The first [video] showed a visiting preacher from Kenya praying fervently over Ms. Palin in a gravelly voice and asking God to favor her campaign for governor and protect her from "every form of witchcraft."

The second showed Ms. Palin at an event in June praising the African preacher's prayer as "awesome" and "very, very powerful." She is also seen nodding as her former pastor from Wasilla prays over her and declares that Alaska is "one of the refuge states in the Last Days," a piece of prophecy popular in some prayer networks that predicts that as the "end times" approach, people will flock to Alaska for its abundant open space and natural resources.

What is known, however, is that Ms. Palin has had long associations with religious leaders who practice a particularly assertive and urgent brand of Pentecostalism known as "spiritual warfare."

Its adherents believe that demonic forces can colonize specific geographic areas and individuals, and that "spiritual warriors" must "battle" them to assert God's control, using prayer and evangelism. The movement's fixation on demons, its aggressiveness and its leaders' claims to exalted spiritual authority have troubled even some Pentecostal Christians.

Ms. Palin has retained friendly relations with the pastor at the Wasilla Assembly of God church, Ed Kalnins. In June, she and other politicians were blessed by Mr. Kalnins in front of thousands at "One Lord Sunday," a multichurch-sponsored event at the Wasilla sports complex.

The governor's relationships with practitioners of spiritual warfare appear to go back many years. Mary Glazier, an Alaska Native who helped bring together the prayer warrior networks in the state, told a prayer conference in June that Ms. Palin "became a part of our prayer group out in Wasilla" when she was 24, and that "God began to speak" to her about entering politics.

Critics say the goal of the spiritual warfare movement is to create a theocracy. Bruce Wilson, a researcher for Talk2Action, a Web site that tracks religious groups, said: "One of the imperatives of the movement is to achieve worldly power, including political control. Then you can more effectively drive out the demons. The ultimate goal is to purify the earth."

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