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In this article, the first of an ongoing series, we present a dossier of some of the principal institutions and individuals behind this evil New Age movement. The reader will learn, how behind the oh-so-nice U.N. brochures and talk about peace, some of the leading figures of this grouping have been exposed as practicing the most obscene homosexual and child pornography rituals imaginable. Take the notorious case of Canon Edward West, the coordinator of the American association of the Most Venerable Order of St. John. Eyewitness accounts indicate that during the 1980s, he was a frequent participant in obscene sexual rituals at homosexual S&M clubs in Manhattan, including the Mineshaft and the Hellfire Club (named after an 18th-century English secret Satanic society). Favorite entertainment at the Mineshaft included having children urinate on the patrons. In the mid-1980s, the club was shut down, following an investigation by the New York Police Department, which found links to organized crime circles, including those of John Zaccaro, the husband of 1984 Democratic vice presidential nominee Geraldine Ferraro.

The evil friends of Bishop Moore

The Cathedral of St. John the Divine, the medieval temple of the Episcopalian Archdiocese of New York, has become the mother institution of the New Age movement in the United States, whose goal is to eclipse the Age of Pisces (Christianity) with an Age of Aquarius ( Lucifer). The presiding bishop of the cathedral, Bishop Paul Moore, whose family is heir to the Nabisco company fortune, has been in the forefront of creating this Satanic new world order, since at least the late 1950s, when, as a priest in Indianapolis, Indiana, he gave the Peoples Temple cult of Jim Jones its start.

Later in 1977, Bishop Moore rocked the Christian world, when he ordained a militant lesbian, Ellen Marie Barrett, who told Time magazine that it was her lesbian love affair that gave her strength to serve God. Bishop Moore claims that the ordination of lesbians, and his other Gnostic heresies, are merely part of the ongoing revelation of Gods truth to man by the Holy Spirit, which had been prophesied by the Disciple John.

With this dissembling rationale, Bishop Moore has transformed the Cathedral of St. John the Divine into a Gnostic stronghold for such organizations as: The Lucis Trust, founded in 1922 by Alice Bailey, a disciple of Theosophist Madame Helena Blavatsky. Originally named the Lucifer Trust, it became a mother institution of the modern New Age movement; The Temple of Understanding, which is headquartered at the cathedral under its president, the Very Reverend Dean James Parks Morton, dean of the cathedral. It has turned the cathedral into a harbor for Gnostic religions ranging from Tibetan Buddhism to Sufi Freemasonry; The medieval village of Lindesfarne, New York, which is to be the model for a New Age lifestyle, once the Earth has been purified of its billions of non-white souls; A special ministry to Sufi Freemasons who were a historical deployment against Ibn Sina and the Arab Renaissance, and whose modern-day cathedral affiliates have been linked to the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat; The Zen Center, which teaches meditation to the elite of the Liberal Establishment; gay and lesbian organizations, which seek to legitimize their sin by arguing that the beloved disciple John had a homosexual affair with Christ, or else by creating Mother Goddess religions in the cathedrals crypts; a medieval chivalric order known as the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John, which, under the direction of the Duke of Gloucester of the British Royal Family, has inculcated the Episcopagan American Establishment in such Gnostic evil as the necessity to spread Shiite fundamentalism under the Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran, because the Shah had sinned by trying to industrialize his nation.

The serried ranks of the dead among Jim Joness Peoples Temple cult, who had consumed cyanide-laced Kool-Aid on orders from Jones, are merely the more public casualties of the Age of Aquarius, when those bearing the Mark of the Beast (666) are to be unleashed upon the Earth once again. Throughout the United States, the Satanic New Age movement has grown to become a major threat to the Judeo-Christian tradition upon which our republic was founded. Among the more recent signs of this upsurge are the Atlanta child murders, the case of New York child-beater Joel Steinberg, and the mass murder of school children in Stockton, California by a drug addict wearing a Satan T-shirt.

The Soviet connection

There is a national security dimension to the growth of the New Age movement. Starting in 1982, Bishop Moore returned from the Soviet Union to warn that unless the Anglo-American Establishment carried out appeasement of the Soviets, the Russians would launch a thermonuclear first strike. Moore, who entered the 1970s peace movement by visiting with the Vietcong-controlled, underground peace movement in Vietnam, had by 1983 joined with the pro-terrorist Institute for Policy Studies and the U.S.A.-Canada Institute of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences, to mobilize the American peace movement to stop the Strategic Defense Initiative. Thirty top Soviet intelligence officers, who were joined by Bishop Moore, gave marching orders to the American peace leadership to this effect in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1983.

Last February, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine hosted a February Fling, sponsored by the Temple of Understanding, which brought together top Soviet officials to meet with their counterparts in the West. Through Fr. Luis Dolan, who travels to the U.S.S.R. every six weeks to get marching orders from officials of the CPSU International Department-controlled Soviet Peace Center, the Temple of Understanding overlaps the Center for Soviet-American Dialogue, which is involved in extensive exchanges, whose purpose is to remove the enemy image of the U.S.S.R. being an evil empire. Father Dolan also works with Wainwright House, which has several programs along the same lines and which hosted a U.S.-U.S.S.R. Citizens Summit. Spokesmen for the Lucis Trust believe that Mikhail Gorbachov may be the premier world leader in their Externalized Hierarchy, giving impetus to a Plan for a new world order of Luciferian values and behavior. The Lucis Trust also carries out exchanges with the Soviet Union, where they believe Triangle Cells pray the Great Invocation for the coming Age of Aquarius. These Luciferians welcome Gorbachov, who bears the Mark of the Beast on his forehead.

Isis priestess of the Aquarian Age

The New Age movements enthusiasm for Gorbachov is really no surprise. The roots of this movement date back to the 1870s, when Madame Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (nee Princess Hahn in 1831 in Ekaterinoslav, Georgia) was deployed by a combination of Black Hundreds forces that included the Okhrana (Czarist secret service) and the Russian Orthodox Church, to destroy Augustinian Christianity in the West, through the creation of a Satanic ideology known as Theosophy, which was a syncretism of Eastern religions. As one Theosophical Society brochure made clear, its goal was to oppose the materialism of science and every form of dogmatic theology, especially the Christian, which the Chiefs of the Society regard as particularly pernicious.

