Witchcraft Today

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2007-08-10T14:56:00.000-05:00

due to lack of space and user friendly options for the viewers, we will be moving this blog to another medium. We will post that address shortly.

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Mideast: Lessons from classical warfare

2006-11-06T12:57:00.000-06:00

Middle East

Nov 7, 2006

Mideast: Lessons from classical warfare
By Spengler

Ancient armies with edged weapons first gave meaning to the term "asymmetrical warfare", much misused by armchair fanciers of anti-colonial warfare. Alexander killed 230,000 Persians at Gaugamela in 331 BC against 4,000 Greek and allied dead. In ancient warfare the pursuers slaughtered the pursued, and the side that ran took all the casualties. Whole civilizations melted away before the onslaught of superior forces. The great error in Western policy is to imagine that anything fundamental has

changed. We throw around the term "cutting edge" lightly, too often forgetting that the edge always lands on someone's back.

For three years I have excoriated George W Bush as a tragic character who always wishes to do good, but always ends up doing ill. Promoting democracy in the Middle East instead will lead to perpetual warfare. Nonetheless I sympathize with Bush, and reject as nonsensical all the conspiracy theories concerning the supposed motives for US intervention in Iraq. What you see is what you get: the United States wishes to promote its own interest by making the Muslims more like Americans. That the effort is doomed to catastrophic failure is a different matter.

Much as I have ridiculed Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, I also sympathize with her point of view. Like Jimmy Carter, she can only interpret events in the Middle East within the frame of her own experience, which is the bitter experience of racism in the US south. She stated on October 11 in her speech to the American Project on Palestine:

I know that sometimes a Palestinian state living side by side in peace with Israel must seem like a very distant dream. But I know too, as a student of international history, that there are so many things that once seemed impossible that, after they happened, simply seemed inevitable. I've read over the last summer the biographies of America's Founding Fathers. By all rights, America, the United States of America, should never have come into being. We should never have survived our civil war. I should never have grown up in segregated Birmingham, Alabama, to become the secretary of state of the United States of America.

In her view the Palestinian Arabs are a disadvantaged people struggling for their rightful place in the world. If the Palestinians fail, Rice cannot help but know, the West will react with racism, the same sort of racism that white Americans exude when speaking among themselves about the failure of American blacks. No matter that as Christians, American blacks relived Israel's journey to freedom during their bleakest moments, and triumphed by appealing to the Christian conscience of southern whites.

The Palestinians are not the victims of empire, but rather the remnants of a defeated empire that cannot admit to its defeat without accepting final and complete deracination. They cannot help but return to the chant they raised when Iraqi Scud missiles hit Tel Aviv in 1990: "The Jews are our dogs." No viable economic basis exists for a state of 5 million Palestinians without massive subsidies from the West, and the Palestinians have voted emphatically against becoming the subsidized dogs of the US and the European Union.

Why do whole countries in the modern world show economic results as lopsided as Gaugamela's casualty list? Little more than a decade ago the former Soviet Union and its satellites wrote off virtually their entire capital stock, and the aspirations of most of their population. By mid-century the population of a political entity that in 1980 seemed destined to rule the world will have fallen by a half (in the case of Ukraine and Moldova) to a quarter (in the case of Russia). What remains of Russia stalks the world scene like a man whose terminal cancer leaves him no motivation save amusement and revenge.

Americans could look on the Soviet Union as an evil empire and communism as an evil ideology because it claimed to replace tradition with the dictatorship of reason. "No more tradition's chains shall bind us!" intoned the anthem of the Paris Communards, adopted by revolutionary Russia.

Appropriately, the communist empire's last military misadventure pitted it against the most traditional of societies, namely Afghanistan. The Russian quagmire in Afghanistan had little to do with communism's ultimate failure, which stemmed from the Russian military's realization that it could not compete with the United States in high-technology weaponry. Despite its internal rot, Russia might have triumphed if it had succeeded in turning Western Europe into an economic tributary, and harnessing European productive power. Nonetheless, Russia's calamitous encounter with tradition symbolized the collapse of the arrogance with which communism set out to remake the world on the supposed foundations of science.

Islam was America's ally in the final struggle against Soviet communism. It is insufficient to say that Islam is traditional; more precisely, Islam is the apotheosis of traditional society. Christianity appeared as the gravedigger of traditional society, calling individuals out from their nations into a new people of God. Where it compromised too deeply with traditional society, through syncretic adoption of pagan elements, ultimately Christianity failed, as in the ex-Christian, neo-pagan continent of Western Europe. Where Christianity liquidated the languages, culture and memories of its converts, it flourished, uniquely in the case of immigrants to the United States.

Issues that seem trivial and even grotesque to Westerners, such as the veiling of women, are life-and-death matters for the survival of Islam, as Muslims in the West know better than their Western critics. Christianity recruits individual souls into a new Israel: Islam enlists converts into an army to defend traditional life against the depredations of encroaching empires. Islam cannot withstand the final dissolution of traditional society that comes with the triumph of globalization. Its entire raison d'etre is a stubborn refusal to adapt, in the fashion that the Chinese have adapted, to a new world with new ground rules. To intervene in the Islamic world is to hasten the dissolution of traditional society and with it the world of Islam. For all his good intentions, Bush appears to Iraqis as the worst thing to visit them since the Mongols in the 14th century.

Christianity, even in its purest, US form, never has quite come to grips with its role as the exterminator of paganism. Christ's kingdom is not of this world, but Christians are. They must live in this world. Except in passing moments of inspiration they must make accommodations to it. Europe's solution was to make Christianity into mere Christendom, in which Christian observance settled into a supporting role within the ambient culture. Less by design than by circumstance, US Christianity has not done this, but only because the US lacks an ambient culture to begin with.

By and large American Christians do not understand what it is that makes them Christians, and why their religion has flourished while European Christianity has perished. Once having abandoned their own culture by becoming American, Americans cease to understand why others will die rather than let their culture be stripped from them. Because American Christians do not quite understand what they are, they cannot understand what makes Muslims so different. Bush, Rice and other well-meaning American Christians will operate on the presumption that Muslims can be persuaded to act like them, with tragic consequences.

It is not what the United States does that threatens Islam, but rather what the United States is: a global avalanche of creative destruction that rips apart the bindings of traditional life. The US has offered a world in which traditional society has no place. The portions of the world that have turned their back to the sword's edge face chaos. An endearing quality of the Americans is that they find the truth too horrible to contemplate.

(Copyright 2006 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved.

Lions Theatre demystifies Satanism

2006-11-06T12:55:00.000-06:00

Lions Theatre demystifies Satanism
BY CLIFTON KAWANGA
03:27:51 - 06 November 2006

Their last play,
Slaughter House
Republic was a condemnation of the Chiradzulu murders but this time around, Lions Arts Theatre demystifies Satanism in their latest play The Blood of Jesus.
Speaking in an interview, the group’s director Thlupego Chisiza said Satanism is still mysterious but the play is a source of hope to those who believe in the power of Jesus Christ.
“Some things that happen in our society cannot be easily explained. There are a lot of accidents, removal of private parts and all kinds of evil acts, we simply look at that as the work of Satan,” he said.
He said people talk a lot about Satanism and what the group has done is to collect that information and come up with the play.
“Some people have confessed that they were once satanic. Our play has tried to create a picture on what Satanism is all about based on people’s experiences but in the end, it is the blood of Jesus that cleanse them,” he said.
The play centres around Isaac, whose father Mphundu is a pastor but the son’s actions puts into question the father’s responsibility in guiding his own children.
Isaac represents the present generation whose majority does not value the advice from their parents and regard their own actions as the best they can do with their lives.
The son challenges Mphundu that he never asked his father to be born. Isaac insists that he is old enough to produce his own children and he shocks his father further: “Girls give me fun, they entertain me. Okay, if I stop womanising it means I will turn you into my wife.”
As the play progresses, Isaac is given a high position by worshippers of Satan for his achievements. He is the one responsible for the deaths of his mother and sister and caused 46 accidents in three weeks.
To the disbelief of his father, he falls in love with his own aunt, Blandina and challenges Mphundu that he has no say on their relationship. Isaac claims to be more powerful than his father and reveals that he is the one who killed his mother and sister.
“It is a play that will make people understand some of the things that happen in life and I hope it will lead a lot of people to salvation because the only way we can run away from evil is to embrace Jesus Christ,” says Chisiza, who is the son of late theatre guru Du Chisiza.
The play which was written and directed by Chisiza goes to Gymkhana Club in Zomba on Saturday before Lions Theatre returns with their act to French Cultural Centre (FCC) in Blantyre the following day.

No spells, just sorrow

2006-11-06T12:52:00.000-06:00

Posted on Mon, Nov. 06, 2006

CONGO | Accused of practicing witchcraft, children are ejected from homes

No spells, just sorrow

Blaming the kids for troubles gives guardians and parents an excuse to get rid of a dependent.

By SHASHANK BENGALI

McClatchy Newspapers

Shashank Bengali | McClatchy-Tribune

Kipasi Kama, 15, was kicked out of his house when relatives accused him of witchcraft. Sorcery allegations are now the No. 1 cause of child homelessness in Kinshasa, Congo.

KINSHASA, Congo | When Mando Mengi was 5, his mother died and his father remarried.

His stepmother, a tall, mercurial woman with two children of her own, saw Mando as a burden and gave him endless chores while the other kids did nothing.

One day, Mando refused to sweep the dirt floor of their home. His stepmother found a sinister explanation for his stubbornness: He was practicing witchcraft.

She began to withhold food and sometimes beat him, saying it would purge the evil spirits. Finally she gave his father an ultimatum: “You’ve brought a sorcerer into this house,” Mando recalled her saying. “Either he leaves or I do.”

Mando didn’t wait for him to decide. He ran away, joining tens of thousands of children who live on the streets of this broken-down African capital.

With 4 million Congolese thought to have perished mostly from illnesses and hunger since a civil war began in 1998, and with eight in 10 surviving on less than a dollar per day, children are sometimes seen as encumbrances, just more mouths to feed. For some parents and guardians, calling a child a sorcerer offers an easy explanation for their troubles and a chance to rid themselves of a dependent.

Feeding these beliefs are growing revivalist churches where spurious pastors offer to exorcise spirits. There are thought to be more than 2,000 such churches in Kinshasa, a city of about 9 million people.

Aid workers estimate that there are 25,000 to 50,000 children living on the streets, and their numbers are growing. As many as 70 percent have been abandoned for allegedly practicing sorcery, according to a report this year by New York-based Human Rights Watch.

In most cases, the group said, victims of witchcraft allegations had lost one or both parents. Their accusers are usually stepparents or guardians, and the children most often targeted are those with behaviors such as bedwetting, sleepwalking or aggression.

“Poverty and desperation are the basic causes,” said Mike Mwamba, the director of a center for abandoned children in Gombe, a busy commercial section of Kinshasa where hundreds of street kids prowl about the main marketplace.

“It’s a typical case. You see someone losing their job, and they look at home for an explanation. Where is this bad luck coming from? They see the child, who has certain negative characteristics. Maybe he is difficult, maybe he wets his bed. That becomes enough to accuse them of sorcery.”

Jean-Marie Kalonji, a pastor who runs the Fountain of Adoration of God Evangelical Center, claims to be Kinshasa’s expert on the subject.

“Witchcraft is a bigger problem in Congo than AIDS,” said Kalonji.

Kalonji renounces the “false methods” of other pastors, which include burning the sorcerer, extracting flesh from his mouth, beating him with an iron rod, trampling him, making him drink a bottle of palm oil daily for a week, and forcing him to stare at the sun.

Kalonji says his technique involves a lot of prayer but no physical abuse.

Pagan hub remains intact

2006-11-06T12:50:00.000-06:00

Published: Monday, November 6, 2006

Pagan hub remains intact
Store and building owners vow to rebuild after a suspicious fire gutted Moonflower Magicks in downtown Everett.

By Jeff Switzer
Herald Writer

EVERETT - Moonflower Magicks was a rare place for today's witches and pagans to gather and be accepted. It was as much sanctuary and cultural center as it was a book and supply shop.

When a fire two weeks ago closed the purple gilded New Age shop at the corner of Colby Avenue and California Street, word of the loss shot through the communities that called it home.

"It's pretty much a hub of the neo-pagan community," said Willow Moon, an Italian witch and Wiccan high priestess from Everett. "It's been a big loss."

The arched ceiling is charred black. Temperatures up to 900 degrees melted the shop's light fixtures.

Investigators said the cause of the fire has not been determined. Shop owner Jana "Moonflower" Benson, 63, said she suspects arson.

She moved to the location two years ago - replacing the Silvertips' first headquarters.

The store stocked a wide range of books on paganism, Wicca and old-world, non-Christian traditions. Owners sold aroma-therapy items, incense, oils, candles, gemstones and jewelry. They also sold statues of gods and goddesses, wands and magic supplies used in rituals.

"It had the sense of an old-time country store, a gathering place and very much a safe place," said Theo Williams, a Wiccan from Everett. He said he "came out of the broom closet" 11 years ago to find that most of his friends were Wiccan, too.

"Having Moonflower's here was a blessing," he said, a pentacle hanging from his neck signifying earth, wind, water, fire and spirit. "If I saw the pentacle, I immediately had someplace to send people."

He reflected on the loss of the store while standing in the darkened ruins last week, amid the cloying scent of a hundred broken bottles of fragrant oil.

"I would definitely not want the karma of the person who did this," Williams said.

Critics occasionally hurled slurs like "devil store" at Benson.

The fire claimed a piece of her livelihood, as well as a treasured picture of Jesus bought in a hashish shop in Nepal.

She got a call after the fire, and a person said "see what you get hanging a picture of Jesus in your store," she said.

When there is no knowledge of something, there is fear, said Tamara Benson, Moonflower Benson's daughter.

"We're kind of all walking toward the same place but we're all coming from different directions and follow our own paths to get there," she said. "We're very accepting of everyone and all of their paths."

The support of neighbors and shop visitors is more prevalent - and heartwarming - than criticism, Moonflower Benson said.

"At first it made me cry," she said.

An Everett-based modern pagan discussion group met regularly at the shop. Other classes met upstairs, including Wiccan and Druidry classes taught by Willow Moon.

Shop and building owners vow to rebuild.

"That particular place is still going to be a place within everyone's hearts," Willow Moon said. "The hub is still there. We're all part of that community, that spirit of place. It may be in shock, traumatized, but it hasn't changed. That spirit of place still exists."

Most fires stink, but this one smelled good because of the incense and oils that broke open or burned, Moonflower Benson said.

She said the fire was like the American Indian tradition of smudging, where sage or aromatic herbs are burned.

"I think we smudged Everett," she said. "Everett should be a lot cleaner now."

Reporter Jeff Switzer: 425-339-3452 or jswitzer@heraldnet.com.

Pagans are a-salt-ed

2006-11-06T00:48:00.000-06:00

Pagans are a-salt-ed

November 04, 2006

A CATHOLIC group has been banned from mystical Glastonbury after hurling abuse and salt at pagans.

Local priest Father Kevin Knox-Lecky invited national group Youth 2000 to the Somerset town for a religious festival.

But one male youth was arrested and two women cautioned after locals had salt thrown at them to cleanse them of “evil” spirits.

Pagan shop owner Maya Pinder, who was abused by Catholics, said: “It was as if we’d returned to the Dark Ages.”

Father Knox-Lecky apologised to the pagan community and vowed not invite the group again.

Bishop attacks 'victim' Muslims

2006-11-05T17:48:00.000-06:00

Times Online

November 05, 2006

Bishop attacks 'victim' Muslims

Christopher Morgan

THE Church of England’s only Asian bishop, whose father converted from Islam, has criticised many Muslims for their “dual psychology”, in which they desire both “victimhood and domination”.

In the most outspoken critique of Muslims by a church leader, Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester, said that because of this view it would never be possible to satisfy all their demands.

“Their complaint often boils down to the position that it is always right to intervene when Muslims are victims, as in Bosnia or Kosovo, and always wrong when the Muslims are the oppressors or terrorists, as with the Taliban or in Iraq,” said Nazir-Ali.

“Given the world view that has given rise to such grievances, there can never be sufficient appeasement and new demands will continue to be made.”

The failure to counter such beliefs meant that radical Islam had flourished in Britain, spread by extremist imams indoctrinating children for
up to four hours a day, he said.

Nazir-Ali added that rigorous checks, from which the government had retreated in face of Muslims’ protests, should be imposed to ensure that arriving clerics were committed to the British way of life.

“Characteristic British values have developed from the Christian faith and its vision of personal and common good,” said the bishop in an interview with The Sunday Times.

“After they were clarified by the enlightenment they became the bedrock of our modern political life. These values need to be recovered to help us to inculcate the virtues of generosity, loyalty, moderation and love.”

Nazir-Ali, who was born in Pakistan and whose father converted from Islam to Catholicism, said radical Islam was being taught in mosque schools across Britain. “While radical teaching may not be happening everywhere, its presence is felt across the country. It affects all Muslims,” he said.

“The two main causes of the present situation [rising extremism] are fundamentalist imams and material on the internet.” He proposed to filter out imams who might whip up extremism: “They must be vetted for appropriate qualifications, they must have a reasonable knowledge of the English language and they must take part in a recognised process of learning about British life and culture.”

The government, after lobbying from Muslim groups, retreated from proposals to toughen entry requirements put forward by David Blunkett, the former home secretary, two years ago. Plans to require foreign clerics to sit a test on British civic values a year after arriving were cancelled along with the introduction of a requirement to speak English to conversational level.

Nazir-Ali also criticised women wearing veils that cover the whole face. Tony Blair called the full veil a “mark of separation”, but Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, said any curbs on wearing it would be “politically dangerous”.

Nazir–Ali drew attention to a “huge increase” in the wearing of Muslim dress in Egypt, Malaysia and Pakistan, saying that in Britain there were circumstances where the full veil should not be worn: “I can see nothing in Islam that prescribes the wearing of a full-face veil. In the supermarket those at the cash tills need to be recognised. Teaching is another context in which society requires recognition and identification.”

Nazir-Ali, 57, was born a Catholic in Karachi, converted to Protestantism and was received into the Church of Pakistan at 20. He settled in Britain in the 1980s and became the youngest bishop in the world at 35.

Muhammad Abdul Bari, secretary-general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said his comments were not “very helpful for community relationships”.

EDITORIAL SURVEY

2006-11-04T20:33:00.000-06:00

This is an informational survey. As the editor I would like to know what the readership thinks about our current layout. My personal opinion is that I love it, though I sometimes find it difficult in regards to reading the posts.

Having said that, I would like for the readers to leave me a comment to this post and let me know your opinions, good and bad, pro and con. I will use these comments to contemplate changing the layout, so please leave contructive criticism's and offer opinions on layout styles you might find more appropriate.

Thank you for your time.

Editor
Witchcraft Today

Catholic marchers turn on Glastonbury pagans

2006-11-04T20:20:00.000-06:00

Catholic marchers turn on Glastonbury pagans

· Police arrest youth on suspicion of harassment
· Priest distances church from intimidation

Thair Shaikh
Saturday November 4, 2006

Guardian

In scenes reminiscent of medieval witchhunts, Catholic pilgrims in Glastonbury have attacked pagans and threatened to "cleanse" them from the town.

Local pagans were pelted with salt and branded witches who "would burn in hell" during a procession organised by Youth 2000, a conservative Catholic lay group. The Magick Box, a pagan shop on the route of the march, was also singled out and attacked.

Maya Pinder, the owner of the shop, said: "We've had to hear comments such as 'burn the witches', we've had salt thrown in our faces and at our shop, people were openly saying they were 'cleansing Glastonbury of paganism'.

"It was as if we had returned to the dark ages. This is hugely damaging to Glastonbury ... it is hard enough to trade in Glastonbury as it is, if you were to take away the pagan element it would be a dead town." The Somerset town is known for having a large population of resident and visiting pagans.

The archdruid of Glastonbury, Dreow Bennett, said: "To call the behaviour of some of their members medieval would be an understatement. I personally witnessed the owner of of the Magick Box being confronted by one of their associates and being referred to as a bloody bitch and being told 'you will burn in hell'."

Father Kevin Knox-Lecky of St Mary's church said that after meeting representatives of the pagan community he had decided not to invite Youth 2000 to the town again.

He said: "A family appeared who we don't know, who were very destructive not only in the town and to the pagan community, but were also swearing at our parishioners as well."

He said the majority of Catholics taking part in the procession had been well-behaved and respectful of the pagans.

The retreat was organised last week to mark the 467th anniversary of the beheading of the last abbot of Glastonbury Abbey, Richard Whiting, and fellow martyrs.

Youth 2000 describes itself as "an independent, international initiative that helps young adults aged 16-35 plug back into God at the heart of the Roman Catholic Church".

It was set up 10 years ago by a disenchanted Catholic barrister who wanted a return to the traditional teachings of the church for young people.

Charlie Conner, the managing director of Youth 2000, said: "There were several incidents that happened that same weekend that were linked to people who had come to Glastonbury for the retreat. This was in direct contravention of the general spirit of Youth 2000 and its express instructions. The young man who was fined was not in fact registered on the retreat, although he did attempt to attend it.

"Youth 2000 does not condone or encourage this kind of behaviour from anyone. We fully agree that differences on matters of faith cannot and should not be resolved by any kind of harassment."

A spokesman for Avon and Somerset police confirmed a youth had been arrested at Magick Box on suspicion of causing harassment, alarm or distress.

Two women were also given cautions and warned about their future conduct.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2006

Satanic Female Eipscopal Bishop Installed

2006-11-04T15:10:00.000-06:00

Editorial Note: Though we post this next article, we do so with much disgust at the obvious bigotry and discriminatory content. Its' presence here is merely to show and document an issue that effects us even in this day and age. It is beyond this editors scope of reason, how someone could hold to such antiquary beliefs which go against every fiber of the true meaning of the religion he claims to be speaking on behalf of, yet claiming (at the end) an accomplished education.

Satanic Female Eipscopal Bishop Installed
By J. Grant Swank Jr. (11/04/2006)

She declares that the Bible is not regarded as divine revelation and therefore is no guide for morality.

That means that she is not a biblical Christian, yet she is a religious leader. She is thereby not defending the Christian deity however still remaining with the ecclesiastical frame. That makes her, not a Christian, not a "middle person between Christianity and Satanism," but a satanic leader of the first order. Being a religious personage within the framework of Christendom but not holding to biblical leader makes her nothing short of a satanic leader of the first order.

Jesus said that there would be false prophets in every age. There were numerous one in His first century. Jesus stated that those religious leaders who lead laity astray will be dealt a greater damnation. Therefore, this particular female Episcopal presiding bishop ensconced, according to Jesus, will pay with a greater damnation.

Once one steps outside the Bible as divine revelation and yet continues as a religious leader within Christendom, that makes that individual no longer a biblical believer. Not to be a biblical believer is not to hold Christ as the only Savior for a repentant mankind. That means that the individual leader is not advocating Christ or His Word but instead advocating Satanism.

Satanism appears not only in the raw with satanic symbols, covens and the like. Satanism appears in the supposed refined state, the prime recent example being Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church Katharine Jefferts Schori. She met with the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams last week. Today, Saturday, November 4, 2006, she is to be installed with the new title upon her head. The Archbishop is reported as not in agreement with her installation.

Schori, in one of her satanic supports, endorses ordaining practicing homosexuals. In that, she is not only diametrically opposed to divine revelation which states God’s abhorrence for such activity, but she furthers AIDS / HIV. By championing active homosexuality, one automatically furthers the disease for much of the researched activity goes on without protected sex. It is ironic and diabolical that a religious leader within Christendom would advocate a lifestyle that aids the spreading of a global plague; nevertheless, that is what theological liberals do.

