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There was a michael's within shooting range of that Home depot!

If you connect all the Michael's shootings: 1, 11, 3, 17, and the Spotsylvania mall Michael's) not shown on your map, they form a Christian CROSS! Ok, now what's the deal with Saint Michael???

St. Michael:

from this site: http://www.belinus.co.uk/doorsofpeace/AngelsMichael.htm

Michael was thought to be the angel that handed down the ten commandments. Prince of Light is one of his names and he was often called upon at the hour of death. He appears when we or the world are really in need. He is often referred to as the Prince of the Angels.

Slayer of Dragons, many churches were built on the focal point of the earth energies, the high points of the land - of which Michael was the protector. These are called Michael Mounts and the Michael Line is one of the most powerful ley lines in England.

In the bible he is said to have been a friend of Lucifer before the fall of the Angels but became the Christian war cry against the Christian enemies, including Satan. Michael is said to be able to rescue our souls when most in need, particularly at the time of death. Though he is also the Angel of Judgement of humankind's souls.

Micahel's name is mentioned in the Bible four times, but he is a very important Archangel in Christian tradition. Michael was the patron of the church and was taken up as patron by many of the military orders that formed around the Crusades. He was Mikha`el in Hebrew, Mika`il or Mikha`il in Arabic, and his name means Who Is Like God.

St. Michael the Archangel

(Hebrew "Who is like God?").

St. Michael is one of the principal angels; his name was the war-cry of the good angels in the
battle fought in heaven against the enemy and his followers. Four times his name is recorded in
Scripture:

(1) Daniel 10:13 sqq., Gabriel says to Daniel, when he asks God to permit the Jews to return to
Jerusalem: "The Angel [D.V. prince] of the kingdom of the Persians resisted me . . . and, behold
Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me . . . and none is my helper in all these things,
but Michael your prince";

(2) Daniel 12, the Angel speaking of the end of the world and the Antichrist says: "At that time
shall Michael rise up, the great prince, who standeth for the children of thy people."

(3) In the Catholic Epistle of St. Jude: "When Michael the Archangel, disputing with the devil,
contended about the body of Moses", etc. St. Jude alludes to an ancient Jewish tradition of a
dispute between Michael and Satan over the body of Moses, an account of which is also found
in the apocryphal book on the assumption of Moses (Origen, "De principiis", III, 2, 2). St. Michael
concealed the tomb of Moses; Satan, however, by disclosing it, tried to seduce the Jewish
people to the sin of hero-worship. St. Michael also guards the body of Eve, according to the
"Revelation of Moses" ("Apocryphal Gospels", etc., ed. A. Walker, Edinburgh, p. 647).

(4) Apocalypse 12:7, "And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought
with the dragon." St. John speaks of the great conflict at the end of time, which reflects also the
battle in heaven at the beginning of time. According to the Fathers there is often question of St.
Michael in Scripture where his name is not mentioned. They say he was the cherub who stood
at the gate of paradise, "to keep the way of the tree of life" (Gen., iii, 24), the angel through
whom God published the Decalogue to his chosen people, the angel who stood in the way
against Balaam (Numbers 22:22 sqq.), the angel who routed the army of Sennacherib (IV Kings
19:35).

Following these Scriptural passages, Christian tradition gives to St. Michael four offices:

To fight against Satan.
To rescue the souls of the faithful from the power of the enemy, especially at the hour
of death.
To be the champion of God's people, the Jews in the Old Law, the Christians in the New
Testament; therefore he was the patron of the Church, and of the orders of knights
during the Middle Ages.
To call away from earth and bring men's souls to judgment ("signifer S. Michael
repraesentet eas in lucam sanctam", Offert. Miss Defunct. "Constituit eum principem
super animas suscipiendas", Antiph. off. Cf. "Hermas", Pastor, I, 3, Simil. VIII, 3).

Regarding his rank in the celestial hierarchy opinions vary; St. Basil (Hom. de angelis) and other
Greek Fathers, also Salmeron, Bellarmine, etc., place St. Michael over all the angels; they say he
is called "archangel" because he is the prince of the other angels; others (cf. P. Bonaventura,
op. cit.) believe that he is the prince of the seraphim, the first of the nine angelic orders. But,
according to St. Thomas (Summa, I:113:3) he is the prince of the last and lowest choir, the
angels. The Roman Liturgy seems to follow the Greek Fathers; it calls him "Princeps militiae
coelestis quem honorificant angelorum cives". The hymn of the Mozarabic Breviary places St.
Michael even above the Twenty-four Elders. The Greek Liturgy styles him Archistrategos,
"highest general" (cf. Menaea, 8 Nov. and 6 Sept.).