The deployment of Madame Blavatsky into the West had been part of the same effortcalled the Dostoevsky Project by the Theosophically-inspired Frankfurt Schoolwhich led the Okhrana to unleash the Scottish Freemasonic forces of the liberal Alexander Kerensky, then the dark forces of the Bolsheviks (many of whom, including V.I. Lenin, had been trained on the Isle of Capri in the cult beliefs of the Emperor Tiberius, who murdered Christ), for an assault upon the Petrine state. Among those principally responsible for deploying the hashish-addicted Blavatsky into the West were: Count Alexander Ignatiev, one-time head of the Okhrana as interior minister, whose family later joined with the Bolshevik Revolution; Imperial Privy Councilor Prince Aksakov, whose correspondence with Blavatsky reveals him to be a key controller; Fyodor Dostoevsky, whose writings have regained popularity under Gorbachov, because they were a19th-century revival of the Russian Orthodox Churchs blood-and-soil doctrine [a Luciferic throwback to previous evolutionary epochs] that Moscow would become the Third and Final Rome; and, Mikhail, Vladimir, and Vsevelod Soloviev, who, from such bases as the St. Petersburg Ecclesiastical Academy, propounded the doctrines of Spiritualism that are being revived in Russia today, and who profiled Blavatsky as Tentacles of the Blavatsky deployment extended quickly through the West:

United States In 1873, Blavatsky traveled to the U.S., where with the Spiritualist Colonel Olcott, she founded the American Theosophical Society, whose headquarters became Pasadena, California. Colonel Olcott had been involved in seances at this time on a farm in Chittenden, Vermont, with Mary Baker Eddy, who founded Christian Science as co-extensive with Theosophy. Later, Olcott accompanied Blavatsky to Adyar, India, which became the spiritual center of the cult.

Great Britain In 1883, Blavatskys disciple Annie Besant, who later assumed Blavatskys mantle as High Priestess of Theosophy, was a co-founder of the British Fabian Society (predecessor of the Labour Party) together with Gnostic Christians and Spiritualists, including the Spiritualist Frank Podmore, later British Prime Minister J. Ramsay Macdonald, Soviet agent Lord Haldane, Lord and Lady Passfield, the Freemason William Clarke, Earl Bertrand Russell, Viscount and Viscountess Snowden, Lord Sidney Oliver, Lord Thomson, and others. In the same year, Scottish noble Douglas Dunglas Home, who had sponsored Blavatsky as early as 1858 and given seances for the Czar, returned to Great Britain, where with support of the Cecil family, he founded the Society for Psychical Research, whose members included Arthur Conan Doyle, Lord Balfour, Lord Bertrand Russell, John Dewey, and William James.

Another excrescence of Theosophy was the explicitly Satanist Edward Aleister Crowleys Order of the Golden Dawn (or, Stella Matutina), which overlapped the predominantly Anglo-American Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO) and the Thule Society in Munich, which gave birth to the Nazi Party through the good offices of Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Karl Haushofer, Rudolf Hess, and the Wagner Kreis.

Germany Blavatskys co-controller, Count Aksakov, established in Leipzig, Germany a Theosophical magazine, Psychische Studien, which was influential upon the careers of Sigmund Freud and especially Carl Jung. It also influenced the schismatic Theosophist Rudolf Steiner, who founded in 1913 the Dornach, Switzerland-based Anthroposophy sect, which has lately been a leading influence within West Germanys Free Democratic Party, and also the seed-crystal in southern Germany of the fascist Green party. [2] Meanwhile, in the 1920s, a Berlin-based Theosophist, Graf von Reventlow, founded a European network of the Cominterns Baku Conference of Oppressed Peoples, which sought to merge Marxism with Sufism.

Switzerland The Ascona, Switzerland secret base of Theosophycentered around a cult of Astartewas the spiritual center of the Frankfurt School, which overlapped the Soviet GRU (military intelligence) through such founders as Hede Massing, Richard Sorge, and Max Horkheimer, who developed the Authoritarian Personality dogma to target and destroy those who based their behavior upon natural law. Ascona was also a spiritual center of the Children of the Sun gay and lesbian networks, which overlapped the Philby, Burgess, Maclean spy network in Great Britain. Finally, Ascona was the religious center for the Theosophical psychiatrist Carl Jung, popularizer of the Gnostic Bible. Among Jungs disciple-patients were: Mary Bancroft, the mistress-secretary of Allen Dulles, who was OSS chief in Switzerland during World War II; and Mary and Paul Mellon, who, on their return to the U.S. in 1939, founded the Bollingen Foundation to propagate Gnosticism and a study center on witchcraft at Princeton University. Also, Lenin himself participated in cult dances on Monte Verita in Ascona.

Alice Bailey and the Lucis ( Lucifer) Trust

Alice La Trobe Bateman was the founder in 1920 of the Lucifer Trust, which represented a syncretism of Gnostic Christianity with Blavatskys Theosophy. Baileys Gnostic doctrine transformed God into Nietzschean Will, while Christ is considered merely a lowly part of the many Ascended Masters, who form a Hierarchy, that is eventually to be externalized to carry out a Plan for a new world order that is otherwise known to Baileys disciples as the Age of Aquarius or Age of Maitreya. The Lucis Trust, which today has Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) status at the United Nations and has been given legitimacy by the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, has spawned an array of New Age fronts, including the Temple of Understanding.

Born in Britain, Alice was raised an Episcopalian, before separating from her first husband, a drunken missionary to the United States, who beat her frequently. Relocated from Britain to the West Coast, she was recruited into the Pacific Grove Lodge of Theosophy in 1915. By 1920, she became editor of the American Theosophists newspaper, The Messenger. In this same year she married Foster Bailey (a Scottish Rite Freemason and Co-Mason), and she launched a fight with Annie Besant for control of Theosophy, which Alice Bailey lost, when Besants man, Louis Roger, was elected president. Immediately after the dust settled, Alice and Foster Bailey founded their own Tibetan Lodge, then the Lucifer Trust, whose name was abridged in 1922 to its present Lucis Trust.