In supporting ordaining active homosexuals, Schori also supports "blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples," per AP. It appears that advocating active homosexuality and same-gender "marriage" go hand in hand with theological liberals.

The biblical Anglicans worldwide are antithetical to apostate Anglicans, the latter known as "Episcopalians" in the United States. The rift grows. The biblical believers point to the Bible as the only morality guideline for genuine Christians. The apostates point to moral relativity as their ethical guideline. The latter opens up definitions of all sorts due to the individual crafting of morals determined by relativism.

The Episcopal Church has gone further and further into apostasy with its leadership brazenly stating that if one holds to the biblical position that biblical believer is of the devil. Biblical believers realize that such is to be expected when once-believers leave the biblical theology for apostasy. The more one drifts from biblical data yet claims to be "religious Christian," the more one becomes vehement in defense of relativism.

Schori does not pretend to be anything but what she claims. What she claims is that the Scriptures are not to be trusted, Christ is not the eternal Savior provided repented humanity, sexuality is an individual relativism, and salvation can be obtained by any means conjured by the mortal. That in itself absents her from the right to use the term "Christian." It also places her eternal soul in jeopardy, according to the words of Jesus as recorded in the New Testament Gospel accounts.

By not endorsing Christ and His sacrificial gift upon Calvary, Schori becomes one with the "spirit of antichrist." The spirit of AntiChrist is mentioned by the apostle John in his letters in the New Testament, John stating that in the End Times that spirit would be set loose upon the Earth. The spirit of AntiChrist precedes the actual appearance of a person known as the AntiChrist, the latter being "the beast" of Revelation 13:1-10, such regarded as the political leader of a ten-nation alliance operative during the about-seven year Tribulation Period.

By Schori’s own confession regarding her creedal beliefs, she has placed herself in line with the AntiChrist rule. Those gathering about her creedal conclusions do the same. That is why those biblical believers within the Episcopal Church and Anglican Church are so opposed to that liberal segment gaining control of the Anglican communion. To the biblical believers it is a matter of siding with the God of the Bible or siding with the Devil. With biblical believers there is no middle ground for one is either with the God of the Bible or against the God of the Bible.

Throughout the Bible itself, there is always the tussle between those who are totally committed to that deity or those who compromise that commitment. The latter are then regarded within holy writ as apostates, backslidden and not deserving to be known as genuine disciples of that deity.

"Christian author and philosopher Os Guinness says the Episcopal Church's incoming Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori is ‘not an orthodox believer.

"By that he means that she doesn't accept the Christian creeds and historical teachings about Jesus Christ, personal salvation, biblical revelation, sexuality and other issues.

"Guinness, an Anglican, says much of the U.S. Episcopal Church has embraced heresy and become ‘apostate’ and even ‘pagan.’

"He asserts that Bishop Jefferts Schori will be ‘presiding over something which God will judge.’

"Guinness considers her part of ‘a new phenomenon in the world, where there are Christian leaders who no longer believe the Christian faith, and yet stay on as leaders.’"

This "new phenomenon" is not undefined by biblical believers. The latter study the Bible, know the fine line detail and therefore are very much aware that in the End Times persons as Schori will take center stage in some quarters due to their allegiance to the spirit of AntiChrist.

Therefore, though such may be theologically shocking to some, it is not to those biblical students who are well informed regarding biblical prophecy in particular.

Copyright © 2006 by J. Grant Swank, Jr.

Graduate of accredited college (BA) and seminary (M Div) with graduate work at Harvard Divinity School. Married for 44 years with 3 adult children. Author of 5 books and thousands of articles in various Protestant and Catholic magazines, journals, web sites, and newspapers. Writer of weekly religion column for PORTLAND PRESS HERALD newspaper, Portland ME.

Academics, chiefs condemn Mt Ayliff killing

2006-11-04T08:36:00.000-06:00

Academics, chiefs condemn Mt Ayliff killing

Ignorance, misogyny blamed for ‘witch’ murders of women in their 40s and 50s

’I’ve done scientific research in the Mthatha area about issues related to witchcraft. What is clear is that the level of ignorance is very high in rural areas. Women between the ages of 40 to 50 years old regularly fall prey to witchcraft related allegations’

— Bhanwari Meel

By ZINE GEORGE and THANDUXOLO JIKA

TRADITIONAL leaders and academics yesterday condemned the horror mob slaying of a Mount Ayliff woman accused of witchcraft, saying it was a manifestation of social illness.

Nomanelwa Ngwane, 50, was battered and burnt by about 200 people after being found naked on the doorstep of a widower, Zakhele Jakuja, in the early hours of Monday morning.

She allegedly told him she had arrived with his dead wife to fetch him for a meeting.

On Friday this newspaper carried a photograph of the killing, in which people are seen laughing at the bloodied woman.

African Traditional Health Practitioners’ Eastern Cape chairperson, Solly Nduku yesterday described the attack “as an act of hooliganism ... a manifestation of social ills.

“People do sleepwalk, which might have been the case in this instance,” said Nduku.

Dr Mathole Motshekga of the Kara Heritage Institute, an African Renaissance body, also condemned the villagers’ actions.

“There is an African way to deal with witches. Our people used to report all cases relating to witchcraft to traditional leaders and they would be resolved.

“But it’s because of the influence of the west that our people are now killing each other about something no one can really explain,” said Motshekga.

He added: “No one can deny that there are good and evil forces in every society. But no one can claim to know how to identify a witch unless he is witch himself.”

Nokuzola Mndende, director of the Icamagu Institute – an organisation designed to preserve African culture – hit out at those who had murdered Ngwane and described the act as misogynistic.

“Why is it that only women are accused of witchcraft?” she asked.

“This is a psychological problem among some men who fear powerful women in leadership roles. If it was a man who had been found naked they wouldn’t have done that,” she said.

Walter Sisulu University head of Forensic Medicine, Professor Bhanwari Meel attributed the actions to ignorance, illiteracy and lack of education.

“I’ve done scientific research in the Mthatha area about issues related to witchcraft. What is clear is that the level of ignorance is very high in rural areas. Women between the ages of 40 to 50 years old regularly fall prey to witchcraft related allegations,” Meel said.

He said superstition was still deeply entrenched in the region. For example, some people still simply did not want to accept that HIV/Aids existed.

“When a relative is infected with the disease some rural people go to sangomas to find out who had bewitched their relative,” he said.

In 2004 four elderly women were butchered in Centane after they were accused of being involved in witchcraft.

“It’s a complex issue informed by many social challenges. A lot still needs to be done to educate people about all these things,” said Meel.

Rhodes University anthropology lecturer Penny Bernard said the Mount Ayliff incident was bizarre.

It could have been caused by the woman being found partially naked in the early hours of the morning. But Bernard said killing someone was no solution. “I have done studies on sangomas and witchcraft mostly in KwaZulu-Natal, and people only use magic to retaliate, not to physically kill someone,” said Bernard.

An experience of mythic proportions

2006-11-04T08:33:00.000-06:00

An experience of mythic proportions

Nov. 4, 2006. 01:00 AM

CAROL PEREHUDOFF

Avebury, England—As I'm coming down the stairs of the Red Lion Pub, where I've rented a room for the night, I see a sign on a chalkboard: "Curious about Paganism? Why not visit the Avebury Pagan Moot? 1st Sunday of every month, 3 p.m."By chance, I'm right on time, but glancing in at the front room of the 400-year-old pub, I decide against going in. I am curious, but the earthy-looking women and burly bearded men inside look a bit intimidating, like a wizarding version of a biker gang.Besides, what's the point of discussing the mystical world of Avebury when I could be out experiencing it? This Wiltshire village, roughly 120 kilometres west of London, is home to Britain's largest stone circle. While it's not as well-preserved as Stonehenge, 32 kilometres to the south, Avebury is 500 years older, 14 times larger and unlike Stonehenge, it's accessible 24 hours a day. So accessible, in fact, that half the village is sitting inside it: the pub, a chapel, a couple of shops and two dissecting roads that loosely divide the circle into quadrants. This is my chance to commune with the megalithic world, so after buying a guidebook at the Henge Shop, I head into the southwest quadrant. Towering over a flock of grazing sheep is a curving row of sarsen stones weighing between 10 and 100 tonnes. Greyish and weathered, they're surrounded by a deep circular ditch (or henge) dug out of the soft chalk ground by Neolithic tribes some 5,000 years ago.No one knows the circle's purpose, though it's believed to relate to the worship of a fertility goddess. The stones weren't shaped but were chosen for their natural forms: mainly rectangles to represent the male and diamonds the female. Originally, the large circle contained two smaller circles: one held a massive phallic-shaped obelisk, now lost. The other, known as the Cove, was made up of three female stones (two of which still stand) that were aligned with the northerly rise of the moon.Then, in the Middle Ages, the Christians ruined it all. Deeming the circle the work of the devil, they started toppling and burying the stones, a practice that halted when one landed on a travelling surgeon-barber, prematurely entombing him. Further destruction came in the 17th century when many stones were cleared for farming. Finally, in the 1930s, a wealthy anthropologist, Alexander Keiller, spent today's equivalent of £2 million to partially restore the site.After completing the 1.5-kilometre circle, I head back to the pub. As I walk in, I overhear a dark-haired woman say: "We all have a sacred myth. You just have to find out what it is. It lives you. You don't live it."I'd like to learn more, but the conversation moves to the stone circle and how one small triangle has a particular power. "Which part is the most powerful?" I can't help interrupting."It's all-powerful, but in different ways," she says."Powerful enough to make me break out in hives?" I hold out my wrist, which is sporting a pink circular welt with a blister inside — a mini stone circle. "The minute I got here I broke out in a rash.""I know what it might be," she says, almost shyly. "It's a healing place here. A lot of stuff works its way out of your body."That sounds better than massive allergy attacks and I smile at her. A pony-tailed man in black examines my wrist. "I can sort that out." He runs out of the room. A few minutes later he's back holding a fragrant bundle of lavender. "Rub this on," he says. "Lavender is very healing."Another man with a greying beard and a beret with a feather introduces himself as Terry the Druid. "We're a mixed lot of pagans here," he says, explaining that the man with the lavender is a Wiccan, then motions to a clean-shaven young man strumming a guitar. "And he's a minstrel."It's tempting to stay in this Harry Potter universe all night, but as dusk hits, I head out to explore. On the other side of town, past a muddy field is the mountainous Silbury Hill, the largest man-made mound in Europe. Experts think it's a burial site, though they've dug three tunnels into it since the 18th century and it still hasn't given up its secrets.It's a place of mysteries, Avebury, and there is a tremendous amount to see. Past Silbury Hill is West Kennet Long Barrow, a multi-chambered tomb as old as 3500 BC. There is also the Avenue, a stone-lined processional route that leads from the stone circle to the Sanctuary, where a prehistoric temple once stood. It's too dark to see anymore so I backtrack to the stones. Maybe it's the influence of the pagans but I can't help thinking that these centuries-old megaliths really are vibrating with a deep earthy resonance. I sit down beside one, then lie flat on my back and look at the stars. If I wait here long enough, maybe my sacred myth will turn up.

Carol Perehudoff is a Toronto-based freelance writer. Her accommodation was subsidized by Visit Britain.

Additional articles by Carol Perehudoff

Priest paves a pagan path

2006-11-04T08:32:00.000-06:00

Priest paves a pagan path

ROSS MACKAE spent years studying - and sampling - various religions, from Buddhism and the Church of Latter-day Saints to Unitarianism and Catholicism, but didn't find what he wanted in any of them.

So he started his own church.

"Now my goal," he said this week, "is for people to see it as just another church."

That's probably easier said than done. He's the high priest of the American Pagan Church, founded two years ago in East Hampton, L.I., with a handful of believers who currently meet in his home.

"We still live in the dark ages - many of our members are discriminated against," said MacKae, a paralegal by profession who was ordained eight years ago after completing a course taught by pagan priests. "One lost her job when she said she was a pagan."

Nevertheless, there are dozens of pagan and witchcraft groups in and around New York, and this was a big week for them. While everybody else celebrated Halloween, they observed Samhein, the new year for most pagans (and witches), and one of the eight most important holidays on the metaphysical calendar.

For privacy reasons, and because it is hard to keep track of all the various groups or define their membership, nobody knows the number of New Yorkers who are pagans, witches or followers of other old religions based on goddess worship, the sacredness of nature and rituals rooted in ancient Celtic, Nordic and other religions.

"There are more than people think," said MacKae, who is called "pastor" by church outsiders and "high priest" on formal occasions but prefers just plain "Ross" at church. "Every year, we lead the opening ceremonies at the Pagan Pride Day celebrations (in Battery Park, on the southernmost tip of Manhattan) and last year, after 10,000 people, we stopped counting."

That's a pretty impressive number, even if many participants were at the park out of curiosity. There also is an annual Pagan Spirituality Expo, held in Greenwich Village, sponsored by various metaphysical groups and businesses that sell herbs, oils, candles, books, wands, astrological charts and other paraphernalia to witches and wizards.

And this is not counting people like Deborah Roth, an interfaith minister who was ordained eight years ago by the Reunification Church in the Order of Malchizedek, an organization that renounces paganism and is named for an Old Testament priest. Roth leads groups - circles, she calls them - devoted to women's spirituality at among other places the Fourth Universalist Society, a Unitarian church on the upper West Side.

"There are some elements of wicca in what I do," she said, "but I don't call myself a wiccan."

In fact, Roth typifies the risks of overly simple labels - she has a master's degree in psychology and is a member of the advisory board of Modern Bride magazine, two facts not necessarily associated with witches.

There is no such confusion in MacKae's case. He founded his church, he said, on the principles of witchcraft, Native American spirituality and asatru (old Norse and German paganism). But members are not limited to those basics.

"All knowledge is our liturgy," he said, "and spiritual search is our dogma."

Services are held on the last Thursday of each month, featuring songs, dances and readings. There is a sermon of sorts - "I ask questions in the kitchen while everyone prepares our shared meal, and then I do a little commentary based on their answers."

Despite its name, MacKae describes the American Pagan Church as an interfaith ministry. "All paths are divine," he said, "and every person has an individual path to follow, but we all travel it together."

The attendance ranges from a half dozen to 20 or so, he said, and some members attend only one or two services a year. "There is no mandatory anything," he said, "and we do not keep an official membership roll."

Networking is important. One popular gathering spot is the Whoville Bar and Grill in Bethpage, L.I., which for years has sponsored a monthly "Pagans in the Park" open house. "That's where a lot of us meet up," MacKae said.

Generally speaking, he said, witches and pagans are not missionaries aggressively seeking converts. But MacKae has a different philosophy.

"We proselytize, every chance we get," he said. "It's not to say, 'You're wrong,' but to say, 'You're right, let us show you how.'"

Originally published on November 4, 2006

A Harry Potter witch hunt

2006-11-04T08:26:00.000-06:00

Opinion

Posted on Sat, Nov. 04, 2006

A Harry Potter witch hunt

Mom who hasn't even read the books says they teach witchcraft

KAY MCSPADDEN

Special to the Observer

The suburbs of Atlanta are at the center of a witch hunt. Literally.

Laura Mallory, a former evangelical Christian missionary and mother of four, has been trying since September 2005 to have the Harry Potter books by author J.K. Rowling removed from all of the Gwinnett County public school libraries. Initially she argued that the books were inappropriate because of "evil themes, witchcraft, demonic activity, murder, evil blood sacrifice, spells, and teaching children all of this," but she later added that they promote witchcraft, Wicca, and the occult.

Mallory's challenge was addressed by the media review committee at J.C. Magill Elementary, where three of Mallory's children are enrolled. The committee recommended that the books remain in the libraries, and the district administration concurred.

In April Mallory appealed to the district school board, which held a public hearing in May. The school board sided with the school media review committee and voted unanimously in favor of keeping the books.

Now Mallory has taken her challenge to the state Board of Education. They met in October and will issue a judgment in December.

In some ways this is a rather predictable book challenge.

Like many book complainants, Mallory objects that the contents of the books are offensive to her religious beliefs. She claims the books have an anti-Christian bias.

Also like many complainants, she admits she hasn't read the books.

"They're really very long and I have four kids," Mallory told the Gwinnett Daily Post. "I think it would be hypocritical of me to read all of the books, honestly. I don't agree with what's in them."

And also like many of the people who challenge books, Mallory ignores the role of parents in guiding their children's choices -- unless, of course, she is the parent making those choices for everyone's children.

The outcry against Mallory's challenge has been predictable as well. Supporters of the Harry Potter series have countered that the books do not promote witchcraft but are fantasy stories about gifted children who discover their own remarkable abilities and go to a special school in order to learn to use them. The books are intense morality tales where good triumphs over evil, where friendship and loyalty are celebrated, where Harry learns from his missteps.

Potter fans also point out that although Mallory charges that the books try to indoctrinate children into the religion of Wicca, the only religious reference is to Christianity, when Hogwarts adjourns each December for the Christmas holidays. Nor do the books teach occult practices, as Mallory claims. The magic taught at Hogwarts is a clever counterpart to real life activities -- learning to make the tip of a wand light up to use as a flashlight, for example, or learning the proper way to fly a broom. The only teacher who presumes to teach what might be called occult practices is Sybill Trelawney, the incompetent fortune teller who is roundly mocked by both her students and her colleagues.

As predictable as the challenge has been, it has also been surprising to me. Why are books this universally read and loved also so widely feared and reviled? Despite their lack of sexual content or offensive language -- two of the most common reasons for book challenges -- the Harry Potter books are listed as the American Library Association's most-challenged books of the 21st century. What's going on?

Laura Mallory told one interviewer that "the books expose and introduce occult practices to young readers, opening a door to their minds and hearts to this kind of stuff, the casting of spells. The occult is dangerous to our children, and we need to get it out of our schools in all its forms."

For Mallory and other people like her who have a pre-Enlightenment view of the world as a place where magic is real and supernatural powers can be accessed through spells, the books might seem frightening. These are the same people who send chain letters and e-mails which promise great rewards to those who say a prayer and forward the mail to others -- and which sometimes threaten harm if the chain is broken.

They are the people who read cosmic significance into coincidence, who believe without question the cautionary tales they hear, who reject reason and science as ungodly and substitute religion with superstition.

Ironically, they say that they worry that children cannot tell the difference between fact and fiction, but their own anxiety about the books suggests that they are the ones who are having difficulty. It's too bad that their confusion means the rest of us have to endure yet another senseless witch hunt.

Kay

McSpadden

Observer columnist Kay McSpadden is a high school English teacher in York, S.C. Write her c/o The Observer, P.O. Box 30308, Charlotte, NC 28230-0308 or by e-mail at kmcspadden@comporium.net.

Florida Supreme Court Rejects Wiccan Tax Challenge over Satanic Bible

2006-11-03T23:49:00.000-06:00

Florida Supreme Court Rejects Wiccan Tax Challenge over Satanic Bible

TALLAHASSEE, FL, November 3, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Last week, the Florida Supreme Court declined to consider a Wiccan group's challenge to a state sales tax exemption. Earlier this year, the high court agreed to take the case and heard oral arguments from both sides regarding the Wiccan's objection to a sales tax exemption for Bibles and other religious items.

Liberty Counsel, a law firm which works for religious liberty, filed a brief with the Florida Supreme Court defending a state law that exempts Bibles, religious publications and ceremonial items from sales tax. In a 6-1 decision, the Court found no conflict in appellate court rulings on the underlying issue of whether the Wiccans have the right, or "standing," to challenge the law.

The Wiccan Religious Cooperative of Florida (Wiccans) follow an earth-based belief religion and at one time qualified for the tax exemption on certain items sold by the Cooperative. They lost their exemption in 2000 because they did not own a place of worship as required by state regulations. They filed suit on Halloween in 2000, saying they paid sales tax on the purchase of the Satanic Bible and the Witch's Bible Compleat and claiming Florida Statute 212.06(9) violated the Establishment Clause.

A trial judge ruled the Wiccans had standing to sue. A Florida appeals court reversed that decision. The Wiccans appealed. The Florida Supreme Court agreed to take the case based on appellate rulings which, at first, appeared to be in conflict with that issue, when, in fact, it dealt with the narrower issue of "taxpayer standing." The Court opined the Wiccans lack standing to challenge the law because they are not harmed by it. This is not the same as taxpayer standing.

Erik Stanley, Chief Counsel of Liberty Counsel, stated, "The Florida Supreme Court did the right thing in dismissing this case. The Wiccans' challenge was nothing more than a vindictive lawsuit. The Wiccans would not have benefited at all if they won because they were seeking to have all religious publications taxed, including their own. Florida's sales tax exemption statute is constitutional and we are pleased that this vindictive challenge to the statute has been dismissed."

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Accused of witchcraft, children kicked to the streets in Congo

2006-11-03T23:48:00.000-06:00

Posted on Fri, Nov. 03, 2006

Accused of witchcraft, children kicked to the streets in Congo

By Shashank Bengali

McClatchy Newspapers

Kipasi Kama, 15, was kicked out of his house when relatives accused him of witchcraft. Witchcraft allegations are now the No. 1 cause of child homelessness in Congo's capital. (Shashank Bengali/MCT)

More photos

KINSHASA, Congo - When Mando Mengi was 5, his mother died and his father remarried. His stepmother, a tall, mercurial woman with two children of her own, saw Mando as a burden and gave him endless chores while the other kids did nothing.

One day, Mando refused to sweep the dirt floor of their home. His stepmother found a sinister explanation for his stubbornness: He was practicing witchcraft.

She began to withhold food and sometimes beat him, saying it would purge the evil spirits. Finally, she gave his father an ultimatum: "You've brought a sorcerer into this house," Mando recalled her saying. "Either he leaves or I do."

Mando didn't wait for him to decide. He ran away, joining tens of thousands of children who live on the streets of this broken-down African capital - most of them, aid agencies say, rejected by families who accuse them of witchcraft.

In Congo, where belief in the power of spirits and black magic goes back centuries, boys and girls as young as 5 are bearing the brunt of witchcraft allegations that once were reserved for rural women and widows. Aid workers blame the social toll of decades of economic depression, disease and conflict, which have torn apart countless families and made daily life desperate for most of the country's 60 million people.

Feeding these beliefs are mushrooming revivalist churches throughout the country, where spurious pastors offer to exorcise spirits - sometimes charging fees, sometimes subjecting children to physical or psychological abuse. There are thought to be more than 2,000 such churches in Kinshasa, a city of perhaps 9 million people.

Aid workers estimate that there are 25,000 to 50,000 children living on the streets here, and their numbers are growing. As many as 70 percent have been abandoned for allegedly practicing sorcery, according to a report this year by New York-based Human Rights Watch.

In most cases, the group said, victims of witchcraft allegations had lost one or both parents. Their accusers are usually stepparents or guardians, and the children most often targeted are those with seemingly strange behaviors, such as bed-wetting, sleepwalking or aggression.

"Poverty and desperation are the basic causes," said Mike Mwamba, the director of a center for abandoned children in Gombe, a busy commercial section of Kinshasa where hundreds of street kids prowl about the main marketplace.

"It's a typical case: You see someone losing their job, and they look at home for an explanation. Where is this bad luck coming from? They see the child, who has certain negative characteristics: Maybe he is difficult, maybe he wets his bed.

"That becomes enough to accuse them of sorcery."

One of the children living at the center is Kipasi Kama, a 15-year-old who's small for his age and bites his nails incessantly. He was living with his father and stepmother when a neighbor said she'd dreamed that Kipasi came to strangle her in her sleep.

Immediately, Kipasi said, his father ordered him out of the house.

"If I am a sorcerer, I don't know it," Kipasi said. "They never gave me a chance to prove that I wasn't."

