Just watch “Constantine” if you need a cite. 
In fact, the efficacy must be decreasing as we bless more water and decrease the overall dilution
Catholic Church holy water always had oils and salts in it. Don’t know if that is standard fare.
But holy water isn’t just used for baptism.
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/ncd04004.htm
Water a Catholic blesses themself with entering and exiting the church doesn’t cleanse their sins.
In the Russian Orthodox tradition, it’s customary for natural bodies of water (rivers, lakes, etc.) to be blessed on Theophany, using the same ritual as is used for making holy water.
Which denominations have a concept (or substance) of holy water? I only know of the epsicopalians and their progeny, and the Roman and various Orthodox Catholics.
Perhaps this accounts for the inability of vampires to cross running water?
But do they have a problem with underground plumbing?
I seriouslt doubt if vampires were affected by holy water prior to Bram Stoker’s dracula. Despite the suggestion of and appearance of traditions of great age, the fact is that Stoker simply made a loy of that vampire lore up – Vampires casting no reflection in mirrors? Not before Stoker. I don’t recall them being repelled by the communion wafer before him, or by holy water. So don’t count on a Super-Soaker full of holy water saving your butt from a Mexican dive full of vampires.
Holy Water is blessed, IIRC, in convenient-sized containers holding abiout as much as a water cooler at a time. Our Church kept a container with a tap on it for parisioners to come and get. I don’t believe it needs any additives, and isn’t done at a particular time of year.
There is a special blessing of water at Easter Time, and such Paschal Water gets holy oil poured in it and the Paschal Candle dunked into it. But i don’t think they bless a whole year’s worth at once.
Holy Water, like any blessed substance, is meant to be handled reverently, which would, I think, tend to keep some priest or bishop from blessing the entire Atlantic at once – how would everyone know its purpose?
No, salt and various oils are used in many of the same ceremonies as holy water, but so far as I know, they’re not part of it.
And the holy water in the fonts at the front of a Catholic church is intended as a reminder of baptism, and doesn’t have any sacramental significance in itself. Nor is holy water strictly necessary for the Sacrament of Baptism: It’s customary to bless the water (that is, invoke God to bless it) beforehand, but in extremum, all you need for baptism is water (any water at all), and two people (any people at all), one of whom sincerely intends to perform the baptism, and one of whom (or that person’s guardian) sincerely desires to receive it.
see my post just above. they put oil in the Paschal water. they might put salt in – I don’t recall. And they dunk the candle in it, so you might get some wax. But that’s just the water they bless at Easter – it’s not all holy water.
In the Judeo-Christian creation lore, the Lord made all the water, every drop. How, then, could any of it be anything but holy?
Well, the infallable authorities that gave me my religious education said that they bless the water at Easter, then as long as you add water to it is maintains the same blessing. It’s a very convenient stretching of resources. Sort of like those fake medicines you buy in the health food stores.
Now, this isn’t the biggest bunch of BS that I got fed by these charlatans but it’s part of it.
My recollection as a Roman Catholic altar boy was that water to be made into Holy Water had to be in a container. People would bring in water in various containers, or bring in empty containers which they filled from the city water tap in the church, and then the priest would bless them.
Water in a natural body (like a lake or ocean) wasn’t in a ‘container’, and so couldn’t be made into Holy Water. Of course, the priest could still say a blessing over it, like they can do over pretty much anything.
In the lore, maybe, but not in the Bible. Genesis just talks about a wind sweeping across the water, and God separating the water into that which is above the heavens, and that which is below. But the water existed at least as early as the second verse.
It depends on how many followers you have. The more you have, the larger your sphere of influence. A deity can’t perform miracles outside its sphere of influence directly, and has to use its creature or a prophet as a conduit.
And then there was the guy writing the book itself and his cup of cappucino…
Prayer is stopped by a lid or a layer of fabric?
[emphasis added]
Well surely he’d know one way or the other wouldn’t he?