By the 1930s, Bailey claimed 200,000 members, and her faction of Theosophy grew even more rapidly after Krishnamurti in 1939 denounced Besants scheme to promote him as the Messiah. Throughout these years, Bailey spent her summers in Ascona, Switzerland, where along with Mary and Paul Mellon, she attended Jungs Eranos Conferences. Bailey established a series of fronts, which include:

The Arcane School Founded in 1923, the school gives correspondence courses in meditation from its branches in New York, Geneva, London, and Buenos Aires. A brochure states: The presentation of the teaching adapted to the rapidly emerging new civilization stresses the training of disciples in group formation, a technique which will characterize the discipleship service in the Aquarian Age.

World Goodwill Founded in 1932, the organization is recognized by the United Nations today as an NGO. Ever since the dropping of the atomic bomb (which is seen by these kooks as a spiritual manifestation of Luciferian light), Lucis Trust has sought to give the U.N. a monopoly over nuclear weapons with which to impose a one world federalist empire upon sovereign nations. World Goodwill works directly with the world federalists, and is part of the work to Externalize the Hierarchy of Illumined Minds, which will usher in an Age of Maitreya, otherwise interpreted by Bailey to be the return of Christ prophesied in the biblical book of Revelations.

Triangles Founded in 1937, Triangles is the name for a global network of cells, whose members pray a Great Invocation, especially on the night of the full moon, when members of the Triangle can be influenced by the astrological signs of the zodiac. Findhorn This is the sacred community of the New Age movement, based in Great Britain. Bailey disciple David Spangler, another explicit Luciferian, became co-director of the Findhorn Foundation, when he formed the Lorian Association. He sits on the boards of directors of Planetary Citizens, the secretariat of Planetary Initiative for the World We Choose (launched at the Cathedral of St. John in 1982), and is a contributing editor to New Age Magazine.

But, Lucis is not limited to low-level Satanists. When he was Secretary of Defense in the early-1960s, Robert McNamara prayed to the full moon along the Potomac River, according to journalist Edith Roosevelt. The Lucis Trust endorsed McNamaras tenure as head of the World Bankwhich is hardly surprising, since Lucis believes in the Blavatskyian Great White Brotherhood, which is consistent with the neo-malthusian aim of the International Monetary Fund to exterminate darker-skinned races. [3] Not only does Bailey explicitly seek to destroy the nation state, which she equates with the idealism of the Age of Pisces, but in her 1954 work Education in the New Age, she also endorses Nazi eugenics and sex hygiene to purify the race. Apart from U.N. Secretary General Javier Parez de Cuellar, spokesmen for Lucis view Mikhail Gorbachov as the greatest world leader externalizing their Plan today.

The Temple of Understanding

The Lucis Trust in 1963 founded a more distanced front group, the Temple of Understanding, which also has NGO status and worked out of the U.N. premises directly, until in 1984 it shifted headquarters to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. The Lucis Trust and the Temple remain covertly entwined to this day.

While the chairman of the Temple is Judith Dickerson Hollister, those involved with its founding were: the late Isis Priestess of anthropology, Dame Margaret Mead of the Order of St. John; Order of St. Johns Canon Edward West; U.N. deputy secretary general Robert Muellar, who had been involved as well with the Lucis Trust; and one Winifred McCulloch, leader of the New York-based Teilhard de Chardin Society.

Dormant for several years after a major expose by Edith Roosevelt, the Temple was revived at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in 1984 at a ceremony presided over by Bishop Paul Moore and the Dalai Lama. According to the past executive director, Priscilla Pedersen, its present board overlaps that of David Rockefellers Trilateral Commission. Recent activities of the Temple include:

Global Forum of Spiritual and Parliamentary Leaders on Human Survival. Held in Oxford, England April 11-15, 1988, its luminaries included the Dalai Lama, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Carl Sagan. Co-organizers of the Global Forum were the Temple of Understanding and the Global Committee of Parliamentarians on Population and Development, which latter advocates neo-malthusian population reduction as the solution to the worlds ills. Present also at the conference were four Soviet Communist Party Central Committee members, including Dr. Evgenii Velikhov, Vice President of the Soviet Academy of Sciences. At the Global Forum, Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, founder-director of the Israel Institute for Talmudic Publications, agreed with Velikhov to set up an institute to gather the Judaica of Russia.

In January 1990, the Oxford Global Forum will be followed by a Temple of Understanding event in Moscow, which is being sponsored by the Russian Orthodox Church, the Supreme Soviet, and the Soviet Academy of Sciences. The main thrust of the follow-on conference will be to get world religious and political leaders working together on such neo-malthusian ecological schemes as the greenhouse effect hoax. This is merely a global replay, which has the backing of the Soviet Union, which agreed to a Dartmouth Conference proposal in the 1960s to promote ecology in exchange for unilateral Western arms control deals.

The North American Interfaith Network It was established last year to bring together the major religions in a theocratic institutional network. Its director is Rev. Daniel Anderson, a Lutheran, who was recently coopted to be executive director of the Temple, working out of the Cathedral of St. John. The Wichita North American Assisi Conference This conference, held Oct. 30-Nov. 1, 1988 in Wichita, Kansas, was in preparation for the 1993 celebration of the centennial of the launching of the New Religions movement by Chicago Round Tabler William T. Stead. Like the Global Forum, the Wichita conference brought together American Indians, Sikhs, Sufis, Buddhists, Islamic fundamentalists, and Jews.

February Fling This was a two-week celebration at the Cathedral of St. John in 1988, to promote 100 prominent Soviets. It was co-sponsored by the Temple of Understanding and the Center for Soviet-American Dialogue. Catholic priest Fr. Luis Dolan, who sits on the board of both institutions, was the organizer of the tour. Father Dolan is head of the Citizens Diplomacy Center of Wainwright House, which sponsors a multitude of East-West exchange programs oriented toward removing the enemy image of the U.S.S.R. as an evil empire.