Others, such as Mando, who's now 15, are deprived of food at home and sent to churches that perform "deliverance" ceremonies. Mando was sent to so many that he remembers them now only by the methods they used: the one where the pastor made him eat pigeon meat, for example, or the one where a group of boys pummeled him with their fists.

It was during that episode that Mando, a lanky boy with sunken cheeks, admitted to practicing witchcraft. It was the only way the beating would stop, he thought.

Jean-Marie Kalonji, a pastor who runs the Fountain of Adoration of God Evangelical Center and advertises his deliverance services on Christian radio, claims to be Kinshasa's expert on the subject. On a recent afternoon, a dozen people waited in the dirt courtyard of his one-room church for consultations.

"Witchcraft is a bigger problem in Congo than AIDS," said Kalonji, a young, professorial man with eyeglasses perched on the end of his nose. He displayed a 2-inch binder crammed with loose-leaf sheets, each of them a witchcraft case, he said.

Kalonji, who claims to have performed hundreds of exorcisms, renounces the "false methods" of other pastors, which he said don't work. He listed some of these methods in a slim paperback volume he authored three years ago titled "African Sorcery: Strategies of Deliverance," which he sells for about $7.

Among them are burning the sorcerer, extracting flesh from his mouth, beating him with an iron rod, trampling him, making him drink a bottle of palm oil daily for a week and forcing him to stare at the sun.

Kalonji was cagey about his own technique, which he said involved a lot of prayer but no physical abuse. As for payment, he said, "If a grateful parent offers me money, I don't refuse."

Aid workers say Congolese authorities have begun looking into cases of abuse by these pastors. But investigators are overwhelmed and most churches just take their services underground.

Less can be done about the abuse that street children must endure at the hands of older, bigger peers. Kipasi said he was tormented because of his size, made to wash other kids' clothes and subjected to a hazing ritual in which scalding liquid is poured on a child as he sleeps.

In its report, Human Rights Watch said older children often sexually abuse younger ones.

Social workers who know Mando's case have tried to persuade his father to take him back. Over the past several months, they said, the man visited the center a handful of times and re-established contact with his son. The last time, he promised to take the boy home at the end of October.

But it's now November and Mando is still sleeping in a steamy, crowded dorm room at the center. Social workers haven't told him about his father's promise, afraid of raising his hopes.

"I just want to go back to my family and live in peace," Mando said. "I regret that they've made me think about this so much. I never thought I was a witch. I thought the whole thing was a little weird."

Bad vibes in Glastonbury after Catholics against pagans

2006-11-03T23:45:00.000-06:00

The Times

November 04, 2006

Bad vibes in Glastonbury after Catholics against pagans

By Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent

BY THE light of the full moon, witches in Glastonbury will tonight be casting a “circle of protection” around Britain’s centre of mysticism after a group of militant Christians cast salt at them in an attempt to “cleanse” the town of paganism.

One Roman Catholic was fined and two cautioned by police after the “alternative Hallowe’en” festival in Britain’s centre of magical mysticism turned into a spiritual battle between Christianity and paganism.

Now even the local Catholic priest has told his fellow Christians that they are not welcome in the town.

The Christians were visiting for the Lightswitch@glastonbury festival, the eighth such event organised by the Catholic charity Youth 2000. Promotional material tempted them there with slogans such as: “Has the light on your halo gone dark? Have your wings gone a bit grubby? Just want to switch your faith back on?”

Organised with the co-operation of the Catholic Parish Church and Shrine of Our Lady St Mary in Glastonbury, it was intended to be the Hallowe’en of choice “for those who have grown tired of tatty fancy dress and the Blair Witch Project”.

But police were called after militants told locals that they wanted to cleanse the town of paganism, cast salt around to exorcise “evil” spirits and called one woman a “whore witch”.

Yemaya Pinder, a witch and a member of the Pagan Federation who owns The Magick Box store, said thatshe believed the Christians should be prosecuted for a religious hate crime.

Mrs Pinder, a mother of two and grandmother of four, and whose sister is an Anglican vicar in Basildon, described how a group of Catholics had entered her shop and abused her.

She said: “It was as if we had returned to the dark ages. They told me they wanted to cleanse Glastonbury of paganism. They said they had lighters and were going to come back and burn us down. When the police asked them to apologise, they refused.”

She said there were no plans to put a curse on the Christians. “But we are doing protection for ourselves and the shop and the town. We are working magic for the healing and the damage they very nearly did between us and the local Roman Catholic church.”

She said that the town’s witches had begun to work their magic, starting the protective circle on Samhein, the Celtic new year, last Tuesday, and planning to finish it using the “high energy” of tonight’s full moon.

Dreow Bennett, the Archdruid of Glastonbury and leader of the pagan movement, said: “To call the behaviour of some of their members medieval would be an understatement. I witnessed a pagan being called a ‘bloody witch’ and being told, ‘You will burn in hell’.

“Apparently this man was not a diligent follower of the teachings of Christ. It was my understanding that Christ taught compassion and tolerance rather than hatred and ignorance.”

Father Kevin Knox-Lecky, the Catholic parish priest at Glastonbury, said: “I was utterly appalled by the disgraceful behaviour, language and threats that were apparently made to members of the local pagan community by a small fringe group that attached itself to the Youth 2000 retreat last weekend in Glastonbury.” He said the militants were “unChristian and unrepresentative” of the majority of the 350 young people at the festival.

He had since met Mrs Pinder and Mr Bennett. The conversation ended in “mutual embrace”. He said: “We have agreed to keep in touch with each other and to support each other in the event of negative attention from any extremists from whichever faith. I have frequently found evidence of rites performed on my church steps.”

Youth 2000 is a registered charity which aims to forge links between young Catholics through retreats and events.

Charlie Connor, the managing director of Youth 2000, said that aiming “blessed salt” at pagans was in direct contravention of the spirit of Youth 2000. “For the avoidance of doubt, Youth 2000 does not condone or encourage this kind of behaviour from anyone. We fully agree that differences on matters of faith cannot and should not be resolved by any kind of harassment.”

But he added: “Youth 2000 would also like to place on the record that many young people at the retreat were harassed, sworn at and even cursed by people. One incident included the taking of photographs of young people, including children, and numbers plates by people present in the town. They were forced to move on. Regrettably, Youth 2000 will not be running a festival in Glastonbury next year.”

Avon and Somerset police said: “The neighbourhood beat manager was on patrol on Saturday and was alerted that there was an incident at the Magick Box shop. The officer arrested a man for a public order offence. He was later released after being issued with a fixed penalty notice. Two women were also given cautions and words of advice about their future behaviour.”

A SPIRITUAL BATTLE . . . WITH A LARGE PINCH OF SALT

Glastonbury has become well known as the venue of one of the world’s most popular music festivals but its mystical roots go back much further

Some believe it was the site of Avalon, the final resting place of King Arthur

Salt, the origin of the word “salvation”, has an important place in many of the world’s religions

Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting The Last Supper shows Judas Iscariot spilling a bowl of salt, seen as an omen of evil and bad luck

Some Christians still believe that they should throw it over their shoulder to ward off devils that may be lurking behind them

U resists bishops' call to block Vatican satire

2006-11-03T13:23:00.000-06:00

U resists bishops' call to block Vatican satire

Minnesota's Catholic leaders denounce play as offensive

BY PAUL TOSTO

Pioneer Press

The state's top Catholic leaders have taken a rare step in collectively calling on University of Minnesota President Robert Bruininks to reconsider the U's plan to stage a controversial play they view as anti-Catholic.

"The Pope and the Witch," a satire depicting the pope as a paranoid, drug-addled idiot and the Vatican as corrupt, drew the ire this fall of a national Catholic group and some local bloggers.

Last week, Archbishop Harry Flynn of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, along with bishops from Crookston to Winona, wrote to Bruininks calling the play offensive to the state's 1.6 million Catholics. They urged Bruininks to rethink its staging this March on the campus of the state's flagship public university.

Dennis McGrath, spokesman for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, said Thursday that he couldn't recall a time when the state's bishops had made such a combined request.

The bishops "have to stand up for the faith," McGrath said. "They can't be silent in a case like this and won't be."

The U reiterated Thursday there are no plans to stop the play.

Flynn and Bruininks met Wednesday to discuss the play and other issues, said U spokesman Dan Wolter. Bruininks "explained that the university will not reconsider the staging of the play, but underscored that our commitment to academic freedom also includes listening and giving a forum to the views of those who have concern with the play's content," Wolter said. The U, Wolter added, is planning a forum in conjunction with the play.

No one at the university could recall a similar instance where religious leaders have encouraged an event to be canceled, he said.

The bishops' call comes at a time of heightened tension in the Twin Cities and across the world on issues of religion and secular life.

Metro Transit officials recently agreed to let a bus driver avoid driving buses with gay-themed ads to accommodate her religious objections. Transit officials later stepped back from that decision, saying it sent the wrong message about tolerance.

Muslim cabdrivers at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport are refusing for religious reasons to take passengers carrying alcohol. Last winter, Century College in White Bear Lake was caught in controversy after an instructor posted copies of the Danish newspaper cartoons of Mohammed that triggered riots around the world.

"The Pope and the Witch" has been a target for years of the New York-based Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. Scenes include a paranoid pope convinced that thousands of orphans appearing in St. Peter's Square are part of a plot by condom makers to embarrass the church, a witch who favors abortion and drug legalization, and revelations of evil in the church hierarchy, according to a 2000 New York Times review.

Robert Rosen, who'll direct the play at the U, writes on the theater department Web site that, "I chose this play because it is political. It takes a stand on issues in the forefront of our daily lives. It is funny, irreverent and to the point."

The key question: Is it satire or sacrilege?

The U in September said campus must be a place for even very unpopular views. That drew a rebuke from Flynn. "One wonders how 'The Pope and the Witch' could possibly enhance intellectual life when that kind of hatred and prejudice is tolerated by the University of Minnesota," he wrote in a column for the Catholic Spirit newspaper. "It is even funded by the University of Minnesota. And, who is paying for this? You and I — the Catholics in Minnesota, among others, through our taxes."

McGrath on Thursday called "The Pope and the Witch" a "direct mockery of the holy father" and completely different from plays like "Nunsense" that poke fun at Catholic traditions in a light-hearted way.

At this point, the U has received a few hundred e-mails and letters on the issue, with a substantial number coming from outside Minnesota, a typical volume for organized e-mail campaigns, Wolter said. The play, he added, has been staged at Yale University, University of New Mexico and the University of Denver and is planned for Tulane University next year.

However it turns out, McGrath said the archdiocese has no plans to organize protests or call Catholics to action against the U. "We have a great deal of admiration for the university, its arts and activities," he said. "There's not going to be any continued rancor that grows out of this."

Paul Tosto covers higher education and can be reached at ptosto@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-2119

Love refund

2006-11-03T13:21:00.000-06:00

Love refund
© bangshowbiz.biz

2006-11-03 16:21:08 -

A German woman, who took a witch to court for failing to make her ex-partner fall in love with her again, has won her case.
The spurned woman paid the self-proclaimed sorcerer a large sum of money to help her get her female lover back, but said the spell didn't work.
The Munich administrative court was told: "The defendant carried out the corresponding ritual over several months, each time under a full moon, but without success." After hearing both cases the court ruled that the witch's services were "objectively completely impossible", because "a love ritual is not suited to influencing a person from a distance".
The witch was ordered to pay her disgruntled client $1,275.

Entertainment News by: PR-inside.com

Witch way do we go now?

2006-11-03T13:17:00.000-06:00

Witch way do we go now?

Ghosts, ghouls and witches gathered to celebrate Halloween in spooky style at Sutton Ecology Centre at the weekend.

The centre in Festival Walk, in Carshalton, turned into a nook of eerie activity to celebrate All Hallows' Eve on Sunday.

Children from all over the borough listened to scary stories, played spooky bingo and made flying bats.

They learned about the animals who are traditionally pets of witches and warlocks and there was even time for a disco at the end of the day.

Manager of the centre Sharon Clouston said: "All of the children dressed up and we had witches, bats and even a couple of Draculas. It was a great day.

"We looked at the animals associated with Halloween and made bats of our own.

"All of the children had a really nice time."

Deadlinepix SU9350

9:39am today

Hubble, bubble, toil and trouble

2006-11-03T13:15:00.000-06:00

Hubble, bubble, toil and trouble

Ruth Sanders performs a Halloween ritual.

NAOMI CANTON
03 November 2006 09:53

At a secret location in Norwich, a group of witches, priestesses and healers gathered for a pagan ritual to celebrate one of the most important days in their calendar.

The day after Halloween is the Pagan New Year and the time when witches remember the dead and keep their memories of ancestors alive in their minds.

The Norwich Chant Collective, made up of 28 people from all walks of life, ages and spiritual persuasions, gathered on Wednesday to celebrate the festival.

The ritual began with cleansing the space with salt, water and a broomstick. They then cast a circle, setting up four altars representing the four elements of air, water, fire and earth.

This was followed by a quiet meditation where those present thought about those who had died, a poem was read and then the priestesses asked for the blessings of the four elements.

A large candle-lit spiral dance was performed, followed by the passing of bread and wine around the circle as a blessing. The group chanted in between each ritual, but no spells or magic were performed.

Gee Dunn, a priestess, witch and facilitator of the collective, said: “We had an eclectic group of people there; some perform magic, some were healers and some were people who didn't identify themselves as pagans but wanted to find out more.

“Halloween is one of the big rituals. For us it's a time of connection with the old, to contemplate the years that have gone, contemplate those we have lost and get a sense of oneness in this landscape and in this place.

“It's an opportunity to honour our ancestors and forebears and remember them and welcome in the new year, that's the key thing, to take time out of every day to contemplate who we are and reconnect with our forebears, the people who loved us but are no longer here.”

The 50-year-old, who lives in York Street, said people were becoming increasingly intrigued by paganism, while some chose to experiment with the power of chanting as a way of meditation.

She said: “There is a lot of interest in the pagan community in Norwich. We feel like we are accepted in the city, but the problem is it's hard for people to find out about us.

“By and large I have not had any prejudice and I am quite open about my practice, but lots of people are quite private. Many of the people who come here have regular jobs and family lives and practise as witches in private.”

The Norwich Chant Collective was formed in 1999. It meets every fortnight to chant and they hold full moon gatherings as well as celebrating the eight pagan festivals.

Paganism:

Paganism describes a group of contemporary religions based on a reverence for nature.

Pagans draw their faiths from the traditional religions of indigenous peoples throughout the world.

Wiccans , druids and shamans all make up parts of the Pagan community.

The Pagan Federation of Great Britain has no precise figures, but estimates the number of Pagans in the British Isles is between 50,000 and 200,000.

The recognition of the divine in nature is at the heart of Pagan belief. Pagans are deeply aware of the natural world and see the power of the divine in the ongoing cycle of life and death.

Most Pagans are eco-friendly, seeking to live in a way that minimises harm to the natural environment and almost all Pagans celebrate a cycle of eight festivals, which are spaced every six or seven weeks through the year.

Pagan ritual may consist of informal prayer or meditation, or of formal, structured rituals through which the participants affirm their deep spiritual connection with nature, honour their Gods and Goddesses, and celebrate the seasonal festivals of the turning year and the rites of passage of human life.

One of these festivals Samhain, also known as All Hallow's Eve, takes place on October 31 and November 1.

Religious witchcraft is a Pagan mystery religion worshipping Goddess and Gods and venerating the Divine in nature.

For more information on the collective, log on to www.norwichchantcollective.org

Are a member of an unusual group? To share your story, e-mail Naomi Canton at naomi.canton@archant.co.uk or call her on 01603 772418.

Thieves using witchcraft fears in new con

2006-11-03T13:10:00.000-06:00

Thieves using witchcraft fears in new con

November 03, 2006 Edition 1

Tricksters are using people's belief in witchcraft to rob them of their possessions in Johannesburg's city centre, police said this week.

A black substance is smeared on the arm of the victim by a passer-by and a "good Samaritan" then approaches them telling them they have been cursed.

"The person who approaches the victim is usually a woman. She then offers to take them to someone to dispel the curse," said Insp Wendy Botha.

The victim is taken to a man who tells them to take out all their valuables and place them in a basket or an envelope.

Wanting to ward off bad fortune brought on by the curse, the victim complies.

He prays for the person to remove the "curse".

The victim is then handed the envelope supposedly containing their possessions and told that they should only open it when they return home.

On opening the envelope, the victim finds it is filled with newspaper.

"These people are playing on the cultural and superstitious beliefs of others to commit crime," said Botha.

Criminals are also using the power of greed to their advantage.

Police warn that what looks like a roll of money is thrown on the ground. The roll is nothing but newspaper with one real banknote on the outside.

On picking up the money, a victim is approached by a woman who suggests sharing the money instead of taking it to police.

She then lures the person to a quiet place where four or five robbers lie in wait.

"Numerous cases have been opened at Johannesburg Central police station with this modus operandi," said Botha. - Sapa

Studying the Academic Side of Halloween

2006-11-02T22:14:00.000-06:00

November 1, 2006 Edition > Section: New York > Printer-Friendly Version

Studying the Academic Side of Halloween

BY GARY SHAPIRO - Staff Reporter of the Sun
November 1, 2006
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/42700

While many people were celebrating Halloween yesterday, a small group was studying it.

A two-day international conference hosted by Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland examines "all aspects of Halloween as a social, cultural and economic phenomenon," according to the conference's Web site. "Halloween remains a surprisingly under-researched and under-theorized topic in academic writing."

"There aren't a lot of books on the history of Halloween," an attorney in Bergen County, N.J., Stuart Schneider, who wrote the books "Halloween in America" and "Halloween: Costumes and Other Treats," said. He said it's a fun holiday in which people can engage "in a little mischief."

Asked about the conference, a professor of social and cultural analysis at New York University, Andrew Ross, said Halloween is a "huge industry." Anything that consumes a lot of people's time, energy, creativity, and money, he said, "is going to attract scholarly attention."

The conference explores how the pagan holiday, widely held to be of Celtic origin, came to America in the 19th century and then was rekindled in Europe toward the close of the last century.

A professor of European Literatures at Queens College, Thomas Bird, said Halloween can be traced to "Samhain Eve," Gaelic for "summer's end." In medieval times, he said, the Church attempted to Christianize the holiday, which became known as "All Hallows' Eve." (The Western liturgical churches celebrate November 1 as All Saints' Day, or the Feast of All Saints.)

"Halloween is like the accumulation of different holidays," Mr. Schneider, who has designed a graveyard in his front yard to feature 26 tombstones and various skeletons, said.

Topics listed for discussion yesterday at the conference included how Halloween was a powerful imaginative source for Scottish poets such as Robert Burns; American radio dramas from the 1930s and 1940s with Halloween themes, and the Halloween concerts of musician Frank Zappa.

Some Halloween talks appear more theoretical. Malcolm Foley and Gayle McPherson of Glasgow Caledonia University use an approach influenced by French philosopher Michel Foucault. They find Halloween to be "a site of some considerable discursive ‘struggle' between, amongst other things, national identity and globalization, childhood independence and moral panic, carnival and asceticism."

Some lectures deal with more concrete issues, such as tourism. Des Brogan of Mercat Tours Ltd. will speak today on the increase in interest of "Dark Tourism" in Scotland, namely: "the gruesome, the grisly, the gory, and the ghastly." Duncan Light of Liverpool Hope University discusses English-speaking tourists who visited Transylvania in 2004 and whose trip included a Halloween Ball at "Castle Dracula." In the abstract of his talk, Mr. Light describes the disappointment many felt. He notes that the significance of Halloween tourism is "something constructed in the culture of origin of the tourists themselves rather than in the attributes of the destination, the more so in that Halloween itself is largely unknown and uncelebrated in Romania."

A talk by Larisa Prokhorova of Kemerovo State University in Russia argues that Halloween became a mass phenomenon in Russia after "an American-Armenian owner of one of the popular nightclubs arranged a fancy-dress party featuring the most common Halloween characters such as vampires and witches."

Mr. Ross said Halloween is a very popular phenomenon that is not recognized by the state, or by the church, but comes "from below." In some cases, there has been civic involvement. Mr. Schneider said a town in Wisconsin around the turn of the century organized a Halloween parade and carnival. Why? "To keep tabs on the kids," he said.

November 1, 2006 Edition > Section: New York > Printer-Friendly Version

Residents scratch heads over headless animals

2006-11-02T15:41:00.000-06:00

Residents scratch heads over headless animals

Some see animal cruelty in the carcasses. Others see something even more sinister.

By JONATHAN ABEL
Published October 30, 2006

SPRING HILL - The 666 phone prefix is enough proof for some. For others, it's the nightclub Saints and Sinners, or the scorching sun that can turn summer into a living hell.

But for some, there's now another sign of Spring Hill's proximity to the Land of Lucifer: a rash of decapitated animals.

"I'm sure there's a coven of witches or devil worshipers around here," said Sandi Bosset, 61, who has been finding headless hens and roosters on her front lawn. "These are obvious rites of witchcraft and satanism."

Over the past few weeks, chickens, quail and goats have been found in trash bins and on the side of the road.

Could this be the work of Santeros? Or satanists? Or school kids turned psycho?

Everyone has a guess, but no one really knows.

This month, veterinarian David Wempe noticed a rancid smell in the trash bin behind the Spring Hill Animal Clinic at Spring Hill Drive and Mariner Boulevard.

He didn't think much of it because people often dump dead animals there.

But a week later, there was a gruesome discovery behind Mrs. Mobility, the business next door: four chickens, two quail and one pygmy goat - each with its head sliced off and nowhere to be found.

The week after that, animal carcasses showed up in the bin behind Nini Nails, also near the vet's office.

Wempe and others who work in the thin commercial strip along Spring Hill Drive started to worry. The animals had no marks on them, no blood dripping from their severed necks.

The Hernando Sheriff's Office is investigating, but won't speculate who is behind the killings.

Meanwhile, a mile away, residents in the neat neighborhood across from Springstead High School were wondering whether the trash bin discoveries could be connected to the slashed-up birds they've been finding.

Three times in the past few weeks, Bosset's grandchildren found decapitated chickens in their yard at the corner of Windbrook Avenue and Lafoy Road.

Bosset's immediate neighbors are good people, she said, and not likely to be devil worshipers, but there are definitely others - she won't say, perhaps she can't say, whom - who could be wrapped up in sick stuff.

Bosset just throws away the animal carcasses instead of calling the police, but on Sept. 8 the Sheriff's Office received an anonymous call about yet another bird sans head at the same corner.

In her report, Deputy Jill Morrell called it a rooster. She said its head was lying next to its carcass. The mysteriousness transcends her methodical description:

"There was also corn and a couple of pennies around the body. A broken white plate with a red pattern was shattered on the ground around the rooster. A plastic CVS bag was lying approximately five feet away from the rooster with what appeared to be small blood marks on it."

Just blocks away, in an overgrown lot at the corner of Monarch Street and Montague Avenue, another omen was spotted, this time in a small white trash bag.

Mike Keefe, 42, who walks his dog there every day, saw one white bird and one black bird stuffed inside. He was too revolted to look further. Other neighbors told him the birds were decapitated.

That hasn't stopped Keefe from walking his dog there, but it did irk him.

"I've been here five years and never seen anything like it," he said. "I don't know if it's voodoo or something."

Others in the neighborhood are talking about voodoo, too. One woman sent anonymous e-mails to the St. Petersburg Times claiming this was the work of Santeria, the syncretic Caribbean religion that includes animal sacrifice.

But Mozella Mitchell disagrees.

"The American consciousness simply identifies everything with voodoo," said Mitchell, a religious studies professor at the University of South Florida who specializes in Caribbean faiths. She gets questions about Santeria whenever headless animals are found.