VENERATION

It would have been natural to St. Michael, the champion of the Jewish people, to be the champion
also of Christians, giving victory in war to his clients. The early Christians, however, regarded
some of the martyrs as their military patrons: St. George, St. Theodore, St. Demetrius, St.
Sergius, St. Procopius, St. Mercurius, etc.; but to St. Michael they gave the care of their sick. At
the place where he was first venerated, in Phrygia, his prestige as angelic healer obscured his
interposition in military affairs. It was from early times the centre of the true cult of the holy
angels, particularly of St. Michael. Tradition relates that St. Michael in the earliest ages caused a
medicinal spring to spout at Chairotopa near Colossae, where all the sick who bathed there,
invoking the Blessed Trinity and St. Michael, were cured.

Still more famous are the springs which St. Michael is said to have drawn from the rock at
Colossae (Chonae, the present Khonas, on the Lycus). The pagans directed a stream against
the sanctuary of St. Michael to destroy it, but the archangel split the rock by lightning to give a
new bed to the stream, and sanctified forever the waters which came from the gorge. The
Greeks claim that this apparition took place about the middle of the first century and celebrate a
feast in commemoration of it on 6 September (Analecta Bolland., VIII, 285-328). Also at Pythia in
Bithynia and elsewhere in Asia the hot springs were dedicated to St. Michael.

At Constantinople likewise, St. Michael was the great heavenly physician. His principal
sanctuary, the Michaelion, was at Sosthenion, some fifty miles south of Constantinople; there the
archangel is said to have appeared to the Emperor Constantine. The sick slept in this church at
night to wait for a manifestation of St. Michael; his feast was kept there 9 June. Another famous
church was within the walls of the city, at the thermal baths of the Emperor Arcadius; there the
synaxis of the archangel was celebrated 8 November. This feast spread over the entire Greek
Church, and the Syrian, Armenian, and Coptic Churches adopted it also; it is now the principal
feast of St. Michael in the Orient. It may have originated in Phrygia, but its station at
Constantinople was the Thermae of Arcadius (Martinow, "Annus Graeco-slavicus", 8 Nov.).
Other feasts of St. Michael at Constantinople were: 27 October, in the "Promotu" church; 18
June, in the Church of St. Julian at the Forum; and 10 December, at Athaea.

The Christians of Egypt placed their life-giving river, the Nile under the protection of St. Michael;
they adopted the Greek feast and kept it 12 November; on the twelfth of every month they
celebrate a special commemoration of the archangel, but 12 June, when the river commences to
rise, they keep as a holiday of obligation the feast of St. Michael "for the rising of the Nile",
euche eis ten symmetron anabasin ton potamion hydaton.

At Rome the Leonine Sacramentary (sixth century) has the "Natale Basilicae Angeli via Salaria",
30 September; of the five Masses for the feast three mention St. Michael. The Gelasian
Sacramentary (seventh century) gives the feast "S. Michaelis Archangeli", and the Gregorian
Sacramentary (eighth century), "Dedicatio Basilionis S. Angeli Michaelis", 29 Sept. A manuscript
also here adds "via Salaria" (Ebner, "Miss. Rom. Iter Italicum", 127). This church of the Via Salaria
was six miles to the north of the city; in the ninth century it was called Basilica Archangeli in
Septimo (Armellini, "Chiese di Roma", p. 85). It disappeared a thousand years ago. At Rome also
the part of heavenly physician was given to St. Michael. According to an (apocryphal?) legend
of the tenth century he appeared over the Moles Hadriani (Castel di S. Angelo), in 950, during the
procession which St. Gregory held against the pestilence, putting an end to the plague. Boniface
IV (608-15) built on the Moles Hadriani in honour of him, a church, which was styled St.
Michaelis inter nubes (in summitate circi).