Wainwright Houses Institute for Spiritual Development was directed by Judith Hollister, the founding chairman of the Temple of Understanding. Through Father Dolan, Wainwright House has pledged to work on four East-West projects in 1989 with the Temple. Among these is a project on ecology, for which Wainwright House has received funding from Lawrence Rockefeller to promote.

Another board member of the Temple is the Rabbi Arthur Schneier, self-described as the Jewish Armand Hammer. Rabbi Schneier controls the question of emigration of Jewish Refuseniks, and a colleague states that he has lined up with Edgar Bronfman to call for repeal of the Jackson-Vanik trade amendment, because under Gorbachov, Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union has increased.

Center for Soviet-American Dialogue

The Center is a major back channel between the New Age movement and the U.S.S.R., and has been taken over by New Age leaders including:

Barbara Marx Hubbard. She is a founding member and co-director of the Soviet-American Council for Joint Projects. She co-founded Win-Win-World and is President of the Foundation for Co-Creation. Her name was placed in nomination for the vice presidency on the Democratic ticket in 1984. Hubbard, who entered the New Age movement under the influence of Teilhard de Chardin, created a human front in 1967 of those sharing a belief in transcendent consciousness, which became the Committee for the Future. Hubbard called this transcendent consciousness supra-sex, and she has an extensive network of congressmen involved in the process of haruspication.

Willis Harman, president of the Institute of Noetic Sciences and Senior Social Scientist at the Stanford Research Institute International. The Institute for Noetic Sciences has worked closely with the Temple of Understanding, while SRI has had among its trainees such figures as former Secretary of State George Shultz, who believes not only in global-power sharing New Yalta arrangements with the U.S.S.R., but also in convergence through a New Age based upon cybernetics. Harman is the brains behind Marilyn Ferguson, whose book The Aquarian Conspiracy sought to popularize Luciferian Gnosticism. Harman is also a founding member of Hubbards Soviet-American Council for Joint Projects, and he is chairman of the Independent Commission for a Viable Future. Harmans own 1974 The Changing Image of Man coined the phrase paradigm shift to describe the sought-after transformation from the Age of Pisces to the Age of Aquarius.

James A. Garrison, executive director of the Soviet-American Exchange Program at the Esalen Institute, which has been linked directly to Soviet psychic espionage activities of the KGB and GRU, penetrating the U.S. military and intelligence communities. This is the modern work of the Blavatsky-Okhrana intelligence deployment, which works today through the likes of Soviet spoonbender Yuri Geller.

Notes (not in original article)

[1] Posted version revised 11/18/01. The version previously posted contained errors due to the fact that I obtained it from http://www.omphalos.net/files/anti/EI R_SAT1.html, which is missing quite a bit of information. I did the best I could at filling in the missing information, but I left some of it blank, and some of what I filled in turned out to be wrong. By sheer luck, I downloaded it again from the aforementioned source on impulse, and again on impulse opened it with Corel Wordperfect 8.0. To my amazement, the missing information appeared highlighted in red, although somewhat garbled. With a little work, I was able to reconstruct it.

[2] Steiner broke from the Blavatsky-Besant-Bailey brand of Theosophy because it had been hijacked by various forces with selfish and evil agendas. He indicated that his mission was to purify Theosophy. It appears to me that his teachings are being misused to convey an aura of authority on certain movements which take them out of context.

[3] The term white in this case refers to a class of initiates, not skin color, although I share Thompsons mistrust of Baileys guides and doubt that they were members of this benevolent class.

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Lucis (Lucifer) Trust Exposing Satanism and Witchcraft

Article ID: JAW188 | By: Richard G. Howe

This article first appeared in the Christian Research Journal, volume 28, number 1 (2005). For further information or to subscribe to the Christian Research Journal go to: http://www.equip.org

SYNOPSIS

The term witchcraft evokes different images for different people. Many Westerners would be surprised to know that more and more of their contemporaries are embracing witchcraft as a viable expression of their own spirituality. However marginal or far out it may have seemed in the past, it is clear that witchcraft is becoming progressively more mainstream throughout the world.

Witches are people who revere both the God and the Goddess. They seek a more friendly relationship with their natural environment, endeavoring to recognize the sacredness of all of nature. Witches, further, seek to utilize cosmic or psychic forces to do their bidding. To this end, the practice of witchcraft involves knowledge and skill in appropriating the rituals that are believed to harness and focus these energies. Seeing themselves in stark contrast to other occult religions such as Satanism, witches seek to work these forces in order to enhance their own experience of life and to promote healing and community.

Do these rituals work? Is this even the important question to ask? What could possibly be wrong with such a seemingly benevolent religion? Witchcraft has something to say about who we are as humans, about what our relationship to our fellow humans and to the rest of the universe ought to be, and about how we should relate to the divine. Some Christians may be surprised to learn of the comparisons and contrasts that can be drawn from witchcraft with their own Christianity.

What kind of images does the term witchcraft provoke? To many it brings thoughts of dark, secret rituals with sinister intent, curses being cast on the unwary designed to bring about their undoing. Others are reminded about witchcraft only one time a year. For them it brings images of children dressed in their pointed hats enjoying candy; of cutouts of witches surrounded by broomsticks, pumpkins, and dry leaves. This creates a problem in trying to understand witchcraft. The subject is either too frightening or too silly to consider. Perhaps many people, Christians included, would be surprised to discover that what goes by the name of witchcraft is often quite a bit more sophisticated and thoughtful than they expected. A Christian analysis must resoundingly condemn witchcraft, but that analysis must be based on a fair assessment of the phenomenon as a whole.

Why Bother?

Some may wonder why there is any need to take a look at witchcraft. After all, there is seemingly no end to which people will go in their eccentric beliefs or practices. The reason a topic such as this merits examination is precisely because witchcraft is becoming less eccentric and more mainstream. For example, in the summer of 2004 the Parliament of the Worlds Religions convened in Barcelona, Spain. Representatives from many of the worlds religions were present to seek peace, justice and sustainability and commit to work for a better world as well as to deepen spirituality and experience personal transformation.1 Present at the 2004 conference (as well as the 1993 and 1999 conferences) were representatives of the Covenant of the Goddess, the worlds largest religious organization for Neo-Pagan Witches, as described by an elder of the organization.2 A common theme that comes up in the context of such conferences is the increasing emphasis on interfaith.