But this case does not look like Santeria to her.

"They have a much more civil way of dealing with the animals that have been sacrificed," she said. "In all cases that I know they consume or cook the animals at the ceremonies or celebrations."

And maybe it's not devil worshipers, either.

As far as Stephanie Bell is concerned, animal cruelty can simply be a sign of psychotic or antisocial behavior.

"People who get away with violent acts toward animals usually don't stop there, and people who would hurt or kill fellow human beings have hurt animals first," said Bell, an animal cruelty caseworker with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

With the approach of Halloween, this type of animal cruelty gets ever more popular, said Joanne Schoch, executive director of the Humane Society of the Nature Coast. Her shelter, like many others, does not adopt out black cats and certain other animals in the week leading up to Halloween for fear they will be killed.

But as the meaning behind the decapitations is unknown, some neighbors like John Franceschi, 58, aren't worried.

"When they start nailing it to your front door or garage door, that's when it gets serious," he said.

Jonathan Abel can be reached at jabel@sptimes.com or 352 754-6114.

[Last modified October 30, 2006, 00:14:50]

How a Pagan holiday became Halloween, a night of candy, costumes and scares

2006-11-02T15:33:00.000-06:00

Posted: Wednesday, Nov 01, 2006 - 01:41:35 pm CST

How a Pagan holiday became Halloween, a night of candy, costumes and scares

By Daniel Klote
Democrat Staff

An American child knows that Halloween is the day when a simple knock on the door, those magic words “Trick or treat!” and a pretty good costume result in handfuls of candy. What could be easier? Yet it took many years for the holiday to evolve into what it is now.

The Irish lay claim to first establishing the holiday, known in the sixth century as “Samhain Night,” a pagan tradition celebrating the end of summer. The holiday didn't extend into the Christian world, though, until Pope Gregory IV reestablished All Saint's Day, or All Hallow's Day, on November first. This marked Oct. 31 as All Hallows' Eve, which was shortened to Hallowe'en, and eventually Halloween, as people know it now.

Halloween wasn't celebrated here in America until the 19th century, when droves of Irish immigrants fled Ireland during the Irish Potato Famine, bringing with them the holiday. Even then, Halloween did not take on its present form until early in the twentieth century, when postcards made the holiday more popular than it ever had been before. It was in the 1950s that commercially made costumes began appearing in stores, and trick or treating became a fixture of the holiday. Classic monsters were instantly popular as costumes, from the Wolf Man to Dracula.

Now, Halloween is one of the most celebrated days during the year, having become one of retailers' most profitable holidays. In the 1990s, yard decorations became a staple of Halloween also. People carve jack-o-lanterns, prop scarecrows up in their doors, coat the eaves of roofs in spider-webs and even use an occasional fog machine for a bit of creepy effect.

Throughout the European and American traditions, though, is the held belief that on Oct. 31, the spiritual world can make contact with the physical realm, and magic laces the air. On Halloween, when the spirits of the dead are said to walk, and the supernatural is at its most potent, residents and trick-or-treaters of California should not be surprised by strange and unexpected sights.

Marin witches fight discrimination

2006-11-02T15:31:00.000-06:00

Marin witches fight discrimination

Stacey Solie
2006-11-01

A "witchlet" who goes to witch camp in the summer. (Light photo by Stacey Solie)

Though witches are still commonly thought of as wicked, shriveled women riding on broomsticks, the practice of witchcraft has grown in both visibility and popularity over the past 50 years, and many of the old stereotypes are falling away.

Wiccans, those who formally practice witchcraft, gained legal protection under the First Amendment for their nature-based religion in 1985. Wicca is also recognized by the Internal Revenue Service as a tax-exempt religion. With the rise of books like Harry Potter and the TV series “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” it is becoming more and more socially acceptable to openly be a witch, or to “come out of the broom closet,” as many witches like to say. Witches can even send their kids to Wiccan summer camp, where they practice as “Witchlets” and read tarot cards on parent’s night.

Last month, Wiccans earned the right to have the pentacle, a five-pointed star that serves as a symbol of their faith, engraved onto tombstones in state military cemeteries in Nevada, although the Arlington National Cemetery has yet to grant approval. In September, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a suit against the National Cemetery Association to force a decision.

“They allow a six-pointed star, but not a five-pointed star? That’s crazy,” said one former Wiccan teacher who was shopping at Spirit Matters in Inverness this weekend and did not want her name published.

The six-pointed star is the Jewish star of David, one of thirty-eight religious symbols that do have federal military approval, including the Christian cross, the Muslim crescent, the nine-pointed star for Baha’i, the Mormon angel, and even a sign for atheism.

Prejudice has even come from the top levels of government. President George W. Bush questioned the ruling of a judge who protected the rights of enlisted pagans to perform rituals on army bases in 2000. He said he didn’t agree that it was a religion and that the judge should “rethink his decision.” In 2001 Jerry Fallwell said that pagans, abortionists and homosexuals “helped” the terrorist attacks on 9/11 happen.

Some witches say that fear and prejudice are unsurprising. “There’s been 500 years of propaganda and bad press. Witches were a convenient scapegoat, just like “terrorists” are today,” said Starhawk, a well-known witch in Sebastopol who has written several books on the subject. “The [Catholic] church waged a war—a physical war, and a propaganda war, and we still haven’t completely recovered,” she said.

Fallingstar

Wiccans believe in both gods and goddesses, and celebrate holidays based on the changing seasons and the lunar cycle. Many of the beliefs are rooted in European pagan traditions, but witches also see a parallel between themselves and the role of the shaman in tribal cultures.

Cerridwen Fallingstar, of San Geronimo, first learned about witchcraft when she worked as a reporter in southern California and was assigned to cover the prosecution of a fortune teller.

It was 1975, and fortune-telling was illegal. “Only ministers were allowed to predict the future,” she said. Raised agnostic, she yearned for a spiritual outlet where she would not have to give up her intellect.

She was intrigued with the women she met through covering the trial and began the process of becoming a witch herself through reading, apprenticeship, and practicing spells and rituals.

Fallingstar is part of a coven, or a group of 13 or fewer women who gather every few weeks to chant, pray, and perform rituals and spells. There are a lot of covens at work in West Marin, she said. “You can’t throw a stone without hitting one,” she said of West Marin witches.

Spells like prayers

It is the ideas of casting spells and using magic that puts some people on edge, but Wiccans say that spells are similar to Christian prayers.

“A spell is an energy directed toward an intention. It’s just like when Christians pray for someone who’s sick, that’s exactly what we do when we’re spell-casting,” said Starhawk.

Wiccans are strongly discouraged from using spells to harm, she said.

“Just like any kind of power, you can use it for positive or negative. What you send out returns on you three times over,” she said.

“The basic beliefs are that the earth is sacred, our bodies are sacred, as are all the other denizens of the earth—animals, plants and people,” she said.

One Wiccan reluctantly admitted that she once came close to casting a “justice” spell on someone who had lied about her and gotten her fired from her job. She mixed olive oil with an incense resin called “Dragon’s blood” and set the mixture in a vial outside near the picture of a goddess.

“If I had followed through, my intention was to put some of that oil on the lock on her car, so that every time she inserted her key she would go through it,” she said. The next morning, the vial had tipped over and the oil had drained away, and she decided against casting the spell. She emphasized that casting that spell would not have been the right thing to do.

Love spells are also generally discouraged within Wiccans. “Love spells are the most dangerous spells in the world,” said one former Wiccan.

“You’re manipulating their lives. If it works there will be hell to pay down the road because that person did not make that choice,” she said.

“I’ve had people ask me to put a spell on people to kill them. I don’t do that. I say ‘Are you nuts?’ ”

Wiccans have a guiding ethic that says, “An it harm none, do what ye will.”

The most common invocations and spells are for more everyday problems. “If you’re studying for a test, and you’re a witch, you might invoke the air to help your intellect remember what you’re studying,” said Urania, a witch in San Rafael. If someone wanted to improve their relationship, they might carve a heart into a candle. “Spells are physical prayers,” she said.

Spells are really just altered consciousness, said Starhawk. “To me, it’s not so much about power, as developing states of awareness that everybody has. It’s a matter of learning to develop them and acknowledge them,” she said.

Still dangerous

The image of witchcraft in the popular mindset has come a long way since the time of the Spanish Inquisition and the Salem witch trials, when thousands of women were persecuted, prosecuted, tortured and even burned for their beliefs.

It can still be dangerous in certain areas to openly share witchy ways. “I have friends who absolutely cannot be known as a witch. It would threaten their lives,” said Urania. She said it’s most dangerous in the south and some parts of the Midwest, but here in Marin County she feels relatively safe. She sends her 10-year-old daughter to witch summer camp in Mendocino, and has never felt that being a witch has affected her ability to get jobs or keep friends.

At home she displays alters in several rooms: one for ancestors, decorated with photographs of dead loved ones, a skull (taken from an old haunted mansion), and pumpkins; one for water, with seashells; and one for air, symbolized by a jar of feathers.

Urania also keeps an old-fashioned birch broom, which she got at Cost-Plus. Witches don’t fly on their brooms, she said. She uses hers to ceremonially sweep the house once a year.

The Spiral Dance

Next weekend, covens all over the nation will meet to celebrate Samhain [sow-hen], the witch’s equivalent to Halloween and to the Day of the Dead celebrated by Latin Americans.

For witches, Samhain acknowledges the coming of darkness and the end of the harvest season when farm animals are slaughtered. It’s also a time to remember those who passed away the year before.

“It’s a time when the veil is thin,” said Starhawk. Samhain is also considered the witch’s new year.

This Saturday, anywhere from five hundred to two thousand Bay Area witches will meet at the Kezar Pavillion in San Francisco to partake in the Spiral Dance, a larger Samhain celebration, started by Starhawk, that’s been going on every year since 1979.

After calling on the four elements of air, water, fire and earth, and the four directions, participants will link arms and form a spiral, a symbol of regeneration.

The dancing and chanting creates an energy, said Starhawk. “This year it’s about turning the wheel and moving our society away from corruption and back towards creativity, courage, healing and justice.”

As for the resurgence of witches in the popular media, like Nicole Kidman’s role in the movie “Bewitched” or the runaway popularity of Harry Potter, Starhawk sees it as a good sign.

“I think the popularity of those things shows how much people have a hunger for a world that’s alive and speaking and communicating,” she said. “There’s a hunger for enchantment and magic.”

Satanists: They Look Just Like You and Me

2006-11-02T15:26:00.000-06:00

Satanists: They Look Just Like You and Me

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Some might argue the life of a mortgage broker is a living hell. For Mike Grace, of Birmingham, Mich., it's not too far from the truth.

By day, he studies to be a loan officer. By night, he is High Magus Noxaura, the founder of the Reformed Church of Satan.

But this is a kinder, gentler Satanist, the Metro Times of Detroit reports. The church doesn't worship Beelzebub, it believes in taking responsibility for your own actions and being your own god.

"I don't care how much fun killing people is," Grace joked to the paper, "that sort of thing is just not acceptable."

He's even got a Web site, positivesatanism.org.

Sadly, Grace fell from grace himself a few days after speaking with the weekly newspaper. He was fired from his promising brokerage position.

"You cannot be a religious leader without your faith being tested," he told the paper.

Cauldron of mystery descends on to town

2006-11-02T15:09:00.000-06:00

Cauldron of mystery descends on to town

By Gary Munday

Witch is witch? Witchfest makes it's return to Fairfield Halls on Saturday

When people think of witches, it is easy to get lost in the stigmas that are readily accepted by the mainstream.

As these modern day fables would suggest, witches are old ladies with warts on their noses, covered in saggy green skin and ride brooms into the night sky while cackling all the way to their local shop for a new supply of frogs - or something along those lines.

Like any stigma or negative representation of a minority group, there is a truth concealed within and with witches, Paganism, Wicca and the like, this is certainly the case.

Those writers and academics that are interested in the practises of all that is witch' say membership is steadily growing, attracting all sorts of ages and creeds, male and female. And if you want any proof that this is really the case, then you need look no further than outside your own front door - for the witches are coming to Croydon.

Witchfest is the largest indoor gathering of witches in the world.

The re-emergence of the witches in Croydon will be an interesting, though undoubtedly peaceful and happy one.

This event will include stall-upon-stall of weird and wonderfuls - incense-making, wands and daggers, tarot cards, books and mediaeval dresses.

There will be talks from highly respected individuals such as Professor Ronald Hutton, the leading academic on witchcraft, Inbaal, the psychic pin-up' from Sky's Psychic Interactive and Kate West, author of the Real Witches' book series.

Music on offer will include the angelic, dulcet tones of the Mediaeval Baebes, flute and vocal eeriness from Carolyn Hillyer and Nigel Shaw and popular Goth Rock from Inkubus Sukkubus, as well many other strong supporting acts other miscellaneous attractions.

So, as children begin their trick or treating antics for Halloween, there is not a more apt time of year to get involved and rediscover the true meaning behind these activities. Go along and experience the reality for yourself.

Witchfest
Saturday, November 4, 10am-12am, £23
020 8688 9291
fairfield.co.uk

3:40pm Wednesday 1st November 2006

Trio indicted in roomie attack

2006-11-02T15:05:00.000-06:00

Trio indicted in roomie attack

Home News Tribune Online 11/2/06

By KEN SERRANO
STAFF WRITER
kserrano@thnt.com

MIDDLESEX COUNTY — The exotic dancer charged with keeping a severed human hand in a jar in her home has been indicted along with two housemates in connection with an alleged attack against another roommate in April.

The dancer, Linda E. Kay, 31, Sean F. McDonough, 30, and Polina V. Nikulina, 26, all of the home on Diana Drive in South Plainfield where the hand was found in July, were charged in indictments returned Oct. 19. The charges against all three — criminal restraint, making terroristic threats and weapons offenses — were not released until yesterday.

McDonough, as part of a six-count indictment, was additionally charged with aggravated assault and two counts of possession of a prohibited weapon: a switchblade and a sawed-off shotgun.

According to the victim, Andrea Leipow, and court records, Kay, Nikulina and McDonough attacked Leipow at the end of April, holding her against her will for five hours and threatening to slit her throat. McDonough pointed an empty shotgun at her forehead and pulled the trigger, according to a complaint signed against him by police.

If convicted, McDonough faces up to 10 years in prison on the worst offense, a second-degree weapons charge. Kay and Nikulina face up to five years in prison if convicted of just one of the third-degree charges they are accused of.

McDonough's attorney, Bradford Bury of Mountainside, said his client is "absolutely innocent" of the allegations in the indictment.

"This is a 100 percent retaliatory, retributive act by Andrea Leipow as the result of her being asked to leave the home after she overstayed her welcome," Bury said.

Donald DiGioia of Mountainside, Kay's attorney, has also maintained that his client is innocent. He did not return calls last night.

The name of Nikulina's attorney could not be confirmed last night. She is listed in court documents as being represented by First Assistant Deputy Public Defender Richard "Red" Barker, but Bury said he believes she has hired a private attorney. Barker did not return a call.

Leipow worked as an exotic dancer with Kay and Nikulina at Hott22 in Union. The April attack came to light after Kay was charged with desecration of human remains, a third-degree offense.

Police went to her house at 28 Diana Drive in the borough on July 21 in response to a report of a man trying to commit suicide with a hammer. The man was not there, but the officers found the hand preserved in a foot-tall Mason jar of formaldehyde on a basement table.

In September, a medical student, Ahmed Rashed, 26, now of Los Angeles, was charged with second-degree theft for allegedly severing and taking the left hand from a cadaver at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in 2002 and giving it to Kay.

Leipow told the Home News Tribune in July that the April assault was the culmination of bizarre goings-on in the house that included satanism. She described the roommates as a cult, with McDonough as its leader.

A relative of McDonough's called those allegations "absolute nonsense," saying Leipow was McDonough's spurned lover who was seeking revenge.

Of the allegations of satanism, Assistant Middlesex County Prosecutor Thomas Carver, who is handling the case, said, "We're not offering that as a motive for what happened that night."

Leipow, who knew Nikulina from Millburn High School, first moved into the home on Feb. 28.

At first, her roommates seemed like ordinary people, aside from Kay and Nikulina's jobs as exotic dancers, Leipow said.

But books on black magic, the severed hand nicknamed Freddy, six human skulls in a bedroom and the medieval weapons, such as a mace, made her feel increasingly uncomfortable, she said. Unclothed mannequins wearing wigs were in several rooms, she said. One of the three housemates read a satanic text in the language Enochian. And her roommates would listen to tapes by the now-dead founder of the Church of Satan, Anton LeVay.

A tattoo-artist friend of the group came by one night and tattooed the three women with upside down 3s on the back of each of their necks.

Leipow, who got the tattoo as a lark, asked them what it meant.

"They said it meant freedom," she recalled. "Now, I'm afraid of what it means."

On April 29, she said she accompanied McDonough, Nikulina and Kay to a neighbor's house, then came back home. The three were drinking heavily, Leipow said.

An argument broke out, and McDonough ordered the two women to strip Leipow and throw her into the street, she said. They forced her to drink alcohol so police wouldn't believe her if she called them, Leipow said.

The situation grew even more violent, she said.

"Linda had a knife to my throat," she said. McDonough knelt on her to restrain her, she said. "I really thought he was going to kill me."

Eventually all three drank themselves into stupors, Leipow said.

"I ended up leaving without any shoes on," she said.

Police give pagan back knife she took to court

2006-11-02T14:52:00.000-06:00

Police give pagan back knife she took to court

A pagan woman arrested for carrying a five-inch blade has been given her knife back.

Debbie King, 45, was originally arrested on suspicion of possessing an offensive weapon after she gave up the sacred knife while visiting Fareham Magistrates' Court.

But the Crown Prosecution Service has decided not to press charges against Miss King – declaring it was 'not in the public interest'.

Cate Sussex, area communications manager for the CPS, said: 'We took into account the reasons put forward by Miss King for possessing the item on that day and had to consider whether a court might find her explanation credible.

'We concluded that there was not a realistic prospect of conviction against Miss King on this occasion and accordingly advised the police that no further action should be taken.'
Miss King had taken the knife to court while she was accompanying a family member and reported it straight away to security staff.

She said she needed the knife as she was due to be interviewed on television in full Pagan dress later that day.

But she was later arrested by officers, questioned and released on bail.

However, Miss King has now been sent a letter by Hampshire Constabulary telling her no further action will be taken.

The knife, known as an athame, has also been returned.

The mother-of-two, of Furze Lane, Milton, Portsmouth, said: 'It has been quite a worry – I was beginning to think I was never going to get it back.

'I really have needed it lately as well, because we've got so much going on.

'I use the knife for pagan ceremonies. It was given to me by someone very dear to me and is important to me.

'I don't blame the police, they were doing their job, but it is about raising awareness of paganism.'

But knife victim Bernard Saupe, 60, of Kite Close, Waterlooville, believes there should be zero tolerance to carrying knives.

Mr Saupe, who needed 18 stitches after he was stabbed in Turkey before a football match in 1993, said: 'There should not be one rule for one and one rule for another.
'Anyone could say it's "religious".

'If that knife got in someone else's hands it's potentially very dangerous.'

adam.beardsmore@thenews.co.uk

02 November 2006

Thoughts from under a witch hat

2006-11-02T14:32:00.000-06:00

Thoughts from under a witch hat
Thursday, November 2, 2006

I have great memories of Halloween.

My mother, like many mothers of her generation, felt conflicted enough about having a high-powered career that she would hand-sew my Halloween costumes in an attempt to be more like *her* mother. Together we could come up with a theme, then venture to downtown Houston fabric stores to pore over polka-dotted cottons, purple lace edgings, rhinestone buttons.

The first of these that I can remember was a tiny pink taffeta princess outfit from a Vogue pattern, which was originally meant to be worn by flower girls. This was about 1980. The following year, we chose Alice in Wonderland - also taffeta, this time a fluffy blue dress with a stiff white apron. I was troubled that I didn't have yellow hair (a stickler for detail, I was already quite familiar with the Disney paradigm), but the overall effect was marvelous, complete with white knee socks and shiny patent leather shoes.

As our neighborhood near Rice University was relatively low on children during the Reagan years, I was sometimes invited to canvass in my friend's kid-filled neighborhood across the city. These special Halloweens featured my friend's father screening cartoons on a sheet hung up on the front lawn, several dozen sugar-hyped children predominantly in "Star Wars" outfits, distribution of antiquated treats such as popcorn balls and caramel apples, and my preschool proprietress tossing fistfuls of candy from her roof, dressed as a witch in stripy socks.

Up until this point, I have passed my adult life in places conspicuously lacking in trick-or-treating, largely due to the scarcity of children on university campuses. Last year, however, was our first Halloween in Marblehead - a small town, and teeming with kids. I felt certain that our street in Old Town would be ground zero for prime trick-or-treating.

"I can't wait," I said to my friend the psychiatrist, who was dressed in a huge yellow Sugar Daddy costume. We were at a Halloween party on the Saturday night before Halloween, eating cheese straws baked to look like severed fingers. I sported a black cocktail dress, spindly heels, fake hooked rubber nose, and tall pointy witch hat.

"We have stocked upso much candy. Of course, I bought it too early, so I ate an entire bag of fun-sized Junior Mints by myself. Then I had to buy more."

The psychiatrist laughed with approval. I had even planned to recycle my witch hat for passing out chocolates.

On Monday afternoon, Halloween proper, everything was in place. I walked the puppy early so that he would be relaxed and asleep by nightfall. While out, I spotted one disinterested-looking young wizard wielding a plastic battleaxe, and knew that we had to hurry. By 4:30 we were home. I posted a sign on our front door ("Attention tricksters!" It read in spooky font. "Treats available! But the Haunted Doorbell has died a horrible death. So.... you must yell loudly enough to be heard on Ye Olde Seconde Floor! Mwah ha ha ha ha ha ha!"), turned on all the lights, left the door ajar, plopped my witch hat on my head, and settled on the sofa with a book to wait.

And I waited.

And waited.

Half an hour, 45 minutes passed. The dusk started to gather into night. I heard giggling in the street outside, but no one approached our house.

My husband appeared in the living-room doorway, munching an apple and smiling indulgently at my witch-hatted self. "Any takers yet?" he asked. I shook my head, and was surprised by how sad I felt.

While walking the puppy that afternoon I had noticed some houses with signs saying, "This house has been ghosted!" It occurred to me that this signage might signify a pre-approved house for candy gathering. Could it be that kids were only going to pre-visited houses? I put my chin on the back of the sofa and stared out the window down to the street below. My witch hat drooped to one side.

What a sad commentary on our culture. That fear of the unknown would cause us to go to great lengths to simulate the appearance of community for our children, when in fact our precautions ensure the dissolution of it. So many of the pleasures I remember from my own childhood - seesaws, monkey swings, tree-climbing, to say nothing of soliciting massive amounts of candy and homemade treats from total strangers - have been sanitized out of the childhoods that are under way today. When my husband and I finally get around to having a child of our own, I suspect that I will also morph into my own mother, putting aside my writing and research to ineptly assemble overly complex Vogue-pattern Halloween costumes for my too-exacting child.

But will there be anyone willing to knock on strange doors with us? Will the people behind the doors even want us there? No one makes popcorn balls anymore to be sure, but in 15 years will they even still sell "fun-size" candies to hand out?

Will we still have Halloween?

I reached into the candy bowl and fished out my umpteenth box of Junior Mints. As I started to outline this theory to the puppy, I heard a voice downstairs.

It was an adult woman's voice, whispering, explaining to someone that they needed to yell loud. Just then, two itty-bitty voices from deep within matching caterpillar costumes let loose with a rollicking "TRICK OR TREAT!"