Well known is the apparition of St. Michael (a. 494 or 530-40), as related in the Roman Breviary,
8 May, at his renowned sanctuary on Monte Gargano, where his original glory as patron in war
was restored to him. To his intercession the Lombards of Sipontum (Manfredonia) attributed their
victory over the Greek Neapolitans, 8 May, 663. In commemoration of this victory the church of
Sipontum instituted a special feast in honour of the archangel, on 8 May, which has spread over
the entire Latin Church and is now called (since the time of Pius V) "Apparitio S. Michaelis",
although it originally did not commemorate the apparition, but the victory.

In Normandy St. Michael is the patron of mariners in his famous sanctuary at Mont-Saint-Michel in
the diocese of Coutances. He is said to have appeared there, in 708, to St. Aubert, Bishop of
Avranches. In Normandy his feast "S. Michaelis in periculo maris" or "in Monte Tumba" was
universally celebrated on 18 Oct., the anniversary of the dedication of the first church, 16 Oct.,
710; the feast is now confined to the Diocese of Coutances. In Germany, after its evangelization,
St. Michael replaced for the Christians the pagan god Wotan, to whom many mountains were
sacred, hence the numerous mountain chapels of St. Michael all over Germany.

The hymns of the Roman Office are said to have been composed by St. Rabanus Maurus of
Fulda (d. 856). In art St. Michael is represented as an angelic warrior, fully armed with helmet,
sword, and shield (often the shield bears the Latin inscription: Quis ut Deus), standing over the
dragon, whom he sometimes pierces with a lance. He also holds a pair of scales in which he
weighs the souls of the departed (cf. Rock, "The Church of Our Fathers", III, 160), or the book of
life, to show that he takes part in the judgment. His feast (29 September) in the Middle Ages was
celebrated as a holy day of obligation, but along with several other feasts it was gradually
abolished since the eighteenth century (see FEASTS). Michaelmas Day, in England and other
countries, is one of the regular quarter-days for settling rents and accounts; but it is no longer
remarkable for the hospitality with which it was formerly celebrated. Stubble-geese being
esteemed in perfection about this time, most families had one dressed on Michaelmas Day. In
some parishes (Isle of Skye) they had a procession on this day and baked a cake, called St.
Michael's bannock.

Here's some info on the Crusades from this web site
(http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04543c.htm)

The Crusades were expeditions undertaken, in fulfilment of a solemn vow, to deliver the Holy Places from Mohammedan tyranny.

The origin of the word may be traced to the cross made of cloth and worn as a badge on the outer garment of those who took part in these enterprises. Medieval writers use the terms crux (pro cruce transmarina, Charter of 1284, cited by Du Cange s.v. crux), croisement (Joinville), croiserie (Monstrelet), etc. Since the Middle Ages the meaning of the word crusade has been extended to include all wars undertaken in pursuance of a vow, and directed against infidels, i.e. against Mohammedans, pagans, heretics, or those under the ban of excommunication. The wars waged by the Spaniards against the Moors constituted a continual crusade from the eleventh to the sixteenth century; in the north of Europe crusades were organized against the Prussians and Lithuanians; the extermination of the Albigensian heresy was due to a crusade, and, in the thirteenth century the popes preached crusades against John Lackland and Frederick II. But modern literature has abused the word by applying it to all wars of a religious character, as, for instance, the expedition of Heraclius against the Persians in the seventh century and the conquest of Saxony by Charlemagne. The idea of the crusade corresponds to a political conception which was realized in Christendom only from the eleventh to the fifteenth century; this supposes a union of all peoples and sovereigns under the direction of the popes. All crusades were announced by preaching. After pronouncing a solemn vow, each warrior received a cross from the hands of the pope or his legates, and was thenceforth considered a soldier of the Church. Crusaders were also granted indulgences and temporal privileges, such as exemption from civil jurisdiction, inviolability of persons or lands, etc. Of all these wars undertaken in the name of Christendom, the most important were the Eastern Crusades, which are the only ones treated in this article.

If this is a plausible theory, perhaps the terrorists are applying, in reverse (now to us), the Crusades originally directed against them during the middle ages.

We have heard that the death card, the tarot card, was a "crusader" death card, perhaps like this one:

I thought I heard that St. Michael was the patron saint of police officers.

ok, so if they've made the cross with the shootings, what's next?

OK, now what's the deal with Saint Michael???

Among other things, he's the Patron Saint of parachutists and Airborne Infantrymen....