In contrast, one group that is often conspicuous by its near absence at such conferences is evangelical Christianity. Why might this be so? Without jumping ahead to my critique, it should be pointed out that the worldview of many who would attend such conferences would vehemently reject the religious exclusivism that characterizes historic, orthodox Christianity. In a very serious way, therefore, many of the worlds religions, including witchcraft, either explicitly or implicitly see themselves aligned against evangelical Christianity; nevertheless, Jesus command to preach the gospel and make disciples of all nations invariably includes witches. In order to do so, it is necessary that we understand who they are and what they believe. Knowing what we are up against is a primary element in being prepared to carry out His Great Commission.

What Witchcraft Is

Definitions can either facilitate or impede understanding. A helpful definition is one that is not overly simplistic, and one that mentions important distinctions as well as similarities between familiar and unfamiliar terms where they exist. In our current age of ecumenical enthusiasm, there is the danger of Christians overlooking the most important aspect of a given religion, namely, the difference between it and their own Christian faith.

There are similarities between flour and ricin. They both are made from plants; they both are white powders; but it is not their similarities that are interesting or important, it is their differences. One is a food and the other is a poison. One promotes life and the other effects death. Dont be misled by my metaphorI am not at this point likening witchcraft to ricin. I am only trying to show that with some issues the differences can be just as important, if not more so, than the similarities. With this in mind let me now delineate the main tenets of modern witchcraft and then contrast those with the main tenets of evangelical Christianity.

Witchcraft Is Known by Many Names

When one begins to investigate the phenomenon of modern witchcraft, it does not take long to notice a range of terms associated with the practice: The Craft, Wicca, paganism, Neo-Paganism, and so on. Brooks Alexander, a Christian researcher who is an expert on the occult and counterculture, gives a helpful summary of certain distinctions between the terms Wicca, witchcraft, and Neo-Paganism. Neo-Paganism is the broadest category, encompassing a wide range of groups that try to reconstruct ancient, pre- and non-Christian religious systemssuch as the Norse, Celtic, Greek, Roman, and Egyptian religionsas well asvarious obscure, forgotten, and neglected occult teachings from around the world.3 He goes on to distinguish witchcraft from Wicca (with Wicca being the narrowest category) along the lines of how closely one follows the specific teachings and practices of the English Wiccan Gerald Gardner, who more or less gave the term Wica (with one c) to his practice.4

There may be subtle distinctions that some prefer to maintain when opting for one term over another, but for the most part these terms are used interchangeably. The term witchcraft is certainly the most familiar within and without the practice, but it is also the term that carries with it the most unwanted baggage. It often has sinister or evil connotations, and for those reasons many within the craft prefer the term Wicca (for the practice) and Wiccan (for the practitioner). The prefix Neo in Neo-Paganism usually indicates an emphasis on ones practice in its contemporary manifestation while still hinting that it is perhaps a revival of, or connected to, something ancient.

Witchcraft Is a Religion

As Americans, this is an important point to remember. We cherish our heritage of religious freedom, but in their enthusiasm to refute the beliefs of witchcraft, some Christians have overstated the case. They rightly claim that the United States was founded on the ethical concept of natural law (where morality is grounded in the nature of the creator God),5 but they wrongly conclude that witches do not have constitutional rights, since witches reject the traditional Christian notion of the creator God. Without getting into the tricky issue of how and whether religion should interact with government or public life, we should recognize that, within the limits of law, all Americans have the right to exercise their own religion in accordance with the dictates of their conscience. Our contention, such as it is, with witchcraft is one of truth. It is a battle of ideas.

Witchcraft Is a Worldview

A worldview is the sum total of ones view of the nature of reality. Everyone has a worldview even if only a few reflect on their own. Ones worldview encompasses ones views of how reality is composed, how it works, and how we as humans fit in or relate to our universe. It can entail ones views about the purpose of life and the origin and destiny of us all.

Naturalism. Starting at the broadest level and working down, it is fair to say that the worldview of witchcraft is naturalism. Naturalism is the view that there is no transcendent reality such as God that can intervene in the natural world. Naturalism maintains that all of reality is interrelated and operates according to laws. Other expressions of naturalism would include materialism, which sees all of reality as being made up of matter that operates according to material laws.

Witchcraft, though an expression of naturalism, is not materialism. Witches recognize that reality extends beyond the realm of the material. This is sometimes confusing. A worldview can be naturalistic even if it accepts the reality of an immaterial realm; indeed, even acknowledging the existence of gods and goddesses does not preclude a worldview from being naturalistic. What stands in stark contrast to naturalism is a worldview that says that the natural realm (whether material, immaterial, or both) is the creation of a transcendent God. This is supernaturalism. This is what historic, orthodox Christianity is.

Occultism. Sharpening the focus, not only can we say that witchcraft is a worldview of naturalism, it is also a worldview of occultism. The term occult is from the Latin occultus meaning hidden, or secret. The category covers a wide range of beliefs and practices that are characterized by two main points that are often thought to be hidden from the average person. First, the occult maintains that there is force or energy into which one can tap or with which one can negotiate to do ones own bidding. The familiar term spell is applied to the technique of harnessing and focusing this power. The late witchcraft practitioner Scott Cunningham explains, The spell issimply a ritual in which various tools are purposefully used, the goal is fully stated (in words, pictures or within the mind), and energy is moved to bring about the needed result.6 Exactly what is the nature of this force or energy, according to the occultist, and what is the best way to work with it is what makes some of the main differences between the major occult groups such as shamanism, witchcraft, Satanism, New Age, and others.