But by then, I was already halfway down the stairs.

Members of regional coven say it isn’t what most people might think

2006-11-02T14:24:00.000-06:00

In time for Halloween ...

Members of regional coven say it isn’t what most people might think

By ERIC LONG - elong@sungazette.com

http://www.sungazette.com/religion/articles.asp?articleID=10967

CRAIG S. McKIBBEN JR./Sun-Gazette

Much of the iconography of the “Children of the Divine” coven is related to their worship of the Egyptian pantheon of gods. The pentagram, a religious icon in the Wiccan religion relays the symbolism of the four traditional elements of earth, air, fire and water with the fifth (pointing upward, a feature which differentiates the Wiccan symbol from Satanism,) symbolizing the Akasha, or spirit. In top photo, Mark Homler, High Priest of the Children of the Divine Coven recreates the ritual of Casting the Circle, a step taken by the high priest to protect the circle of worshippers from negative energy during worship. At left, Sandra Craven, High Priestess of the coven, recreates a ritual known as Invoking the Goddess which invites the spirit of the goddess, in her coven’s case, Isis, to be present in the coven’s circle during worship.

Along with the fall season that leads up to Halloween, many people think of witches on broomsticks and all the concepts that have been popularized over centuries.

But two members of a coven that operates in this region say that Wicca, the religion of witches, is not what most people think it is.

Mark Homler, who lives just off Route 287 near Jersey Shore, is a high priest in that coven and said there are misconceptions that many people carry.

He said his path into Wicca came from disappointment.

‘‘I started out as a born-again Christian, but that didn’t satisfy me because pastors were preaching fire and brimstone and one of the preachers, off the pulpit, was having an affair,’’ Homler said.

‘‘He was out there breaking the Commandments.’’

Homler said he met a woman who was a practicing Wiccan and began to learn about that religion.

‘‘We sat down, had a conversation,’’ he said.

‘‘We read books and I fell in love with the religion itself. Just the idea of learning about how to practice the craft and do healings attracted me.’’

Homler said the coven to which he belongs has actually performed several healings.

‘‘We heal people — we try to better their lives through witchcraft,’’ he explained.

He also explained that he is the high priest of his coven. His neighbor and the high priestess of the coven, Sandra Craven, said she got involved in Wicca through Homler.

‘‘My sister, Cecilia Craven, got into it. Mark introduced us to it,’’ she said.

‘‘I just started by reading books, anything and everything I could get my hands on I read and I liked it, it was interesting,’’ she said.

Their coven, which has 13 members, is called ‘‘Children of the Divine.’’

Homler explained that 13 is the smallest number of members a coven can hold, but that a coven can have more than that.

Craven’s own attraction to Wicca also came from a Christian tradition.

‘‘My sister and I were raised Catholic, so we were told at one time that we believe blindly in the Catholic religion, which is true,’’ she said.

‘‘With Wicca, you see what is done. Through meditation, you can ‘visit’ with the goddess.’’

Homler said that depending on the Pantheon (beliefs) you ascribe to, you have a certain goddess to follow.

‘‘We go through an Egyptian Pantheon and the goddess is Isis,’’ Homler said.

‘‘Just as in Christianity they say God has a thousand names, that is basically Pagan. The name of the goddess depends on the pantheon you follow. We call it Isis.

‘‘We are known as Hermetic witches because this is the Pantheon we feel comfortable with, through the ancient Egyptian religion.’’

According to Homler, Wicca is a nature-based religion.

‘‘We are very open-minded,’’ he said. ‘‘We accept anybody, no matter their lifestyle. I am gay and I have a partner. Christianity generically denounces us. But Wicca accepts everyone, no matter what their lifestyle is, or what their stature is, or how much money they make.’’

He said other differences between established religions also made Wicca appealing to him as well.

‘‘We also don’t have to fear the ones we pray to,’’ Homler said.

‘‘They say about being God-fearing. We don’t have to fear our god.’’

But there are similarities.

‘‘We do have things similar to the Ten Commandments,’’ he said. ‘‘We call them Principles of Belief.’’

He also said there is one big misconception.

‘‘Most people think witches are Satanic — we are not, that is a Christian concept.

‘‘We try to practice the ancient ways as close as we possibly can.’’

Craven said certain tools are used in that practice.

‘‘We practice through herbs, oils, candles, stones,’’ she said.

Homler listed other misconceptions.

‘‘We do not sacrifice,’’ he said.

‘‘The ancient Druids did sacrifice.’’

Craven said some Druid and Wiccan customs got confused, but they are not the same.

‘‘Things got confused and I think they adapted some of each others’ ways,’’ she explained.

‘‘But we don’t do sacrifices, nor do we condone or allow it,’’ Homler said.

‘‘Magic is energy we gather from nature. We are used as vessels through the goddess as we form an idea in our head. When it comes to the healings, we just form an idea in our heads, we see what needs healed and we direct the energy into that part of the body, mind or soul that needs healed.’’

He said a child related to one coven member was healed from cancer, even after chemotherapy and radiation had failed to help.

Sabbaths celebrated by Wiccans include Yule, which occurs at winter solstice around Dec. 21 or so; Ostara, at the spring equinox about March 21; Imbolc, around Feb. 1 and Beltane, which is known as the May Day festival.

Halloween is also special to Wiccans, who call it Sanhaim (pronounced SOW-an, which is the witches’ new year, Craven said.

‘‘We also honor our loved ones who have crossed over,’’ Homler explained.

‘‘We also remember the ones who have died for us, the ones killed back in the burning times (such as the Salem witch trials). That was actually worldwide.’’

He said most of the real witches committed suicide, often drowning themselves rather than be tortured by Puritan or other authorities.

Wiccan practices include magic, tarot cards, astrology and magic, among other skills. Others specialize in spells.

Craven said Wiccans also do not believe there is such a place as hell.

But Wiccans are not evil.

‘‘The main thing with Wicca is there are two laws we go by — love is the law because we are to love everybody no matter what; the other is the Wiccan Rede, to do as thou will, as it harms none,’’ Homler said.

Wiccans do use items like crystals, brooms, staffs and cauldrons used in ceremonies, all related to directing in positive energy and excluding negative energy, he said.

According to Homler, Wicca has been around for about 50,000 years, well before the time of Jesus Christ.

‘‘Wicca is a way of life,’’ Craven said. ‘‘We don’t just meet once a week at a building, it is every day for us. As a rule, it makes you a better person. It opens doors for you to be more patient with people.’’

But there can be a dark side to Wicca, Homler said.

‘‘We don’t believe in all good or all evil — there is evil in everybody. It is the way people practice their magic or witchcraft that makes the difference,’’ he explained.

‘‘I have heard of a witch, a woman, who practiced the left-hand path — the dark side of the craft.

‘‘She wanted what she wanted and did not care who she hurt along the way.’’

More information is available online at Wikipedia, at www.wikipedia.org, or by emailing to Homler at sapphire_webweaver2002@yahoo.com

a little more time ...

2006-11-02T14:20:00.000-06:00

It seems I have a tad of time on my hands these days again, so I am gonna give this another try. As always, if you have a few free minutes a day to contribute, please DO let me know!

Thanks and many Blessings :)

EDITORS NOTE

2005-08-07T13:08:00.000-05:00

I am very sorry I have let this forum slip a tad! I have been ill for some time and then on top of that had connection problems. I truly need people willing to help find these articles and post them to help make this a viable place to keep up with important news from around the world that touches or affects our community! I will show whom even is willing to help how I find each of these articles. If I could get one person for each simple one word article search this would not be a burden to any one person and would only take a few minutes a day of your time! As it stands It takes me anywhere from 30 minutes to about an hour doing all the searches myself. If you are interested in helping out this project, please send me an email at aestrearaven@yahoo.com and I will get you set up.

Blessings and I apologize again for the lag! I hope to be back up and running soon!
Your Witchcraft Today Editor

7/3/05 Nigeria: The Last of Africa's pseudo-Federations

2005-07-03T18:14:00.000-05:00

Nigeria:
The Last of Africa's pseudo-Federations

by
Mazi Kevin Ani

When forecasters of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) predicted the total collapse of Nigeria within 15 years, all hell broke lose. The reactions of the key players in the moribund state highlighted the total bankruptcy of black leadership in this epoch. Some of the so-called leaders have called the prediction a glib talk; others have called for the establishment of a national guard while yet others have called for a rapid response force using arms purchased from Europe, America, China etc. to counter the alleged threat. In fact, the US analysts were merely observing a reality that was all too evident on the ground, if only people would stop burying their heads in the sand and exposing their thinking parts.

Nigerian is a phoney federation. It is beleaguered by so many internal contradictions Advertise here

that its ultimate collapse as a state is now only a matter of time. When that collapse occurs, Nigeria will join the graveyard of other unworkable and meaningless satanic empires constructed by colonial social engineers in Africa and elsewhere in the last century. Nigeria is uniquely evil because in its short violent existence, it has consumed over 3 million Igbo lives. It will certainly not be missed when it goes the way of the defunct USSR, Yugoslavia and other murderous states.

There are some people who are currently benefiting from the satanic state and its evil institutions of brutality. Such people have been ranting and raving about the aforementioned US report, but total break up is now unavoidable and no amount of self-righteous rants will change the course of history. In this essay we aim to interrogate the US report in order to confirm the historical validity of the predicted collapse. We seek to locate Nigeria in the context of other failed pseudo-federations of our time.

Phoney Federations as Bye-products of Colonial Racist Ideology

Nigeria is a bizarre by-product of the colonial ideology in Africa. This was an ideology that denied the validity of African history and humanity, asserting quite bluntly that Africans were sub-humans with no history. Among the chief theoreticians of this ideology was a H.R. Trevor- Roper, Regius Professor of Modern History at Oxford University England. According to him, Africa had no history at all. Commenting further, he said:

Perhaps in the future, there will be some African history to teach. But, at present there is none: there is only the history of the Europeans in Africa. The rest is darkness… and darkness is not a subject of history.

Since Africa had no history, Eurocentric scholars and social engineers have ignored local realities and proceeded to create their own version of African history. To match this political ideology, they have even created their own prejudiced lexicons, which differentiated Africa from the rest of humanity. As shown in Table 1, some legacies of this linguistic apartheid are still evident today. For example, Africans are said to have no nations, only tribes, no generals, only warlords etc. Only Europeans produced doctors, soldiers, statesmen generals etc. Africans produced only witches, warriors, tribal chiefs and warlords (Table 1). The application of linguistic and social apartheid to state formation ultimately led to the creation of monstrosities such as Nigeria.

Table 1: Linguistic Apartheid: European vs. African terms

European
African

Nation
Tribe

Soldier
Warrior

General/Field Marshal
Warlord

Doctor
Witch

Statesman
Chief

African Tribes vs. European Nations

Colonial ideologists in Africa did not just hypothesize; they acted on their theories as well. For example, since Africans were deemed incapable of forming nations, it followed that African tribes however large in population, and whether or not they had a common history, culture, occupied a contiguous territory etc. could be amalgamated with other tribes to form new “nations”. These new nations were then expected to embark on the project of nation-building with the expectation that at some unspecified future date, they would become true nations, a stage presumably attained in Europe eon years ago. This was how the Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba, some of the largest true nations of Africa became coerced in one unworkable nation-state called Nigeria.

Of course this was a sharp contrast to what obtained in Europe. As shown in Tables 2 and 3 every European nation however tiny had a right to self-determination, a seat in the UN etc. For example, whereas, Luxemburg with 0.04 million population is a fully independent state, over 40 million Igbo, one of the largest true nations of Africa have been denied these rights and coerced into an uneasy alliance with Mohammedans, feudalists etc. in an unworkable contraption called the Nigerian state. Within our own lifetime, more tiny European nations-states have emerged (e.g. Croatia, Slovania, Georgia, Bosnia etc.) and the high heavens have not fallen.

Table 2: European Nations

Group Name
Location
Population
Designation
Current Status

Luxemburg
Europe
0.04million
Nation
Independent state

Ireland
Europe
3million
Nation
Independent state

Sweden
Europe
5million
Nation
Independent state

Denmark
Europe
5 million
Nation
Independent state

Iceland
Europe
0.3 million
Nation
Independent state

Liechtenstein
Europe
0.03 million
Nation
Independent state

Norway
Europe
4.million
Nation
Independent state

Portugal
Europe
9 million
Nation
Independent state

Finland
Europe
5 million
Nation
Independent state

Table 3: African Tribes

Group Name
Location
Population
Designation
Current Status

Igbo
Africa
45 million
Tribe
Part of failed state Nigeria

Yoruba
Africa
35 million
Tribe
Part of failed state Nigeria

Zulu
Africa
4 million
Tribe
Part of South Africa

Hausa
Africa
38 million
Tribe
Part of failed state Nigeria

The Rise and Collapse of pseudo-Federations in Africa

Having convinced themselves that African peoples were incapable of nationhood

both historically and developmentally however large, the colonial masters proceeded to form mixtures of these alleged pre-state bands or tribes into units which they called “federations” and other fancy titles. They did this by simply by drawing straight lines on maps. Nigeria is a good example of such unworkable amalgams. It is a false federation which has within its boundaries, Mohammedans, Christians, animists, Igbo Yoruba, Hausa etc. This is a recipe for state failure and disaster for which Africa is justifiably famous.

In fact, the post-colonial history of the Africa and the world is replete with the carcases of these false federations which have collapsed one after the other like a pack of cards. Viewed both historically and comparatively, Nigeria is next on line to go down the ignominious path of other fraudulent federations, some of which are reviewed below.

1. The Central African Federation

This was also known as the federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. It was created by the British in 1953 after a so-called referendum. It comprised of the protectorates of Nyassaland, Northern Rhodesia and the self-governing colony of southern Rhodesia. The unworkable contraption collapsed in 1963, paving the way for the present day modern states of Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

2. The East African Federation

A supposed federation of Kenya, Tanganyika, Uganda and Zanzibar, this British contraption was created in 1948. All the usual trappings of the state – joint high commission etc. were set up. The silly set up however started to fall apart in 1961 following the independence of Tanzania. Today the so-called East African Federation has been consigned to the dustbin of history and in its place are the states of Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda. That was yet another requiem for a pseudo-African federation, the product of the colonial ideology in Africa.

3. The Sahel-Benin Union

The British were not alone in setting up worthless federations, the French

also set up unworkable unions in Africa. One such federations purported to amalgamate the states of Dahomey (now Benin), Ivory Coast, Niger and Upper Volta (present day Burkina Faso) in 1959. Also known as Conseil de L’Etente, the unworkable union has since been consigned to the dustbin of history. Elsewhere in the area, the French - created union of Central African republics formed in French Equatorial Africa also bit the dust, another testimony to the bankcuptcy of colonially-inspired union of opposites.

4. The Caribbean Federation

Just as the colonially-inspired pseudo-federations were collapsing like a pack of cards in continental Africa, elsewhere in the black world, the British were busy creating yet more “federations”. The Caribbean federation otherwise known as the West Indies Federation was created in 1958 incorporating Jamaica, Trinidad, Leeward and Windward Islands, Barbados etc. In 1962, the so-called federation came to an abrupt end and its so-called constitution and other paraphernalia of state were consigned to the bin. Jamaica, Trinidad, Barbados etc were thus left in peace to pursue their various destinies as independent states.

The Nigerian Federation – Requiem to a Failed State

From the foregoing, it is clear that Nigeria is neither unique nor sacrosanct as we are led to believe. On the contrary, Nigeria is just one of the very many sham federations set up in Africa and elsewhere in the black world under colonial occupation. All of these so-called federations have since failed and have been consigned to the garbage dump of history. The last of them is Nigeria, a state tittering on the edge of the abyss. Therefore to suggest that the Nigerian state is immune to collapse is a total and utter nonsense. The seeds for the collapse are all too apparent, unless urgent steps are taken. In the rest of this essay, we outline the main issues that will finally consign Nigeria to well deserved oblivion:

1. The Igbo Question

One of the largest true nations of Africa, the Igbo have traditionally played a leading role in the great events of black history. The Igbo were the first to challenge colonial slavery. In the Americas, they were key players in the world first successful slave revolt led by Toussaint L’Overture (1743-1803), which led to the foundation of the state of Haiti. The state of Haiti is today replete with relics of its Igbo past. In the 18th century, Olaudah Equinoh, an Igbo not only championed the abolition of chattel slavery but also helped to found the state of Sierra Leone which capital was called Freetown for freed slaves.

While Africa languished under

Edward Wilmot Blyden, LLD. (1832-1912) (Igbo Founder of West African nationalism & and Pan-Africanism) How long will the Igbo nation remain coerced into a failed state?)

colonial rule, another Igbo, James Africanus Beale Horton (1835-1883) - physician, British Army officer, mining entrepreneur and banker – demanded the immediate freedom and sovereignty of Igboland. In fact, Horton was the true father of the Igbo liberation struggles, a tradition ably taken up by His Excellency Gen. Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu. In addition, it was Edward Wilmot Blyden (1832-1912), another Igbo in Diaspora, born in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands who laid the foundation of West African nationalism and of pan-Africanism while Nnamdi Azikiwe inspired a whole generation of Africans who finally overthrew colonial rule in Africa. Today the great Igbo nation is entrapped in an unworkable and failed state, hemmed in by sundry feudalists and Mohammedans. It is hard to believe that the Igbo nation with such a rich history of resistance and freedom fighting will remain embedded in such an unworkable failed state called Nigeria for any length of time. Therefore Igbo dissociation from the Nigerian state is only a matter of time, unless urgent steps are taken to address their grouse.

2. The Biafran Genocide (1966-70) an unfinished business.

The Biafran war (1967-70)

Biafra (1969): Christopher Kip Warr of Oxfam buries a 4-year Igbo child victim of hatred and genocide. (Courtesy: Patrick Watson and Benjamin Barber)

which claimed over 3 million Igbo lives was

a horrific crime against humanity, a crime crying out for atonement. In 1970, Biafra’s Gen. Philip Effiong was faced with two choices, ending the war or continuing it in a guerrilla format under the platform of the Biafran Organization of Freedom Fighters (BOFF). Effiong chose to end the war but with the caveat that the Igbo would fight again if the wrongs which led to war were not corrected. Other world leaders (e.g. President Georges Pompidou of France) were united in repeating the same warning i.e. that Biafra would re-emerge in the future unless the Igbo question was carefully resolved.

Nigeria ignored the warnings. Instead, it set about confiscating Igbo bank accounts, their landed properties, destroying their schools, churches, language, cities etc. In 1970, Nigerian leaders proclaimed that money was no problem but how to spend it and yet they refused to rehabilitate the infrastructures damaged in Igbo territory during the war. Today Igbo cities are crumbling while resources extracted from occupied Igbo territories are used to develop Hausa and Yoruba areas. What is left is siphoned abroad and stored in coded bank accounts. Instead of addressing the Igbo grievances, Nigerian rulers have gone to Britain, Russia, Germany, etc. and bought rusty old guns, which have given them the confidence and boldness to treat the Igbo question with flippancy. They pretend that

The Biafran child (1967-70) Courtesy: Wanadoo (France): Can Perpetrators and victims of Genocide be governed in one nation-state?

they won the war, even though no victory was possible without the intervention of Britain, USSR, and the Arab League. As their state totters on the edge of disaster, these people are still rambling on about rapid response, national guard and other degenerative lexicons of force, forgetting that even the USSR, armed to the teeth with conventional and nuclear weapons could not ultimately save itself by sheer force of arms.

And so the alienation of the Igbo from the Nigerian state continues unabated. It is becoming increasingly clear that the Hausa-Fulani and their allies who perpetrated the Biafran genocide and their Igbo victims cannot and will never be successfully governed under one nation-state. To do so would be practically the same as forcing the Armenians and their Turkish killers or the Jews and their Nazi tormentors into one nation-state. Besides, no independence movement of the size and scale of Biafra with the level of sacrifice in known human history ever ended without achieving its aim. This is a simple truth.

3. Over-centralization of the state amidst internal irreconcilability

Even the defunct USSR allowed its constituent republics their own armies, national football teams etc. The Soviet republics were each represented in the UN and yet the USSR went down the tube. The Nigerian state was, in fact, originally set up as a federation of three republics – north, east and west reflecting the fact that the state itself had within its boundaries, three of the largest African natural nations, each over 30 million in population. The linguistic and cultural differences separating the Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba are at least as wide as those separating France, Russia, Italy, Israel, Turkey, Iran and Japan.

Once the white man’s tutelage was withdrawn, the Nigerian central government under black misrule quickly evolved from the status of a managing agency, into a feudal monarchy, the so-called presidency in which a semi-literate Hausa-Fulani or lately Yoruba fellow presides over Bantustan-style “states” which “governors” depend on handouts from the centre in the most bestial display of the black man’s gross incompetence and imbecility. This is why Nigeria is unworkable. In fact, Nigeria as it is is comparable to merging France, Russia, Italy, Israel, Turkey, Iran and Japan in a single unitary state and from where we stand, it is stupid; it is impractical and will never work, not now not ever.

4. The Clash of Civilizations, otherwise known as the War on Terror.

America’s 9/11 has changed the power equation in Nigeria. We recall that in 1966-70, the West and Russia had armed and supported Islamic forces to take power BNW Advocates' Island

For Immediate Release
Establishing and Re-inforcing Igbo Root - by Norbert Nwankwo - Publisher
Biafra Memorial Day celebration in Canada: by Joy Nneji - Publisher

in Nigeria. In so doing, they inadvertently handed over control of the entire world energy supplies to the wahabists of Saudi Arabia and their northern Nigerian supporters. Today, the same west under attack by al-Qaida have now come to the conclusion that allowing the Islamists to control the Nigerian state and its oil isn’t such a good idea after all. Russia itself is deeply embroiled in a war of attrition with Islamists in Chechnya.

The Islamists of Nigeria have not helped their case either. For example, some fellows have against the dictates of common sense introduced sharia law in parts of northern Nigeria, stoning women and hurting western sensibilities. Elsewhere, in the area a demented group is seeking to create a Taliban-style regime; while yet another is burning US flags in Kano even as writers, beauty contestants and artists are silenced with fatwa.

Meanwhile Nigeria’s days as a single state seemed numbered the day Mr bin Laden in one of his famous video tapes named Nigeria as one of the states he intended to liberate. The world (most especially the West) is not about to sit and watch a black Taliban state allied to al-Qaida emerge in Nigeria. Clearly, the time is now ripe for the West to disintegrate Nigeria along its natural fault lines. This would at least isolate and quarantine the Hausa-Fulani Islamists and their al-Qaida allies in their desert margin where they would pose no threat to the West’s alternative energy supplies in the South Atlantic coast of Nigeria. Is anyone now in doubt about the essential thrust of the US report?

The way things are going, it will soon be a requiem for Nigeria, a state run on the principle of gross injustice. When the final bell tolls, the grave stone of Nigeria will be inscribed with the words: here lies the remains of a genocidal state which oppressed and murdered 3 million Igbo people.

7/3/05 Tiny Scottish village girds for summit

2005-07-03T18:06:00.000-05:00

Tiny Scottish village girds for summit
G-8 globalization protests get going under tight security
Ros Davidson, Chronicle Foreign Service

Sunday, July 3, 2005

Auchterarder, Scotland -- Although Sandra Murray works in the local tourist bureau, she wishes the visitors flooding into her town had stayed home.

"I'd like to ride my bicycle down the main street with a banner -- 'Blair and Bush, go home!' -- but I think I'd be put under house arrest," she said.

The security lockdown is almost complete in this town of 4,000 in the Highlands in anticipation of this week's Group of Eight summit at nearby Gleneagles resort, as days of protests get under way elsewhere in Scotland.

President Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the leaders of Germany, France, Italy, Canada, Japan and Russia will gather Wednesday through Friday to consider an agenda topped by global warming and African poverty, two issues that are grabbing headlines as the summit nears.

Auchterarder is justifiably jittery. The gathering of world leaders has become a magnet for dissent. Since hundreds of anti-globalization protesters were injured and one killed during the G-8 meeting in Genoa, Italy, in 2001, the summits have retreated to remote locations.

For the past year, Britain, of which Scotland is the northern part, has been readying for its costliest-ever security operation. As many as 10,000 police, backed by British troops if necessary, will be ready to patrol the rolling hills and major counterdemonstrations.

Forty miles from the summit site, more than 200,000 anti-poverty campaigners formed a human chain around Edinburgh, the Scottish capital, on Saturday for the Make Poverty History rally.

Waving banners, blowing whistles and clutching balloons, protesters clad in white -- the symbol of the anti-poverty campaign -- streamed through the cobbled streets of the Old Town, over the Royal Mile and through the commercial district, encircling Edinburgh Castle with a giant human bracelet.

The atmosphere was festive, with a percussion band from Ghana playing and some demonstrators wearing masks depicting the faces of G-8 leaders including Bush, Blair and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"We are citizens of the global village. We need help," said Siphiwe Hlophe, 45, who traveled from the African nation of Swaziland to participate in the march. "The G-8 leaders must live up to their promises. They must be accountable."

Steel barricades were erected around the Scottish Parliament and U.S. Consulate. Police helicopters hovered overhead and officers in riot gear, some on horseback, were on standby. But police said there were only minor disturbances, and the single arrest was for a drug offense, the Associated Press reported.

An attempted blockade on Monday of Faslane on Scotland's west coast, home to Britain's four nuclear submarines, is in the works.

Among those trying to close the base will be Miriam "Starhawk" Simos, a pagan witch and high-profile activist from San Francisco. She led nonviolence training sessions last weekend and helped set up an "ecovillage" for protesters in Stirling, 12 miles south of Gleneagles.

"I'm not trying to influence the talks with magic," she said. "I'm trying to use magic to strengthen the sense of community and help us reconnect with the Earth."

David Solnit, another prominent Bay Area activist, will join the Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army. Dressed for fun, they will try to impose "house arrest," they say, on the G-8 leaders this week. Solnit helped organize anti-globalization protests in Seattle in 1999.

Edinburgh will again be inundated by protesters on Wednesday, the summit's opening day, when Bob Geldof, the charity rocker and Live 8 organizer, is calling for a million demonstrators to join the "Long March to Justice" just hours before the capital city plays host to a Live 8 concert.

Gleneagles may be swamped the same day by several thousands protesters --

including George Galloway, the outspoken Scottish-born Member of Parliament who publicly scolded U.S. senators on Iraq last month. Singer-activist Bono has called for a march to the resort to pressure the leaders on African debt relief.

Over the past year, front-line Scottish police officers have trained on techniques to clear roads with bulldozers and cut protesters down from tall trees. They have tested special fireproof underwear and "WMD suits," in case of chemical attacks. All leave has been canceled. Police "spotters" from France and Italy are on hand to help identify potential trouble-makers.

There already have been reports of confrontations. "Anyone with dreadlocks, a banner or leaflets has been approached by police," says David Mackenzie of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

Three busloads of protesters arriving from Northern Ireland for Saturday's march said they were stopped, photographed and searched by police, according to a BBC report. Others said police prevented them from boarding trains at London's Euston Station until they agreed to be photographed, the BBC said.

In a controversial move, British officials have confirmed that the government might invoke Section 44 of the Terrorism Act to arrest individuals and hold them without charges. The Scottish regional government has suspended the Freedom of Information Act, indefinitely, for all official security for the summit.

Major financial institutions, such as JP Morgan Scotland, have told employees to work from home this week, while Standard Life is advising employees to dress down. Even the queen has delayed her annual visit to Holyroodhouse Palace in Edinburgh.

Scotland's first minister, Jack McConnell, flew several weeks ago to Scotland's oil capital, Aberdeen, to assure the oil companies that their offshore rigs and offices can get extra protection.

Rumors are rife, from imported police water cannons to U.S. Marines patrolling the Gleneagles. A Starbucks spokeswoman denied reports that the coffee chain is importing from Seattle a contingent dubbed the "latte police."

McDonald's, often a target of anti-globalization protests, also scotched rumors that it will close its outlets in downtown Edinburgh. The radical fundamentalist organization Hizb-ut-Tahrir, banned in much of the Muslim world, planned to participate, according to local news reports.

Most dramatic is a tabloid report that an American aircraft carrier will anchor off the coast. "That is patently false. It's fiction," said an exasperated Susan Domowitz, at the U.S. Embassy in London.

Auchterarder's jitters have not been helped by an official wrangle over whether protesters should be allowed to march past the resort. Galloway, the phrase-turning politician, has warned of "chaos" and "blood on batons" if protesters are kept at a distance.

Demonstrators are also angry because the local county is requiring that they buy insurance for $9 million worth of liability. "They are trying to stop people from participating peacefully," said Josh Brown, of G8 Alternatives, one of the groups behind the protests.

On a recent warm afternoon at Gleneagles, amid manicured gardens, police cars patrolled the grounds. A helicopter circled above. Grates over water drains had been marked with black tags, to show they had been searched.

Usually known for luxury golf and shooting, Gleneagles is now surrounded by five miles of security fence, 6 feet high and double-layered. Villagers who live inside the "ring of steel" must carry photo ID cards, unless they are under 8 years old.

By the opening day, camouflage-patterned fabric will cover the inside of the security fence. But the window-dressing will not appease everyone in the village, where the local parish church has opened its doors to protesters and where a replica African grass hut erected on church grounds emphasizes the protesters' focus on poverty.

"The G-8?" said a man smoking a cigarette in a doorway who was too angry to give his name. "I don't like it. It's everything. All the police. ... They should have held it on a bloody aircraft carrier off the coast."

7/3/05 Watch out for fake Brazilian spiritualists

2005-07-03T18:04:00.000-05:00

Watch out for fake Brazilian spiritualists

July 02 2005 at 05:38PM

By Michael Schmidt

Gangs of Brazilians posing as wealthy relatives of spiritualists have allegedly been preying on the Portuguese-speaking communities in Johannesburg and Durban.

The gangs strip them of hundreds of thousands of rands in cash and jewellery, before hopping a flight back to São Paulo.

Police inspector Dennis Adriao confirmed that a case had been opened at the Sandton Saps after a well-dressed Brazilian "family" allegedly made off with close to R250 000 in money and jewellery, including an elderly couple's wedding rings and the nest egg a mother had saved up for her daughter's education.

'I was suspicious'
The elderly couple lost most of their savings and were too distressed to speak about their ordeal. A Portuguese-English interpreter who acted as the Brazilians' driver said she had uncovered another three "families" operating in the country.

The interpreter, who did not want to be named for fear of reprisals, said that on May 16 she was called by the manager of a café in the Bruma Lake area that is frequented by Portuguese-speakers.

There the interpreter met a smartly tailored couple in their twenties going by the names of Renato and Rosina Caldeira, and travelling with their "children" - a girl of 8 and a boy named Cristiano, or Cristie .

The couple said they were relocating Renato's clothing manufacturing business to Johannesburg from São Paulo, and had applied for residency via the Brazilian Embassy, but spoke no English and needed help finding an apartment.

The interpreter helped them choose a luxury apartment in Sandhurst Gardens, Sandton. The selected apartment belongs to a woman who wanted to be known as Liz.

It is a polytheistic religion
Liz said she had charged the Caldeiras R9 000 a month in rent and they had agreed to give her a breakage deposit of two months' rent on June 15, when they said Renato's parents would come out from Brazil to establish the business. The couple hired a Portuguese-speaking maid, and agreed to pay her R1 800 a month.

The interpreter then drove Renato around: supposedly he was looking for business premises and was keen on setting up shop in Sandton City.

Meanwhile, he and Rosina took out adverts in local Portuguese-community newspapers, marketing her services as a spiritualist and fortune-teller specialising in solving love and business problems and in reading Tarot.

They gave her the name "Professor Wilma Soares".

Another Johannesburg woman, who was experiencing problems with her marriage and whose daughter was troubled by bad dreams, consulted "Wilma" after growing suspicious of the motives of another Brazilian "spiritualist", a blonde named Patricia.

Patricia told the woman that her daughter had been cursed by someone who cast a spell using a corpse in a graveyard, but then the fortune-teller demanded too much money to heal her.

On June 3 the mother went to Sandhurst Gardens where she met Wilma, who impressed her as "well dressed, pretty, about 28 years old. She read cards and seashells, which they do in Brazil."

The mother identified Wilma's practice as Kardecism, a form of spiritualism popular in Brazil. She said she had been amazed to find that Wilma also told her she was experiencing problems with her daughter because black magic had been performed on a corpse "and that soul had entered my daughter's body.

"On June 8 Wilma said she needed a large amount of money to pray over. I was suspicious, but she asked me how much my daughter was worth."

The apparition of a skull in a towel that had been handled by Wilma convinced the mother her daughter was in danger, so she "withdrew R60 000 from the fund I had kept untouched for my daughter's education".

She later added another R20 000 and, as per Wilma's instructions, four bath towels worth R1 200 to the cache that Wilma had prayed over.

Wilma then let her take back the money, apparently in order to establish trust, but on the weekend of June 11 to 12 she asked for it again to pray over it.

The interpreter said she later discovered that the Caldeiras caught a flight back to Brazil on June 12. The phone number and address they gave in S‹o Paulo were fake.

The Caldeiras allegedly took with them the mother's R80 000, cash and jewellery from the elderly couple, R76 000 from a woman who runs a trucking company and R90 000 in cash and jewellery from a Sandton woman.

They also failed to pay the maid, and left the Sandton apartment in ruins.

The mother opened a charge against the Caldeiras, alerting the Brazilian Embassy in South Africa, and the South African embassy in Brazil. "I know I'm not going to get my money back, but I want justice served and to stop them. "

The interpreter, who was still owed R5 000 by the Caldeiras, was aware of at least one other Brazilian "family" operating in Joburg, and one in Durban.

Essentially, there are two main types of espiritismo in Brazil:

Kardecism: a quasi-Christian spiritualist "practical science" founded by Allan Kardec, the pseudonym of a "prior incarnation" of French polymath Hyppolite Rivail, in 1857 with the first of a series of publications, the most influential of which was The Gospel according to Spiritism. Kardecism, as it became known, is based on the belief that Christ is spirit guide for all humanity, and is marked by prayer and charity work. It experienced a brief prominence among the smart set in the late 1800s, establishing strongholds in Brazil, where it has some two million adherents today, and in the Philippines.

Candomble: a syncretic Afro-American religion of Brazil, similar to Cuban Santeria and Haitian Vodoun, that is an amalgam of Catholicism, Native American animism and African tribal beliefs brought by slaves to Brazil from regions today approximating Nigeria and Angola during the slave trade of 1549 to 1888. As with its Caribbean counterparts, Candomble provided cover for slaves to organise politically in secret.

It is a polytheistic religion, dominated by priestesses, and is marked by spirit possession, trance-states, animal sacrifice and banqueting. Today some 2-million Brazilians give Candomble as their religion, but up to 70-million may participate in its rituals. A form called Umbanda combines elements of Kardecism.

This article was originally published on page 2 of Saturday Star on July 02, 2005

7/3/05 ABC Gets Unfriendly 'Neighborhood' Welcome

2005-07-03T18:02:00.000-05:00

ABC Gets Unfriendly 'Neighborhood' Welcome
By DAVID BAUDER, AP Television Writer

ABC's extraordinary cancellation of "Welcome to the Neighborhood" less than two weeks before its premiere proves that reality television can only handle so much reality.

With a threatened lawsuit and accusations the network was tone deaf to bigotry, ABC may have traded a major headache for the temporary embarrassment of throwing out a series that was already finished.

But executives must surely be hearing uncomfortable questions about how ABC got so close to the brink in the first place.

The six-episode summer series, which was to debut July 10, was heavily promoted and given the plum "Desperate Housewives" time slot. ABC saw it as the potential hit follow-up to "Dancing With the Stars."

"Welcome to the Neighborhood" followed three families in a comfortable cul-de-sac near Austin, Texas, given the chance to choose who moves in when a neighbor moves out of a 3,300-square-foot home on their block. Each family is white, conservative and initially interested in neighbors like them.

Instead, they have a rainbow coalition of choices: a black family; a Hispanic family; an Asian family; two gay white men who've adopted a black boy; a couple covered in tattoos and piercings; a couple who met at the woman's initiation as a witch; and a white family where mom is a stripper.

After the usual reality show contrivances — voting a family out each week after a competition to give one family immunity — the winning family gets the house.

The idea is to see preconceptions, even prejudices, break down as the white homeowners get to know the competitors as people instead of stereotypes.

But you can't show a transformation without illustrating what people are transforming from.

"Why should people of color and others ... be humiliated and degraded to teach white people not to be bigots?" said Shanna Smith, president of the National Fair Housing Alliance. "That's not good for race relations in America."

Within the first two episodes, one man made a crack about the number of children piling out of the Hispanic family's car. The citizenry of the business-owning Asian family was questioned and displays of affection between the gay men were met with disgust.

Anger about the series even united the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (which found it "really disturbing" to watch privileged couples vote out families they don't like) with the Family Research Council (which worried that conservative Christians would appear like overly judgmental buffoons).

Smith said it was illegal for homeowners to pick and choose neighbors. Her group was readying a lawsuit, saying the series frustrated all their efforts to see that people are not discriminated against in seeking housing.

The protests clearly blind-sided ABC.

"I didn't think that people would be this nervous," Andrea Wong, head of alternative programming at ABC, said before Wednesday's decision to ditch the show. "Because I really think it's such a positive show and such a good thing to put on TV and cause viewers to look at themselves, I'm surprised by the negative reaction to it."

ABC's lawyers gave "Welcome to the Neighborhood" the go-ahead, and it apparently didn't disturb Wong when the family that shared her Asian-American descent was the first to be knocked out.

Wong was not giving interviews after the cancellation. Series producers Jay Blumenfield and Tony Marsh also weren't talking.

Smith, who had seen tapes of the first two episodes, was disturbed at a lack of balance. Competing families couldn't address biases because remarks weren't made in their presence; besides, they were on their best behavior to win a house they could otherwise not afford.

ABC said last week that "given the sensitivity of the subject matter in early episodes we have decided not to air the series at this time."

"You only sort of get half the story in watching the first two episodes," Blumenfield said before the cancellation. "You see the harshness, the entrenched points of view. These things kind of melt away as the humanity comes out. It was astonishing to watch and I think everyone felt very positive at the end."

The progression was telegraphed by the tattooed Sheets family, the most instantly reviled by the homeowners. Yet the Sheets quickly bonded with the neighbors when they realize they're all Republicans, and one couple came to see them as versions of themselves a decade earlier.

In talks with network President Alex Wallau, Smith said she was convinced ABC meant nothing malicious in preparing the show, and that ABC was unfamiliar with housing law.

"We're still concerned it's not gone forever," she said, "and if there are any other attempts to air it, we are prepared to take legal action to stop it."

Since producers clammed up after ABC's abrupt decision, Marsh wasn't available to address the irony of his words from just a week earlier.

"One of the horrible things that is happening right now in this country is that people are so afraid of a healthy debate," he said. "Somehow if you put out a strong point of view you're either painting someone improperly or you're offending the people who might oppose that view. We don't believe that preconceptions and prejudices are something to hide. They're something explore and hopefully get over."

The only good news for ABC is that for viewers, this is a tree falling in a very distant forest. Since the public won't see it, it will be hard for the public to get worked up.

There's also good news for one of the eight competing families: the winner will still get the house, even if their moment of joy has been censored. To keep the secret, the family had not been allowed to move in until after the series was supposed to conclude in late August.

An ABC spokeswoman declined to say who won.

___

On the Net:

http://www.abc.com

___

EDITOR'S NOTE — David Bauder can be reached at dbauder(at)ap.org

7/3/05 Vampire witch drank blood of street children

2005-07-03T18:00:00.000-05:00

Vampire witch drank blood of street children
By Viktoria Buralenko in Odessa
July 4, 2005

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A woman has been arrested in Ukraine after luring street children into her home for their blood.

Diana Semenuha, 29, believed that drinking blood could fend off a muscle-wasting condition.

She kept the children intoxicated on drugs and alcohol and bled them regularly, selling the surplus to other black magic practitioners. When the children grew weak, she dumped them back on the streets and lured replacements with the promise of a place to sleep and a hot meal.

Police raided Semenuha's flat in the Black Sea port of Odessa after a tip-off.

Olga Buravceva, a police spokesman, said: "The apartment was painted black, with all the windows covered with thick black cloth to stop natural light coming in. The only light came from black candles, and there was a heavy, sickening odour of some sort of incense in the air."

Detectives found seven drugged children strapped to beds and benches, and a large, black knife and silver goblet engraved with satanic symbols.

Semenuha's arrest exposed an occult network in the city.

One of the children told police: "She gave me vodka and I sniffed some glue. But then she came up to me with a syringe and asked me to stretch out my hand … She drew the blood with the syringe and a needle and then put it in her silver bowl and drank it, murmuring in some strange language."

Semenuha, who gave her profession as "witch" when she was arrested, has admitted holding the children. "I let them sniff glue, but I paid for it and took a small amount of blood in return," she said. "But there was no violence involved. I also fed them and gave them shelter."

Police fear she could escape prosecution for corrupting minors and plying them with alcohol because the seven children found at her home have since escaped from care and gone back on the streets.

7/3/05 Probe heads for comet collision

2005-07-03T17:59:00.000-05:00

Probe heads for comet collision
By Paul Rincon
BBC News science reporter

The US Deep Impact spacecraft has launched a projectile into the path of a comet millions of kilometres from Earth to find out what is inside.
The washing machine-sized 372kg (820lbs) "impactor" should smash into Comet Tempel at 0552 GMT on Monday.

By studying the comet's interior, scientists hope to learn more about the formation of the Solar System and the chemical building blocks of life.

Its mission will be short-lived but is certain to be spectacular.

Spacecraft instruments and ground-based telescopes will record the event, as a hole the size of a football stadium is blasted in the comet.

Like any good geologist would, we want to hit it with a hammer and see what's inside
Jessica Sunshine, mission scientist

The cosmic fireworks are scheduled for 4 July - American Independence Day.
Deep Impact, the spacecraft which carries and ejects the impactor will take pictures and gather data from the collision and its aftermath, 133 million kilometres (83 million miles) from Earth.

Comets are porous balls of ice and rock hailing from the frigid outer boundaries of our Solar System. Periodically, some journey inwards, looping around the Sun.

Like other comets, Tempel 1 contains "pristine" material unchanged since the Solar System formed. This is hidden beneath an outer crust.

"These materials have not seen the light of day for 4.6 billion years," mission scientist Jessica Sunshine told reporters at a news conference in Pasadena, California. But scientists still know very little about the composition of this material.
"Like any good geologist would, we want to hit it (Tempel 1) with a hammer and see what's inside," Dr Sunshine added.

The impactor itself will shatter as the comet crashes into it at a relative velocity of 37,000 km/h (23,000 mph), but an onboard camera will record the approach in the last minutes before collision.

Cometary impacts early in Earth history are thought to have first brought water to our planet.

They might also have seeded it with the chemical building blocks required for life. "We want to find out what those materials were," explained Rick Grammier, Deep Impact project manager.

World watches

Mr Grammier likened the mission to "a bullet trying to hit another bullet with a third bullet in the right place at the right time" to watch it. Despite the complexities, team members are confident they will not miss.

Mission manager Dave Spencer said: "We've got good navigation, a good idea of the comet's trajectory and we've been correcting for that all along.

"We're well prepared to position ourselves for this train that's going to run over us." The impact is expected to excavate a crater more than 25m (80ft) deep and 100m (330ft) across, ejecting ice, dust and gas and exposing pristine material.
The Hubble, Chandra, Spitzer and XMM Newton space observatories will be trained on Tempel 1 for the collision, as will ground-based telescopes worldwide.

Deflecting danger

The mission could inform strategies for deflecting a comet, should one threaten to strike Earth in the future.

"If you are worried about defending Earth from possible impactors, it's a whole lot easier to change the course of something if you know what it is you're changing the course of," said Dr Mike A'Hearn, Deep Impact principal investigator.

This week, astronomers got a preview of the pyrotechnics to come when Tempel 1's nucleus released a short-lived blizzard of particles and gas.

These outbursts seem to occur as comets heat up when approaching the Sun.

7/3/05 Gaylord Nelson, Former Senator Who Founded Earth Day, Dies at 89

2005-07-03T17:58:00.000-05:00

Gaylord Nelson, Former Senator Who Founded Earth Day, Dies at 89
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: July 3, 2005

MILWAUKEE -- Gaylord Nelson, the former governor and U.S. senator from Wisconsin who founded Earth Day and helped spawn the modern environmental movement, died Sunday. He was 89.

Nelson died of cardiovascular failure at his home in Kensington, Md., a Washington suburb, said Bill Christofferson, Nelson's biographer and a family spokesman.

"He died peacefully. His wife was with him," Christofferson said.

Thirty-five years after the first Earth Day, April 22 is still a day on which many people plant trees, clean up trash and lobby for a clean environment.

A conservationist years before it became fashionable, Nelson was recognized as one of the world's foremost environmental leaders. Then-President Clinton presented Nelson with a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1995 for his environmental efforts.

"As the father of Earth Day, he is the grandfather of all that grew out of that event: the Environmental Protection Act, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act," read the proclamation from Clinton.

"Gaylord's contributions in the fields of conservation reform and environmental improvement are a living memorial to him," Melvin Laird, a nine-term congressman from Wisconsin and secretary of defense in the Nixon administration, said in a statement before the death was announced.

Nelson entered public life in 1948 as a Wisconsin state senator from Dane County, a position he held for 10 years. In 1958, Nelson became only the second Democrat during the 20th century to be elected governor of Wisconsin.

While in office, Nelson used a penny-a-pack tax on cigarettes to pay for the Outdoor Recreation Acquisition Program in 1961. The program allowed Wisconsin to buy hundreds of thousands of acres of park land, wetlands and other open space.

After two two-year terms, Nelson was elected in 1962 to the U.S. Senate, unseating 78-year-old incumbent Republican Alexander Wiley.

In his three terms, he championed conservation policies, including legislation to preserve the 2,100-mile Appalachian Trail and create a national hiking system.

Nelson's most recognized effort, however, was Earth Day, which he started as an environmental demonstration based on the anti-war teach-ins of the Vietnam War.

"It suddenly occurred to me, why not have a nationwide teach-in on the environment," Nelson said. He announced his idea at a speech in Seattle in September 1969, and it "took off like gangbusters."

The first Earth Day, April 22, 1970, attracted an estimated 20 million people. Tens of thousands of people filled New York's Fifth Avenue, Congress adjourned so members could speak across the nation, and at least 2,000 colleges marked the occasion.

Nelson once said Earth Day worked because "it organized itself. The idea was out there and everybody grabbed it. I wanted a demonstration by so many people that politicians would say, `Holy cow, people care about this.' That's just what Earth Day did."

In 1972, Sen. George McGovern, the Democratic presidential nominee, sought out Nelson as a potential running-mate. Nelson said no.

"Behind his humor and behind the sort of rough-cut, down-to-earth manner, there was always a person of sober conviction," McGovern said later.

Nelson continued to represent Wisconsin in the Senate until he was narrowly defeated in 1980 by Robert W. Kasten Jr., one of a raft of Republicans swept into office with Ronald Reagan.