Second, the occult maintains that human beings are divine. The practice of the occult arts is thus an endeavor to actualize ones own divinity. As witchcraft practitioner Margot Adler claims, A spiritual path that is not stagnant ultimately leads one to the understanding of ones own divine nature. Thou art Goddess. Thou are God. Divinity is imminent in all Nature. It is as much within you as without.7

Humanism. Witchcraft sees itself as a celebration of all life. This celebration involves the denial that there is anything wrong with the human race. The practicing witch Starhawk rejoices that we can open new eyes and see that there is nothing to be saved from, no struggle of life against the universe, no God outside the world to be feared and obeyed8 (emphasis in original). Pagan Elder Donald Frew of the Covenant of the Goddess explains, How can we achieve salvation, then? Were not even trying to. We dont understand what there is to be saved from. The idea of salvation presupposes a Fall of some kind, a fundamental flaw in Creation as it exists today. Witches look at the world [around] us and see wonder, we see mystery.9

Witchcraft Is a Practice

Notice that the term practice is often used with the term witchcraft. What this tells us is that, for many, Wicca is as much what someone does as it is what someone believes. While it is certainly true that what one does is invariably a product of what one believes, for witchcraft the emphasis is on what the practice can do to enhance ones own well-being as well as the well-being of others. Witches do not simply adhere to a list of dogmas; indeed, in many ways witches like to think that they eschew dogmas. As Adler describes it, If you go far enough back, all our ancestors practiced religions that had neither creeds nor dogmas, neither prophets nor holy books. These religions were based on the celebrations of the seasonal cycles of nature. They were based on what people did, as opposed to what people believed. It is these polytheistic religions of imminence that are being revived and re-created by Neo-Pagans today.10

A look through witchcraft material at the local bookstore will reveal that much of it deals with various rituals and activities that can be perfected in order to manipulate and utilize this cosmic or psychic force to do ones bidding. One will find chapters on the various items of clothing to wear (robes; jewelry; horned helmet, when one is not working naked, or skyclad); the tools to use (candles, herbs, tarot cards, talismans, fetishes); and rituals to perform (spells, incantations, chanting, music, dancing)all of which enables the practitioner to become open to these forces (if they exist outside) or to conjure up these forces (if they originate from within). One will learn how to interpret dreams, meditate, have out-of-body experiences, speak with the dead, heal, and read auras. One can seek to develop ones own powers within the context of other witches (in a coven) or alone (in solitary practice). There are no obligations to follow any previously prescribed method. If what others have done before works, that is fine. If one sees the need to change the ritual or tools to get better results, then that is fine as well. All of these activities are designed to do two things: to enhance the well-being of ones self or those around him or her and to actualize ones own divinity.

What Witchcraft Is Not

Witchcraft Is Not Satanism

It might be surprising to some to know that witchcraft is not Satanism. Not only do the two have different histories (even if they are short histories), they also have, at a certain level, different views of the world and ones place in it. I add the qualification at a certain level because there is a shared occult perspective between witchcraft and Satanism. Satanism and witchcraft are both occult religions; because of this, they both see reality as entirely natural. There is no transcendent God in the truest sense of the term. Further, they both see all of reality, material and immaterial, as interconnected and working according to laws that can be mastered in such a way as to make not only material but also immaterial reality work according to ones own bidding. Satanism and witchcraft both stand in stark contrast to Christianity in their repudiation not only of God but also of the role of Jesus in effecting the salvation of mankind; indeed, there is a sense in which both Satanism and witchcraft deny that mankind is in any need of salvation.

These similarities are not trivial, but neither are the differences. Any criminal activity that can be associated with occultism is usually associated with some form of Satanism (usually some form of self-styled Satanism). As a matter of principle and practice, witchcraft lives by the creed, An it harm none, do what you will.11

Satanism is more often associated with an attitude of self-aggrandizement rather than the sense of community that characterizes most witchcraft. Further, Satanism and witchcraft differ somewhat in their respective views of nature and humanity. As researchers Shelley Rabinovitch and James Lewis observe, To the neo-Pagan practitioner, nature is viewed as somewhere on a scale from benign to overtly positive, if not outright friendly toward humanity. The ideal in most neo-Pagan practice is to become as one with the natural worldto live in harmony with nature.In contrast, neo-Satanists view the natural world as somewhere between benign and openly hostile to humans.12

Witchcraft Is Not Christianity

Some witches suggest that the practice of witchcraft can be compatible with Christianity,13 but virtually everyone realizes that witchcraft is not Christianity. Some may accuse me of having an uncanny grasp of the obvious for asserting this. Who would possibly confuse the two? In making this claim, however, I mean to do two things.

First, I want to emphasize that one must be careful that various subtle aspects of the practice of witchcraft do not influence ones own Christian view of the world in a way that is incompatible with the Christian faith. What I have in mind here is how easy it can be for Christians to assume that certain practices that characterize the occult in general or witchcraft in particular are sufficiently neutral that one may safely dabble in their use. Some Christians see no problem with experimenting with sances or tarot cards, not realizing that they could be eroding their own view of the nature of reality, not to mention the danger of encountering demonic activity. Even if these practices worked, pragmatism is not a criterion for truth (Jer.44: 1718).

My second reason for pointing out that witchcraft is not Christianity is to try to summarize exactly where witchcraft and Christianity compare and contrast in their respective worldviews. Before I outline those areas of contrast (i.e., where the flour and ricin are different) let me acknowledge those areas where witches and Christians might share common concerns.

Witchcraft and Christianity: Common Concerns. First, because of their view of the nature of the world, witches often have a sense of environmental concern. Now, the motivations of witches and Christians are widely disparatewitches are environmentally conscientious because of their view that the Earth is sacred, whereas Christians should be environmentally conscientious as a matter of stewardship of the creation before the Creatorbut Christians can agree with Wiccans that there is a duty to be environmentally responsible. How that environmental responsibility translates into public policy and individual actions may vary along the political and personal spectrum; nevertheless, we can all agree that there is an environmental responsibility that each of us shares.

Second, witches tend to have a conscientious sense of global concerns. Again, exactly how these concerns translate into public policy and individual actions may vary along the political and personal spectrum, but our common interests stem from the fact that we are all human beings living on the same planet.

Third, witches tend to be benevolently disposed toward their fellow human beings. The stereotype of witches being people with sinister intent wielding spells of black magic needs to be abandoned. As Christians we can share in their concern for the well being of others though we will obviously disagree as to what exactly constitutes that well being.

Witchcraft and Christianity: Mortal Foes in What Ultimately Counts. Our enthusiasm to establish rapport with those around us who may embrace witchcraft as a way of expressing their own spirituality must not keep us from recognizing that, when it comes to what ultimately counts, witchcraft and Christianity (but not witches and Christians14) are mortal foes. What ultimately counts is the objective truth about who God is, who we are as humans, and how we relate.

Christianity is monotheistic. Christianity claims that there is a God and no one of us is He. Witchcraft claims the opposite: We are of the nature of the Gods, and a fully realized man or woman is a channel for that divinity, a manifestation of the God or the Goddess.15 Adler favorably quotes historian James Breasted who said, Monotheism is but imperialism in religion.16 In place of the strict monotheism of Christianity, witchcraft not only deifies the self, but it ostensibly reveres the pagan God and Goddess.17

Christianity is exclusivistic. Remember Jesus words in John14:6: I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. Contrast that with what Adler proclaims: The belief that there is one word, one truth, one path to the light, makes it easy to destroy ideas, institutions, and human beingsyour own spiritual path is not necessarily mine.18

Christianity is authoritarian. Usually this term authoritarian has negative associations, but if authoritarian means recognizing authority then Christianity certainly does that. Not only has God revealed Himself through the things He has made (see, e.g., Ps.19:1 and Rom.1:20), but He has also revealed Himself finally and fully through Jesus Christ and the Bible. In contrast, Frew says, To grant a traditional text such authority would be to say that this is it, the truth for all time. But we are a nature religion, and a fundamental truth of nature is that everything changes.19 Christians recognize the authority of Gods word in such matters, and so we have to face the fact that the Bible unequivocally condemns the practice of witchcraft, along with all forms of the occult (see Deut.18:1012; Acts13:611;16:1618; Gal.5:1921).

Christianity recognizes everyones need for salvation. The most important message we have to give to the world is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Without the sacrifice of Christ to wash away our sins and reconcile us to our Maker, there is no hope in the world to come. Witchcraft teaches that our destiny is to return again to this world through reincarnation. Cunningham comments, While reincarnation isnt an exclusive Wiccan concept, it is happily embraced by most Wiccans because it answers many questions about daily life and offers explanations for more mystical phenomena such as death, birth and karma.20 Frew expounds, While many of us believe in reincarnation, we do not seek to escape the wheel of rebirth. We cant imagine anything more wonderful than to come back to this bounteous and beautiful Earth.21 In contrast to this spiritually fatal illusion, the Bible warns, And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment (Heb.9:27 NKJV).

WHAT ARE WE TO DO?

There is a sense in which the job before us as Christians never changes, no matter who our audience is. Tactics and strategies may vary depending on the task at handwhether apologetics, evangelism, or discipleshipbut the commission never varies. It behooves us as Christians to maximize our effectiveness in reaching the lost by being informed and sensitive to the beliefs and practices of others while paying close attention to the subtle differences between various worldviews and our own Christian faith. This is true no less of witches than anyone else who may be living right next door.

notes

1. Parliament of the Worlds Religions, http://www.cpwr.org/ 2004Parliament/welcome/index.htm.

2. Donald H. Frew, Pagans in Interfaith Dialogue: New Faiths, New Challenges, CoGWeb, http://www.cog.org/pwr/ don.htm. On the significance of the presence of pagan witchcraft at the conference, Frew commented, The 2004 Parliamentcemented our position as an established religion on the world stage. (Donald Frew, e-mail interview by author, October31,2004.)

3. Brooks Alexander, Witchcraft Goes Mainstream: Uncovering Its Alarming Impact on You and Your Family (Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2004), 23.

4. The question of the origin and history of modern witchcraft is complicated. According to some researchers, Gerald Gardner (18841964) is almost single-handedly responsible for the modern phenomenon we now know as witchcraft. Whether Gardner invented or rediscovered the religion is disputed. For discussions on the matter, see Brooks Alexanders work cited in endnote 3; Ronald Hutton, Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999); Jenny Gibbons, Recent Developments in the Study of The Great European Witch Hunt, CoGWeb, http://www.cog/org/witch_hunt.html. For a response to earlier versions of Huttons arguments, see D. H. Frew, Methodological Flaws in Recent Studies of Historical and Modern Witchcraft, Ethnologies 1 (1998): 3365. For Huttons rejoinder to Frew, see Ronald Hutton, Paganism and Polemic: The Debate over the Origins of Modern Pagan Witchcraft, Folklore (April 2000), http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2386/is_1_111/ai_62685559. I agree with Alexanders conclusion: There has been no passing down of any tradition from medieval witches to anyone in our own time. There is no identifiable continuity between the witchcraft of the Middle Ages and the modern-day religious movement that bears the same name. (Alexander, Witchcraft Goes Mainstream, 127.) This is not to say, however, that there is no continuity between some of the concepts of modern witchcraft and ancient religions. As Donald Frew observes, There is a genuine antiquity to many of the core theological concepts and linked liturgical practices, andthere is a traceable path of transmission from Classical antiquity down to the modern movement, butthis is not the same thing as a continually practicing group. (Donald Frew, e-mail interview by author, October31,2004.)

5. For a defense of the role of natural law in the birth of the United States of America see Gary T. Amos, Defending the Declaration: How the Bible and Christianity Influenced the Writing of the Declaration of Independence (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth and Hyatt Publishers, 1989). For an examination of natural law theory in pluralistic America see Norman Geisler and Frank Turek, Legislating Morality: Is It Wise? Is It Legal? Is It Possible? (Minneapolis: Bethany House Publishers, 1998) and Carl Horn, ed., Whose Values? The Battle for Morality in Pluralistic America (Ann Arbor, MI: Servant Books, 1985).

6. Scott Cunningham, The Truth about Witchcraft Today (St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn Publications, 1988), 17.

7. Margot Adler, Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America Today, rev. and exp. ed. (Boston: Beacon Press, 1986), ix.

8. Starhawk, The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess (San Francisco: Harper and Row Publishers, 1979), 14.

9. Frew, Pagans in Interfaith Dialogue.

10. Adler, ix.

11. Janet and Stewart Farrar, A Witches Bible Compleat: Principles, Rituals and Beliefs of Modern Witchcraft, rev. ed. (New York: Magickal Childe, 1987), 2:135.