He joined the Washington-based Wilderness Society and served as its full-time legal counselor. William H. Meadows, the group's president, called Nelson the "founding father of the modern environmental community."

In the Wilderness Society, Nelson more and more focused his attention on the world's quickly multiplying population. When he was born in 1916, the world's population was about 1.8 billion -- and it grew to nearly 6 billion in 1999.

"The wealth of the nation is air, water, soil, forest, scenic beauty, wildlife habitat -- take that away and all that's left is a wasteland," he said in a June 1999 address to the Wisconsin Legislature.

Nelson grew up in the northern Wisconsin town of Clear Lake and later said he learned to love the outdoors "by osmosis" and learned frugality from his father, a country doctor who conserved paper by writing his patient profiles on the back of drug advertisements.

Nelson earned his bachelor's degree from San Jose State College in California and received his law degree from the University of Wisconsin in 1942. He served in the Army during World War II before returning to Madison to set up his law practice.

In 1947, he married Carrie Lee Dotson, an Army nurse he had met in Pennsylvania. They had two sons, Gaylord Jr. and Jeffrey, and a daughter, Tia.

7/3/05 Forget cameras - spy device will cut drivers’ speed by satellite

2005-07-03T17:56:00.000-05:00

Forget cameras - spy device will cut drivers’ speed by satellite
Dipesh Gadher, Transport Correspondent

IT IS the ultimate back seat driver. Motorists face having their cars fitted with a “spy” device that stops speeding.
The satellite-based system will monitor the speed limit and apply the brakes or cut out the accelerator if the driver tries to exceed it. A government-funded trial has concluded that the scheme promotes safer driving.

Drivers in London could be among the first to have the “speed spy” devices fitted. They would be offered a discount on the congestion charge if they use the system.

The move follows a six-month trial in Leeds using 20 modified Skoda Fabias, which found that volunteer drivers paid more attention as well keeping to the speed limit. More than 1,000 lives a year could be saved if the system was fitted to all Britain’s cars, say academics at Leeds University, who ran the trial on behalf of the Department for Transport (DfT).

It is part of a two-year research project into “intelligent speed adaptation” (ISA), which the department is funding at a cost of £2m. Results of the initial trial will be presented to ministers this week.

A study commissioned by London’s transport planners has recommended that motorists who install it should be rewarded with a discount on the congestion charge, which tomorrow rises to £8 a day.

The trial Skodas were fitted with a black box containing a digital map identifying the speed limits of every stretch of road in Leeds. A satellite positioning system tracked the cars’ locations.

The device compared the car’s speed with the local limit — displayed on the dashboard — and sent a signal to the accelerator or brake pedal to slow if it was too fast. The system can be overridden to avoid a hazard.

“The trials have been incredibly successful,” said Oliver Carsten, project leader and professor of transport safety at Leeds University.

The DfT says it has no plans to make speed limiters mandatory but admits that it is considering creating a digital map of all Britain’s roads which would pave the way for a national ISA system.

Edmund King, of the RAC Foundation, said limiters might make motorists less alert: “If you take too much control away the driver could switch on to autopilot.”

7/3/05 TESTING THE FAITH

2005-07-03T17:53:00.000-05:00

TESTING THE FAITH
Fed-up Christian families moving toward 'secession'
Group attracts over 700 members in past year as citizens begin transplanting to S. Carolina

Posted: July 3, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Joe Kovacs
© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com

Will Christians move to places like Kiawah Island, S.C.?

A year after suggesting possible secession from the United States, a group of Christians fed up with American laws they believe are at odds with the Bible is beginning to move to its target state of South Carolina.

ChristianExodus.org has attracted more than 700 members from across America since WND broke the news of its inception last May, and already a half-dozen families have picked up and transplanted to the Palmetto State.

"A year ago, no one had moved. It was just a project on the board," said Cory Burnell, a financial adviser who is president of ChristianExodus. "Now, it's actually happening. Whether it's a couple of years or 20 years, we're gonna get it done."

Calling the legalization of same-sex marriages in Massachusetts the straw that broke the camel's back, the group was inspired to concentrate like-minded Christians in a single area to influence local laws, with secession a possibility. Recent Supreme Court decisions regarding the seizure of private property and the debate over the public display of the Ten Commandments have only served to strengthen the resolve of many.

"We, like other believers, as well as many other conservatives have seen the political situation in the United States dominated by liberals over the last 40 years, whether they were in power or not," says Mike Sawyer, who is looking to make the move. "The 'conservative Republican' party has let the people who have worked to get them elected down repeatedly. The latest 'filibuster disaster' regarding judicial nominees is a case in point. Basically, a handful of Republican senators decided to cave in to the liberals, again. We believe that this can only be turned around with a concentrated effort in one state."

But is splitting away from the U.S. a serious option?

"The thought of secession is a last resort strategy," Sawyer said. "We hope to work within the system as much as possible in order to restore a true constitutional government."

That sentiment is echoed by Frank Janoski, who moved his wife, Tammy, and their four children from Mohrsville, Pa., to South Carolina in February.

"I believe we can work with 'the system' if you will to effect the outcome of local elections and certainly the CE theory is to do this county by county," Janoski said, "but I do not discount the possibility that the federal government or the rest of the 'union' may not agree with our objectives or core politics. So secession may be a very real alternative – and is as I believe our constitutional right if things lead to that."

"I'm about as patriotic as anyone you'll ever meet," says Charles Lewis, who moved his family of four from the nation's capital for the opportunity to raise his children in a wholesome, Christian-friendly environment. "However, the secession option is firmly in the Constitution – it's the linchpin of the whole thing, [the] ultimate safety valve."

Nevertheless, Lewis' love for America remains clear.

"The USA is God's country, the greatest nation of modern times," he told WND. "We've fed the world, fought its wars, sent out more missionaries to spread the word of God than any other. Our Declaration and Constitution were divinely inspired."

ChristianExodus members are coordinating with the Constitution Party, the political party most closely aligned with the goals of Burnell's group. Those who make the move are expected to play an active role in local and state politics, with many looking to run for elected office.

Burnell says he's excited about the movement due to the sheer youth of those involved.

Cory Burnell

"Most of our leadership is in their twenties, thirties and forties," he said. "We're a project driven by young people. We're not going anywhere – except South Carolina."

Though ChristianExodus does not have any test for citizenship, it does post a statement of beliefs on its website. Burnell says Catholics, Mormons and even Jews are members, all looking to reestablish constitutionally limited government founded upon Christian principles.

When news of the movement first came out last year, both ChristianExodus and WND received both positive and negative reaction, with critics saying:

"Talk about giving the 'left' a weapon from our weakness! These Christians are asking the state that started the Civil War to leave the U.S., and start a new country? With ideas like this, we won't need a devil." (Peter Ward)

"Those 'Christian secessionists' are just not thinking properly. Their heads are just as muddled as the rest of the citizens. They should be arrested for high treason against the USA. ... An independent 'Christian state' where the vast majority of the 'Christian' population is prayerless and continues to be addicted to TV entertainment is far from being the solution. (James Chai)

In response to such criticism from the Christian community, Burnell says, "They do most anything to cop out. I don't put too much weight into people who aren't doing anything."

The group is planning to hold a conference the weekend of Oct. 15-16 in Greenville, S.C., to include speakers and vendors such as real estate agents for those considering a change in residency.

Ironically, Burnell, who last year was living in Texas, has moved west to California due to a family commitment, but he says he does plan on moving east to South Carolina.

"Why not go to the liberal bastion to motivate yourself to get out?" he said.

Joe Kovacs is executive news editor for WorldNetDaily.com.

7/2/05 My exorcisms get results, says voodoo priest of north London

2005-07-02T20:34:00.000-05:00

My exorcisms get results, says voodoo priest of north London
By Tariq Tahir
(Filed: 19/06/2005)

The nondescript red-brick block in north London barely warrants a second glance, but inside one of the flats is concealed a bizarre world barely comprehensible to most people.

This is the home of Malcolm Poussaint, a self-styled "voodoo priest" who performs harrowing exorcism rituals on children as young as six whom their parents believe are possessed by demons.

Malcolm Poussaint at his home in Harlesden. He says there is considerable demand for his services

Mr Poussaint sees nothing wrong with what he does. It is, he insists, work that has to be carried out.

"If the child is not exorcised then it will grow up to be horrible. I get results," said the 75-year-old, who is originally from Benin in West Africa.

He is one of scores of exorcists, mystics and psychics offering their services to London's large African community.

The world they inhabit has been thrown open by the recent conviction of Sita Kisanga and her brother, Sebastian Pinto, immigrants from Angola, for the horrific abuse of an eight-year-old orphaned girl they believed to be a witch. The girl's aunt was also convicted for her role in the abuse.

The child was cut with a knife, beaten with a belt and shoe, and had chilli rubbed in her eyes in an ordeal that lasted several weeks.

A disturbing Scotland Yard report also revealed fears that young boys were being brought into Britain from Africa for ritual sacrifice.

Speaking at his flat in the Harlesden area of north-west London, Mr Poussaint insists that exorcism is necessary for children possessed by evil spirits. The girl's tormentors went about their work in the wrong way, but "she was possessed by demons", he said.

Dressed in the white robes he wears during the exorcism, he described to The Sunday Telegraph the ritual the children are subjected to in order to cleanse them of "evil spirits".

He does not advertise but is a well-known figure in the local African community, so recommendations come through word of mouth.

After payment of £70, an initial "consultation" is held with the parents to determine how the child is possessed. Then the child is brought to his flat for the ritual. Mr Poussaint says that if the child is agitated he tells the parents to give it a bath in an effort to make it relaxed.

He is adamant that the children he sees "are possessed" and "look like lost souls". Midday is the best time for exorcisms, he explains, as it is when the spirits are liveliest.

When the child is ready, it is brought into the living room by its parents where Mr Poussaint is waiting, beating a small drum. The room will have been blacked out and on the table a dozen different candles are lit. Dried beans, beads and a bottle with water in it are laid out symbolically for the coming exorcism.

Oil is dabbed on the child's head and Mr Poussaint says he and the parents hold the youngster as they go into a trance, all the time chanting "prayers" for the demons to leave.

"Sometimes the child is shaking because there's a bad spirit in the child. The child sometimes cries and I hold onto the child so the child is not able to move. I will get the mother to hold onto the child so I can send the vibrations across to the child.

"The spirit that is calling to remove that spirit is a good spirit. After the child is relaxed and soothed."

Mr Poussaint says his last exorcism was on a six-year-old boy. "He was having problems and the mother was in a mess herself. She tried to get help but nobody was able to help her. The child was running around, screaming, making noise, acting abnormally, hitting things, hitting people, jumping on the sofa. The spirits were provoking that child. After we did the exorcism he was calm."

Mr Poussaint denies his exorcisms will do any long-term damage to the children. On the contrary, by making the evil spirits leave them, the children will not drift into crime, drugs or violence.

When asked if he ever inflicts violence on children, Mr Poussaint gives an emphatic "No" in response. His customers are only ever satisfied, he claims.

"I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm helping people. There have never been any problems. Once the children get older they are OK. Parents never come back to see me."

Mr Poussaint says there is considerable demand among adults for the services he performs and knows of another 10 so-called "voodoo priests" who are called on to exorcise evil spirits. Among others, people in trouble with the law, seeking promotion at work or wanting to fix broken relationships all seek his help."

He describes how adults attend mass exorcism sessions in rented halls. Those attending stay overnight and many are given what he claims are cleansing baths to rid them of evil spirits. Many become hysterical while others are overwhelmed and faint.

"When I first started going I was frightened myself. These people are acting abnormally because they are possessed by spirits and I help them."

His beliefs and others, such as "kendoki", the belief in witchcraft, are a misunderstood aspect of African culture, Mr Poussaint insists. "British people don't understand it. There has been a lot of animosity towards black people."

Publishers wishing to reproduce photographs on this page should phone 44 (0) 207 538 7505 or e-mail syndication@telegraph.co.uk

7/2/05 House Introduces Religious Freedom Amendment

2005-07-02T20:31:00.000-05:00

House Introduces Religious Freedom Amendment

Would protect the people from tyranny of the courts

Yesterday, Rep. Ernest Istook (R-OK) and Sanford Bishop (D-GA) led a bipartisan coalition of over 100 Congressmen and several pro-family groups in introducing a constitutional amendment to protect religious expression on public property. The group held a press conference near the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court.

The proposed Religious Freedom Amendment (RFA) would reverse this week’s Supreme Court order that the Ten Commandments must be removed from a Kentucky courthouse. The amendment also would protect voluntary prayer at schools and other religious speech on public property.

Original Intent: The Courts, the Constitution of Religion

Istook, the lead sponsor of the proposal, said:

“The Supreme Court has sent a clear message to public officials everywhere: They will face an onslaught of expensive litigation unless they remove the Ten Commandments from public property. Intolerant people have been attacking the Ten Commandments, the Pledge of Allegiance, voluntary prayers at school, and other religious expression, but this amendment will halt those attacks. The courts are using the First Amendment to attack religion, when they should be using it to protect religion. Unfortunately, only a constitutional amendment can fix this problem.”

The Religious Freedom Amendment is modeled after an earlier version that was supported by a majority of House members in 1998 vote, but did not receive the necessary two-thirds. The proposed text (58 words) reads:

“To secure the people’s right to acknowledge God according to the dictates of conscience:

The people retain the right to pray and to recognize their religious beliefs, heritage, and traditions on public property, including schools.

The United States and the States shall not establish any official religion nor require any person to join in prayer or religious activity.”

“We can’t stay silent and accept decisions like we’ve seen this week, which is only the latest in many years of bad rulings,” said Istook. “When judges overstep their boundaries, as they have here, we have only two lawful options: Either impeach the judges or amend the Constitution to reverse their rulings. Only the constitutional amendment undoes these bad precedents and guarantees that all courts must change course in the future.”

A constitutional amendment must pass by two-thirds in the House and Senate, and then be ratified by three-fourths of the nation’s 50 states, with no approval or other role involving the President or the Governors.

The following are the remarks made by Congressman Istook, introducing the proposed amendment to the public:

Good morning; thank you for coming. I’m Congressman Ernest Istook from Oklahoma. On behalf of over 100 Members of Congress, I’m here to announce that today we are filing the Religious Freedom Amendment, a constitutional amendment that will reverse this week’s Supreme Court ruling against the Ten Commandments, and also correct a series of similar rulings that we believe are wrong.

Many justices have correctly interpreted the First Amendment to our Constitution. We stand with those justices. Unfortunately, they have been slightly outnumbered by justices who we believe do not understand or apply the First Amendment correctly. That is why so many cases have swung the wrong way by 5-4 margins. We would be raising our families in a very different environment if there had been just a one-vote difference in so many court cases. I emphasize this because critics of our efforts try to claim that what we propose is radical. But in fact it represents the viewpoints of many Supreme Court justices, and the mainstream of the American public.

We wish we didn’t have to be here, because we respect our Constitution and its First Amendment. Unfortunately, that First Amendment is being misused by intolerant people who claim that it should suppress religious expression rather than to protect it. That effort begins with their efforts to get you as reporters to claim that the issue is “separation of church and state,” as though those words appear in the Constitution. They don’t. In fact, Chief Justice Rehnquist, in an official dissenting opinion, has called upon every judge in America to quit using that term, because, he says, it causes a “mischievous diversion” from the actual words and the actual meaning of our First Amendment. The actual words of the First Amendment are, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”. The second part, protecting the free exercise of religion, is almost forgotten in the rulings we keep seeing.

Unfortunately, when media or judges think that the actual test is “separation of church and state,” then they conclude that the presence of government requires the absence of religion. And because government is so big today, that philosophy pushes religious expression off the stage. That is why we are filing the Religious Freedom Amendment today. It’s not enough to say we disapprove with decades of bad Supreme Court rulings; it’s not enough to praise the eloquence of the strong dissents written by justices who correctly interpret the Constitution. It is necessary for Congress to do something that will reverse those bad rulings. Our proposed Constitutional Amendment will do so, in 58 simple words that echo the balance of the First Amendment—protecting religious freedom while preventing any official state religion. These are the words:

"To secure the people's right to acknowledge God according to the dictates of conscience: --The people retain the right to pray and to recognize their religious beliefs, heritage, and traditions on public property, including schools. --The United States and the States shall not establish any official religion nor require any person to join in prayer or religious activity."

What will this amendment accomplish?

First and foremost, it will preserve the original balance of the First Amendment, protecting religious expression by Americans while preventing the establishment of any official religion. That is why the Religious Freedom Amendment reiterates the restrictions on government as well as stating the people’s freedoms to observe their religion on public property. This is the same philosophy we follow with free speech--a freedom often used by protestors on public property.

This Amendment will protect displays of the Ten Commandments, in Kentucky as well as in Texas. It will protect the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. It will protect the ability for schoolchildren to pray at school, individually or together. It will protect our national motto of “in God we trust”. It will protect the references to God that are already found in the state Constitutions of every state, and on many public buildings. It will protect against the new lawsuits popping up that seek to censor school singings of songs like “God Bless America,” “America the Beautiful,” and even the closing verse of the national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” because they all have lyrics that refer to God.

And this will protect public officials who today face an onslaught of expensive litigation unless they remove the Ten Commandments from public property. When judges overstep their boundaries, as they have here, we have only two lawful options: Either impeach the judges or amend the Constitution to reverse their rulings. Only a constitutional amendment will undo these bad precedents and guarantee that all courts must change course in the future.

The courts are using the First Amendment to attack religion, when they should be using it to protect religion.

The proper standard is the one applied by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1948 involving the Pledge of Allegiance. They ruled that no child can be compelled to say it, but their opposition to it does not give them the right to silence their classmates who do wish to say it. That is the standard that should be applied to religious expression on public property, and the standard that the Religious Freedom Amendment follows. Abstain if you wish, but don’t try to censor everyone else. It’s a lesson in tolerance that we all need to learn.

7/2/05 Nuu-chah-nulth leader passes

2005-07-02T20:30:00.000-05:00

Nuu-chah-nulth leader passes
Posted: July 01, 2005
by: David Wiwchar / Today correspondent

Photo courtesy Ha-shilth-sa/Bob Soderlund -- George Watts as a young Nuu-chah-nulth leader in 1975.
AHOUSAHT, British Columbia - The Nuu-chah-nulth people of Vancouver Island are mourning the loss of one of their great leaders.

George Watts (Wah-meesh-mis) was one of the most well-known Native leaders in British Columbia from the 1970s through to his death from a heart attack May 31 at the age of 59.

Watts, Tseshaht, was instrumental in forming the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council in 1973, a confederacy of 14 First Nations along the west coast of Vancouver Island, and guiding its rise as one of the most powerful political groups and Aboriginal social agencies in Canada.

Born Sept. 6, 1945, Watts lived on the reserve for most of his life except when he attended the University of British Columbia, where he majored in engineering and education.

Those familiar with Watts in the political arena knew him as a focused and determined competitor, fiercely protective of his people and their rights and unwavering in his work towards a brighter future - not just for First Nations people, but for all of British Columbia and Canada. He was a crusader for the just, an advocate for the unable and a passionate voice for First Nations.

''We are reminded of the exemplary vision demonstrated by George; a vision that has been instrumental in the work that our First Nations leaders in British Columbia are engaged in today said Assembly of First Nations' National Chief Phil Fontaine. ''His spirit will continue to walk with us in our journey toward the achievement of mutual dreams and visions we share for our people.''

''George Watts was a First Nations leader who will be remembered for his vision, courage and integrity,'' said British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell. ''Mr. Watts' commitment to his community, his heritage, and to the future of the Nuu-chah-nulth people set an example for all of us across Canada, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal alike.

''He played a defining role in moving the treaty process forward in B.C., but also in moving his community forward and inspiring young Aboriginal citizens to believe in themselves and in their potential,'' he said.

Children and education were two of Watts' top priorities as a leader. Whether working toward the establishment of a youth center in Tseshaht or being a voice for children in Bolivia, he believed all children deserve a chance in life and should be raised with love, compassion and respect.

He also sat on various boards and committees as one of two delegates representing Canada at the International Labour Convention on Indigenous Rights, serving as the Canadian delegate to the first Convention on Fighting Racism and as a delegate for a number of years to the United Nations Conference on Indigenous Rights in Geneva. On the home front, he sat as lead negotiator for five of the 14 First Nations at the Nuu-chah-nulth Treaty table and served as the acting chief councilor for the Tseshaht.

Simon Lucas, council member for the Hesquiaht First Nation and longtime friend, said: ''When George Watts entered our lives, he was a much-educated man. He used his intelligence to advance our people politically and administratively. His humbleness kept in tone with our culture, and his moolth mumps [roots] will always be remembered, especially his quest for our people to get the highest education possible.''

John Watson, head of the Federal Aboriginal Affairs Secretariat, knew Watts for almost 30 years. Even though they often sat across the negotiating table from one another, he thought of Watts as not only a friend but as a mentor. Watson said Watts always fought for the underdog and readily took on difficult issues.

Watts dedicated his life to his family and his people; and although he is gone, his relentless pursuit of justice will continue. As leaders from across Canada noted at his ''Celebration of Life'' memorial, he will be missed - but more importantly, he will be remembered forever.

7/2/05 FLAG FEN LATEST - PETERBOROUGH CITY COUNCIL TO HOLD PUBLIC MEETINGS

2005-07-02T20:29:00.000-05:00

FLAG FEN LATEST - PETERBOROUGH CITY COUNCIL TO HOLD PUBLIC MEETINGS
By David Prudames 30/06/2005

A visitor centre was established at Flag Fen in 2002. Courtesy Toby Fox.

Peterborough City Council is to hold two public meetings about plans to build a renewable energy plant near the famous Flag Fen Bronze Age site.

Local residents and businesses will get the opportunity to question the company behind the £250 million, 29-acre waste processing energy park proposed for the site at Fengate in Cambridgeshire.

The two-hour meetings will be held on July 13 at Peterborough Central Library and on July 25 at Peterborough Town Hall Council Chamber.

As previously reported on the 24 Hour Museum, the development has caused concern among residents, as well as staff at Flag Fen who fear it will affect the 20,000 visitors the site receives each year and archaeological remains still in the ground.

But Peterborough Renewable Energy Ltd, the company behind it, maintains that the development will be able to work with Flag Fen. In a statement, Managing Director Chris Williams told the 24 Hour Museum: "There are opportunities for the centre to benefit, through exposure and good working relationships."

A view of how the proposed plant may look from Flag Fen. Courtesy PREL.

The developers estimate that the plant could handle more than a million tonnes of waste each year. Innovative technology will then be used to generate electricity by burning the waste along with biomass (organic matter such as plants) at very high temperatures in an oxygen deficient environment.

Rather than be put off by the plant Chris Williams believes that, with its own visitor centre, the energy park could help Flag Fen attract more visitors.

"The estimates for the plant’s own sustainability centre expect 30,000 visitors per year," he said, adding that a shared infrastructure could be developed with the Bronze Age site. "The opportunity for a truly fantastic visitor attraction with archaeology and sustainable living methods at it’s core is a unique selling point and should see numbers rise at Flag Fen."

According to Williams, the company would look to minimise the impact on archaeology during the construction phase by supporting a full pre-construction dig of the site.

He also acknowledges that archaeology surrounding the construction site could potentially be affected by drying out, but said the company intends to look for solutions, such as water monitoring and a re-wetting programme.

How the proposed plant may look. Courtesy PREL.

"In no way do we wish to work against Flag Fen," he added, "however, waste and climate change are very real, very important issues that if not tackled early – and some argue it’s already too late – the soil conditions, water tables and weather cycle we see today will continue to change."