12. Shelley Rabinovitch and James Lewis, The Encyclopedia of Modern Witchcraft and Neo-Paganism (New York: Citadel Press, 2002), s.v. Neo-Satanism Compared and Contrasted with Neo-Paganism, 18586, emphasis in original.

13. See, e.g., Gavin Frost and Yvonne Frost, The Magic Power of Witchcraft (West Nyack, NY: Parker Publishing, 1976), 130.

14. The belief systems of Christianity and witchcraft are mutually exclusive, but Christians are called to love all human beings and consider as their true enemy the evil spiritual force that lies behind the worlds anti-Christian belief systems (Eph.6:12; cf. Matt.5:4347).

15. Farrar, 2:33.

16. Adler, vii.

17. The emphasis on the God and the Goddess stems from witchcrafts worldview of the interplay in reality of opposites that seek balance. The Farrars explain, All activity, all manifestation arises [sic] from (and is inconceivable without) the interaction of pairs and complementary opposites. (A Witches Bible Compleat,2:107.)

18. Adler, viii.

19. Frew, Pagans in Interfaith Dialogue.

20. Cunningham, 65.

21. Frew, Pagans in Interfaith Dialogue.

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Modern Witchcraft: It May Not Be What You Think

Sometimes famous people chose very unreal religions and cultus. Read about the most famous celebrities who are fond of Satanism.

We live in such incredible time when each person is a master of himself or herself. We can do everything we want, go where we want, eat what we decide ourselves. And our freedom is much wider than these usual, daily actions. We are free to choose the person whom we want to be the leader of our country and we can choose what to believe in.

Due to the freedom of religion we are able to make our own choice about this private and important issue and no one can judge us. Usually, most people choose between the most widespread and popular religions, such as Christianity, Islam or Catholicism. Sometimes they can make less popular choice, for example, Buddhism or Hinduism. And no one is going to be surprised by this decision.

But modern world gives an opportunity not only to choose the religion freely but also to invent. Probably, it is much easier to create your own religion than you think. A person can create his or her own church without any difficulties. You should just give the substantial answers to the questions of the human kind and find people who will share your ideas. You can even register it officially if you meet all the demands of the law.

The bright example of such kind of religion is Pastafarian. They spread the idea of a flying spaghetti monster all over the world.

Another unusual, but quite popular religion is satanism. It has many believers in many countries of the planet and is constantly getting more and more new believers.

Among them, there are many famous celebrities. Probably, because it is already not very interesting and unusual to be a Scientologist, so they are looking for new ways to shock the publicity. Or, maybe, they sincerely share the ideology of Satanists.

We will never know exactly

Satanic religion is comparatively new one. It appeared only in the middle of the previous century. If you imagine people in mantles, worshiping the Devil and making the bloody sacrifice at the altar, you are wrong. It is a kind of myth.

Actually, Satanism is a contrariety to traditional Christian virtues and postulates. This religion is aimed at the usage of practical common sense and justice, as well as encouragement of benevolence and sympathy. It is not even a real religion, it is kind of world outlook, philosophy.

People who prefer this religion they do not actually worship the Devil in a biblical sense. They suppose the Satan to be a symbol of rebels against tyranny and authority. You may be surprised, but many adherents of Satanism are really atheists. Satan is not an identity, it is an archetype. It is the tale of traits, such as change, development and pursuance of self-development. It is a desire to become a real personality.

Moreover, those people think that religion should be based on science and critical reasoning, not on supernatural and superstitious ideas. There is no common canon, and each Satanists chooses for himself his own life journey, so they often are out of tune with the agreed standards.

There are even some subgroups of Satanists. Now this religion is fastly growing. For example, in the USA it was practically legalised not long ago. And now there are even special additional courses at schools which would be backed financially by the state government.

Of course, such interesting and unusual cultus cannot be neglected by superstars, who are always eager to distinguish themselves from the crowd. Read about the celebrities fond of Satanism.

The most famous celebrity engaged in Satanic cult is Marilyn Manson.

Probably, no one expected that the cute boy from the church is one day going to become one of the first and most famous the adherent of Satanic church. According to the musician, he combined in his name two things: lightness - actress Marilyn Monroe and darkness - Charles Manson, to show the thin line that divides in human life beautiful and terrible sides, genius and madness. But leaving people to wonder what is meant by beautiful, Manson from the very beginning sought to cause public Shock.

Jayne Mansfield, the famous Hollywood actress, is a person who stood at the origins of Satanism. Many people suppose that her death in a car accident is directly connected with her religion. But at the beginning of her worship, Jayne Mansfield acknowledged that for the first time in her life, she found a philosophy through which she could be a businesswoman, an intellectual, a mother and a beauty at the same time. Competitors will not condemn such for original sin.

Many people see some special secret satanic signs in a music and image of famous pop-diva Lady Gaga. There is no exact information about that, but she is supposed to be influenced by this cultus. This assumption was expressed by the maid of one of the hotels where the pop singer stayed. After her stay in the room, the maid found the bathtub full of blood.

About this the maid has reported to thier Concierge, Andrea Miller. The maid immediately advised to forget about it, and now her name shall be kept secret from the press. We only know that she works in a London hotel Intercontinental.

READ ALSO: 10 unsolved mysteries about Satan

Legends of rock-n-roll, idols of millions of teenagers of their time, Elvis Presley and John Lennon were also suspected of Satanism, as in some of their songs are seen covered implication and worshiping of Devil.

Of course, another famous rock band, KISS, did everything to shock the public by their horrible masks and images. Their songs also are sometimes frightening ordinary listeners.

In the creative work of Nicki Minaj are traced attributes of the satanic cult, she is accused of carrying out some rituals in public.

Beyonce and her husband, Jay-Z, are also rumoured to be Satanists.

If to take for true the information about the direct connection between Satanism and Illuminati, then we can also designate many Nigerian celebrities as Satanists.

Such as Tiwa Savage, Goldie, Charly Boy, Don Jazzy and so on.

Source: Legit.ng

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Celebrities involved in Satanism, who are they? - Legit.ng