According to Dr Mike Heyworth, director of the Council for British Archaeology (CBA), Flag Fen is "one of our premier prehistoric visitor attractions. One of the few places where people can see an incredible survival of archaeological material."

It was discovered in 1982 by renowned archaeologist and author Dr Francis Pryor. Now president of the CBA and a member of TV’s Time Team, Dr Pryor unearthed a small piece of timber, which turned out to form part of a massive Bronze Age causeway. It continues to yield material today and there is more waiting to be excavated.

Dr Pryor is currently director of archaeology at Flag Fen and told the 24 Hour Museum that he remains very concerned about the development, describing it as "potentially catastrophic."

As well as worries about the construction phase, he raised the issue of unexcavated remains, preserved in the waterlogged peat. It is this wetness, he said, that has and continues to preserve remains in the ground so uniquely and if it dries out the archaeology will be destroyed.

Bronze Age timbers, preserved by the fen soil, in situ. Courtesy Toby Fox.

He also highlighted the impact on visitors, which he said is perhaps the most immediate problem. "We are a tourist attraction," he explained, "we opened in 1987 and it’s a struggle to keep going. Peterborough is not a tourist area despite having a magnificent cathedral and we are slowly building up a visitor profile, but everything depends on the atmosphere."

The fear is that where visitors currently enjoy a peaceful and evocative experience at the site, the proposed plant might change that.

But that said, Dr Pryor recognises the importance of renewable energy: "Anyone living in the fens has to be in favour of any electricity generation which doesn’t contribute to global warming and I’m wholly in favour, in principle. But," he added, the location of the plant "seems to me really very insensitive."

While he considers the possibility of a visitor centre at the plant to be a good idea, he added: "It isn’t going to make up for the impact of the development."

Responsibility for approving or disapproving the planning application lies with the Department for Trade and Industry. The city council has until September to compile a report and make comments for consideration.

For more information about the development visit www.prel-online.co.uk and to see the full planning application online see the Peterborough City Council website.

7/2/05 Life according to... Where have all the ghosts gone?

2005-07-02T20:28:00.000-05:00

Life according to... Where have all the ghosts gone?

By Gerry Anderson
featureseditor@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

02 July 2005
AS a rule, I have never been much impressed by talk of the paranormal. Whenever folk raise the subject of ghosts, I usually reply that the nearest I've ever been to communing with them was once having a drink with Alex Higgins and Charlie Landsborough.

But then I am, of course, no stranger to the unacceptable side of life. After all, I did spend a period of time playing in a show band. Life and death hold no mystery or fear when a man has been to that particular Hell and back.

But I am not completely desensitised. There was a time when I was exposed to the Ways of the Old Folk. On a dark night while ruminating over the remnants of an expiring turf fire, my old uncle in Donegal would often hesitate in mid-sentence, cock a practised ear and inform me, a timorous, fearful child, that the noise outside the window was indeed the wail of the Banshee. Nowadays such a howl would go unnoticed. One would merely assume that the people next door were watching Pop Idol.

There was also an anonymous spirit known as the Woman in White whom my uncle would occasionally point out when he and I were strolling home in the dark after attending some infernal fiddle-infested country gathering. The Woman in White would be seen wending her way across the bog with a lantern in her hand and, I would imagine, necessarily clad in the sturdiest of footwear. My uncle always claimed he'd spotted her and would grab my arm in the process of wheeling me round to a position from which I could spot her too. I never did see her.

Of course, this may have had something to do with the fact that, unlike my uncle, I didn't have half a bottle of poteen in me at the time. As my aunt used to say, "The crattur can make many things seem what they are not."

People should be employed to shout those words at students writhing on the ground in Belfast's Bradbury Place on a Saturday night. It may curb anti-social tendencies.

And am I not on first name terms with a certain white witch who lives in the shadow of Mount Errigal in Donegal and who once introduced me to a number of varieties of Little People, one species of which are 10 feet tall, wear clothing that resembles the white man's long johns and don't like rock 'n' roll or people who smoke?

To these particular Little People I say: "Come back to Donegal. All is forgiven. The conditions in the pubs are perfect for you now. All the characters and the old men have disappeared. Come and drink in an antiseptic smoke-free atmosphere swarming with sullen traditional musicians and pink-sweatered golfers who laugh very loudly at nothing at all."

But I started out talking about the paranormal. I often wonder what ghosts will do in the future when there won't be any more old houses to haunt. According to the evidence in my own city of Derry, it seems that every building over 100 years old is being demolished by developers while elected officials stand impotently by. We'll soon have to place armed guards round the city's walls. They're too old and get in the way of traffic, you see.

Ghosts will have nowhere to go. Can you imagine telling your son in future years that your local KFC or Pizza Hut is haunted? It doesn't work.

It's confession time. I am here to tell you that, despite cynicism in the past, I now believe firmly in ghosts.

During the course of these past few weeks, I, a BBC Radio Ulster team and members of the Northern Ireland Paranormal Research Association have spent sleepless nights staking out locations where spirits are said to lurk.

We went to Richill Castle just outside Armagh, the Grand Opera House in Belfast, the Old Workhouse in Stroke City and to Crumlin Gaol.

What we found there I cannot divulge here. Keep your eye out for the programmes. What I can say for certain is this: we are not alone.

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7/2/05 Sculpture bearing Ten Commandments stirs debate

2005-07-02T20:27:00.000-05:00

Sculpture bearing Ten Commandments stirs debate

KINGSTON, N.Y. A sculpture of a horse bearing the Ten Commandments on the lawn of an Ulster County Courthouse is causing a political tiff.

Artist Rita Dee had her wooden sculpture "Atticus" placed in front of the courthouse this week. It's drawing objections from Kingston Mayor James Sottile, a Democrat, and Ulster County Legislature Chairman Richard Gerentine, a Republican from Marlboro, both of whom say the horse should be removed.

Sottile told Dee to remove the sculpture from the court property. Dee agreed, but later said she had contacted a Virginia-based law center specializing in religious free speech.

Dee said her sculpture, named after the defense lawyer Atticus Finch from the Harper Lee novel "To Kill a Mockingbird," symbolizes courage, integrity and honesty.

Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

7/2/05 Abortion front & center

2005-07-02T20:25:00.000-05:00

Abortion front & center

Woman's right to choose key to upcoming justice war

By JAMES GORDON MEEK
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

WASHINGTON - Experts say the coming war over the next Supreme Court justice will zero in on a single legal issue: a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy.
Never mind the environment, regulation, gun control, civil liberties or fighting terrorism.

Abortion will be the litmus test for all of President Bush's nominees, experts say, because any new appointee could tilt the Supreme Court's ideological balance and overturn Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 case legalizing the procedure.

"There's no doubt on both sides the No. 1 issue is Roe," said Manuel Miranda, a conservative legal activist in Bush's corner. "It's the representation of everything the court has done one way or another."

Abortion has for years prompted liberals and conservatives to give tens of millions of dollars to fund an almost-certain media melee by activist groups over Bush's picks for the top bench. Both sides of the abortion issue lure in cash by promising supporters Roe vs. Wade will be done in by a conservative court.

"It's like putting Tom DeLay or Hillary Clinton's picture on your fund-raising - it works," said former Solicitor General Theodore Olson.

But experts say that even if Roe vs. Wade is reversed after three decades, it wouldn't be the end of abortion in America.

Roe's demise would mean the question of abortion rights would revert back to the states. In most states, it would remain legal, experts say.

"You're secure for a long time, and if you live in places like New York, you're probably secure forever," conceded Miranda.

Miranda estimated it would take at least three conservatives replacing moderate or liberal justices to overturn Roe, and he doubted it could be achieved before the better part of a decade.

"Roe is now 32 years old. Even [Chief Justice William] Rehnquist believes precedent at some point trumps other arguments," said Solomon Wisenberg, who vetted nominees for the Reagan administration.

A 1992 case, Planned Parenthood vs. Casey, could have thrown out Roe, but that was prevented by the votes of three Republican-appointed justices who still are serving: Anthony Kennedy, Sandra Day O'Connor and David Souter.

With their views now well-known, "Roe isn't about to be overturned," Wisenberg said.

Originally published on July 2, 2005

7/2/05 New Domain Ruling Threat to Churches

2005-07-02T20:24:00.000-05:00

Published Saturday, July 2, 2005

New Domain Ruling Threat to Churches

By YOGITA PATEL
Religion News Service

WASHINGTON -- Religious institutions may be more vulnerable to takeover through eminent domain after last week's Supreme Court ruling that gives local governments greater power to seize properties for private economic development, according to some religious and civil rights advocacy groups.

Churches, mosques, synagogues and other nonprofit religious entities are considered especially at threat because they generate no tax revenue for cities, while developments like hotels or shopping malls are seen to be economic boons for urban renewal projects.

"Because all houses of worship are tax-exempt, they will continue to be attractive targets for seizure by revenue-hungry local governments," said Jared Leland, media and legal counsel Of The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.

The Becket Fund is a nonprofit, interfaith legal organization that advocates for the free expression of religion.

The Becket Fund, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Rutherford Institute and many other groups filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of seven residents of New London, Conn., who were fighting the city's decision to raze their homes to allow private developers to build a commercial complex.

Leland warned that taking land and property strictly for economic interests is a dangerous slippery slope, and said religious organizations threatened by this decision offer communities services and aid that are immeasurable by monetary standards.

"Religion is something that may not have an economic impact on communities, but does have a tremendous social impact on communities." Leland said. "Religious institutions should be welcomed and protected in the land-use matter."

John Whitehead, president gf the Rutherford Institute, said public furor may protect some religious institutions from takeovers, but warned they still will be vulnerable.

"If push comes to shove, churches, synagogues and anyone who they don't consider tax-generating entities will come under this," Whitehead said.

The Rutherford Institute is a nonprofit, civil liberties legal organization.

The close 5-4 decision in Kelo et al v. City of New London cited rights given to municipalities by the Fifth Amendment, which allows them to seize private properties for public use, in exchange for just compensation to the owner.

The high court said economic development, especially in blighted areas, is an appropriate "public use" rationale for seizing property.

Leland said although the ruling removes the added protection of the Fifth amendment for fighting eminent domain cases, his organization will continue to fight for the rights of citizens and places of worship.

"The First Amendment and federal law will continue to be the shoulder to lean on for religious institutions," Leland said.

In addition, Whiteheadnoted that the ruling may not have the final say in eminent domain cases, since the ruling allows state legislatures to pass laws restricting this type of land seizure.

He said he hopes that religious institutions will use their organizing powers to protect themselves and help homeowners facing situations like the New London residents.

"The less fortunate are vulnerable and that's what Christians should be concerned about," Whitehead said. "The churches can fight back; small land owners and families can't."

7/2/05 The Fox Sisters: Spiritualism's Unlikely Founders

2005-07-02T20:20:00.000-05:00

Article from American History Magazine

The Fox Sisters: Spiritualism's Unlikely Founders

Out of the pranks of precocious sisters in upstate New York in 1847 grew a religious and social movement that swept across America. Often associated with abolition, suffrage and the brotherhood of all souls, spiritualism continued to evolve and flourish through the 20th century.
By Nancy Rubin Stuart

Whether skeptic or believer, few Americans have been able to ignore the phenomenon known as spiritualism -- the belief that spirits can communicate with the living, usually with the help of certain sensitive individuals called mediums. During the last half of the 19th century, some Americans believed that the strange rappings heard in early séances were a spiritual telegraph, the otherworldly equivalent of Samuel F.B. Morse's new invention. Others insisted that the noises were a sleight-of-hand trick used to prey upon vulnerable mourners. Even so, the religious and social movement inspired child mediums, outraged American clergymen, infuriated scientists and, at its peak, attracted more than 1 million American adherents.

The origins of America's first spiritualist movement began humbly, in the hamlet of Hydesville, N.Y., just a few miles outside the Erie Canal town of Newark, about 20 miles west of Rochester. There, during the winter of 1847-48, 15-year-old Maggie Fox and her little sister, Katy, 11 1/2, schemed to frighten their mother, Margaret Fox, by creating sounds that echoed through their farmhouse at night.

At first, the girls tied strings to apples, then repeatedly and rhythmically dropped them on the stairs to mimic ghostly footsteps. According to an interview Maggie gave the New York World 40 years later, she and Katy soon learned to make popping, cracking and thumping sounds on their own. While the exact method they used has never been fully explained, Maggie claimed that they did so by popping or cracking the knuckles of their toes or by snapping their big and second toes much as one snaps one's fingers. Eventually the girls became so adept that they performed the trick in their stocking feet and even while standing in shoes. These rapidly repeated sounds were allegedly so loud that the elder Foxes had been awakened from their sleep.

The superstitious Mrs. Fox soon became convinced that their farmhouse was haunted. In contrast, her blacksmith husband, John, scoffed, insisting that the sounds came from a loose board or shutter that rattled in the night winds.

Maggie later claimed that she and Katy planned a final performance for their mother in which they would talk to the ghost. After the rapping sounds had begun in the evening of March 31, 1848, Mrs. Fox rose, lit a candle and began searching the house. When she reached her daughters' bed, Katy peered into the darkness and boldly addressed the ghost. "Mr. Split-foot, do as I do," she said, snapping her fingers in the cadence of the earlier noises. The appropriate raps followed. Maggie then clapped her hands four times and commanded the ghost to rap back. Four knocks followed. As if on cue, Katy responded by making soundless finger-snapping gestures that, in turn, were answered with raps.

Taking pity upon her terrified mother, Katy then offered a hint of explanation for the sounds. "O, mother, I know what it is. Tomorrow is April-fool day and it's somebody trying to fool us," she began.

But Mrs. Fox apparently refused to consider the suggestion of a prank. The ghost, she believed, was real and, terrified though she was, she decided to test it herself. Initially, she asked the ghost to count to 10. After it responded appropriately, she asked other questions, among them, the number of children she had borne. Seven raps came back. How many were still living? Six raps. Their ages? Each was rapped out correctly. As Mrs. Fox later related, she then demanded, "If it was an injured spirit, make two raps." Promptly two knocks were returned. Mrs. Fox then wanted to know who the ghost was in life. Maggie and Katy quickly concocted an answer. The spirit, they claimed, was a 31-year-old married man, dead for two years, and the father of five. "Will you continue to rap if I call in the neighbors," their mother asked, "that they may hear it too?"

This domestic drama might have ended there had Maggie and Katy failed to respond. But Mrs. Fox's reaction took them aback. To confess that what they had begun as a prank had evolved into a cruel joke was unthinkable. To do so would surely incite their parents' wrath. After an awkward pause, the spirit rapped out its agreement to "talk" to the neighbors.

The first to arrive was Mary Redfield. Initially skeptical, the matron nevertheless asked the spirit questions about her own life and received such accurate answers that she scurried across the road to tell others.

Maggie and Katy were now in even more trouble. If they admitted their trickery, their mother, indeed the entire Fox family, would have been widely ridiculed. "We could not confess the wrong without exciting very great anger on the part of those who we had deceived. So we went right on," Maggie explained in her 1888 memoir, The Death Blow to Spiritualism.

The next night, before a curious crowd of neighbors, a spirit began its rappings. Frustrated by the clumsiness of the communication, one of the visitors proposed a code. He assigned numbers to letters of the alphabet so that the "ghost" could not only spell out words but whole sentences. (The girls would use some version of this system, often adapted and simplified, from then on.) While frightened, the girls then knocked out messages that they claimed came from a murdered peddler who was buried in the farmhouse basement. In reaction, the neighbors decided to excavate the cellar to see if there was any truth to the tale. But fate intervened. Heavy spring rains and the farmhouse's location near a creek filled the excavation pit with groundwater, making further investigation impossible for weeks.

Rumors about the alleged haunting at Hydesville nevertheless continued to spread throughout the countryside, and before long the Fox farmhouse was overrun with visitors who lingered until nightfall when Maggie and Katy again felt compelled to serve as mediums for the spirits. Inevitably, the tales of their séances elevated the girls to a new status. Some of their neighbors now regarded them with awe, as divinely inspired individuals chosen to interpret messages from the dead -- an attitude that may have contributed to Maggie and Katy's continued reluctance to confess to the prank.

In contrast, a restive group of locals treated the girls with contempt, convinced that they were either tricksters or witches. Emotions ran so high in their nearby Methodist Episcopal church that ultimately the minister asked the Fox family to leave the congregation. In his view the girls had engaged in unholy practices and their parents must be held accountable.

Rumors of the events in the Fox house continued to spread far and wide, inspiring attorney E.E. Lewis of nearby Canandaigua to visit Hydesville to investigate. Losing no time, he questioned the neighbors, interviewed former tenants of the farmhouse and asked the elder Foxes to describe the events in their own words. By late May 1848, Lewis published a pamphlet titled "A Report of the Mysterious Noises Heard in the House of John D. Fox, in Hydesville, Arcadia, Wayne County."

Once again, the story might have ended there except that Maggie and Katy's eldest sister, Leah Fox Fish, a divorced 33-year-old mother living in Rochester, happened to read the report. Stunned to learn that the hauntings involved her family, Leah promptly booked passage on an Erie Canal packet boat to Newark and continued on by carriage to Hydesville. Beyond Leah's immediate concern for her family's welfare was an even more provocative thought: Might these strange events be fulfillment of a prophecy about the imminent approach of the spirits that had appeared in a recent best-selling book?

That work, The Divine Principles of Nature, written by seer Andrew Jackson Davis, was based on the writings of the 18th-century European mystic, theologian and scientist Emanuel Swedenborg. All human experience, Swedenborg had written, was only a reflection of a larger spiritual universe. By 1847 Davis had popularized Swedenborg's theories by suggesting that the material world was only the shadow of a spiritual universe. The dead, Davis claimed, were in daily contact with the living, even if the latter did not realize it. "This truth will ere long present itself in the form of a living demonstration," he predicted. "And the world will hail with delight…that era when the interiors of men will be opened and the spiritual communion will be established."

Leah wondered, was it possible that Davis' predictions were coming true in her parents' home in Hydesville?

By the 1840s, American preoccupation with death was widespread. The nation's new cities were expanding, its immigration was at an all-time high and its factories and ports booming, all of which contributed to urban overcrowding and poor sanitation, which spawned epidemics of cholera, whooping cough, influenza and diphtheria. The mortality rate was on the rise. Nearly one-third of all city-born infants died before reaching their first birthday, and young mothers -- bearing an average of five children each -- were often fatally struck with puerperal fever. Death thus touched all families, leaving behind millions of relatives with memories of those who had passed to the other side.

Simultaneously, prosperity born of America's urbanization and expanding economy flooded the marketplace with factory-spun textiles, dishes and furniture, prompting a new hope and materialism. In such an atmosphere, traditional religions like Calvinism, with its punitive doctrine of original sin, no longer seemed relevant.

A more significant approach to true worship of the divine, according to some, was brotherly concern for others expressed through meaningful social action. By the 1830s and '40s, America's new breed of humanitarians had founded dozens of charities and embraced social causes such as abolition, coeducation, temperance and prison reform. Still another symbol of that mood was the establishment of 40 utopian communities in America.

Contributing to that positive mood was America's westward expansion. Frontier towns appeared seemingly overnight -- so too did the nation's expanding railroads, interlocking systems of canals and fleets of steam-powered boats. New inventions such as Morse's telegraph suddenly linked once-remote cities and towns. By the late 1840s anticipation of a better life and the concept of "progress" had become a national expectation. "It is an extraordinary era in which we live....The progress of the age has almost outstripped human belief," proclaimed orator-statesman Daniel Webster in 1847.

While perhaps neither young Maggie Fox nor her sister Katy grasped the implications of their era's zeitgeist, their eldest sister, Leah, had long hoped to embrace that promise. For years, the single mother had struggled to support herself and her daughter by giving music lessons to the offspring of Rochester's wealthiest citizens.

Rochester had been prosperous even before its connection to the Erie Canal. Opened in 1825, the waterway linked the city to Buffalo to the west and Syracuse, Albany, the Hudson River and New York City to the east, and turned Rochester into America's "first inland boom town," as one historian dubbed it. Its wealth inevitably attracted swindlers, wastrels and atheists who, according to the local population, brought godlessness, poverty and the abuse of alcohol.

During the period of religious revivalism known as America's Second Great Awakening, scores of charismatic preachers consequently appeared in Rochester and other Erie Canal communities to offer salvation through a variety of evangelical and innovative sects. Among them were the Shakers, Mormons and the Millerites, whose followers abandoned their worldly goods in preparation for a Second Coming, predicted for 1843 and '44. In the wake of the failed coming of the Day of Judgment and other religious exuberances, a spiritual cynicism settled over the area. To Leah Fox Fish, who had personally witnessed that evolution, the community seemed ripe for a new religious expression. A practical woman with an opportunistic bent, she had hastened to investigate the rappings associated with Maggie and Katy.

Determined to plumb the mystery, Leah drew her sisters aside and, promising to keep their confidence, wrested the "secret" of the raps from them. Repeatedly, Leah tried to reproduce the noises under Maggie and Katy's tutelage, but could make only the faintest of sounds. Later, after inviting Katy to Rochester, perhaps to practice the rapping skills herself, Leah shrewdly claimed in her memoir that the "ghost" had followed her to Rochester and so disturbed her household that she was forced to move. Yet, Leah's next residence, half of a two-family house, was adjacent to a cemetery -- an odd choice for someone eager to escape hauntings.

Mrs. Fox soon joined Leah and Katy, with Maggie in tow. No sooner were the younger sisters united than they grew bolder, filling the house with even more raucous ghost disturbances. Leah eventually decided that it was time to share the "spirits" with others. Appointing herself as official interpreter of the raps, she demanded that Maggie and Katy conduct séances in Rochester under her tutelage. To bolt was impossible, Maggie later explained, for Leah threatened to accuse her and Katy of deceiving her with raps -- just as they had their parents and the Hydesville community. Thus intimidated, an embittered Maggie later told the New York World, "Katie and I were led around like lambs."

The very first to be invited were Leah's closest friends, Amy and Isaac Post, a Quaker couple who were abolitionists, members of Rochester's underground railroad and leading social reformers. Earlier, the middle-aged couple had rejected their Hicksite Quaker sect because of its intolerances and thus seemed well suited to receiving Leah's new idea of spirit communication as a faith. When Leah described the hauntings in June 1948, the Posts initially laughed and then asked if the family were "suffering under some psychological delusion."

The couple, however, like others of that era, had lost several youngsters to illnesses, and ultimately they agreed to participate in a séance. To their surprise the messages Maggie and Katy rapped out and which Leah "translated" were so personal as to be convincing. The Posts immediately became believers and were soon enthusiastically promoting their belief in the Fox sisters' "spiritual manifestations" to others.

Leah's timing had been ideal. The notion of a collective spirit -- a benevolent force that endowed each human being with the capacity to right the world's wrongs -- was flowing through American thought. Spiritualism, as Leah would casually explain then and later in her memoir, The Missing Link in Modern Spiritualism, encompassed all souls regardless of race, gender, ethnicity or other religious affiliations. Intrigued with Leah's concept, the Posts and their circle soon accepted spiritualism as the first stirrings of a universalism or communalism -- a brotherhood of the human spirit that mirrored their own resolve to find an alternative faith devoid of intolerance.

Before long the Fox sisters were besieged with requests for séances. Sometimes with only Maggie, sometimes with only Katy and sometimes with both, Leah presided over the meetings. Once guests arrived, they sat around a table, recited an opening prayer and sang. After joining hands and sitting in silence, Maggie or Katy fell into a trance. Then the audience heard the faint sound of ghostly raps.

Not everyone, of course, believed them. Members of Rochester's clergy railed against them as witches and heretics. Some citizens considered the séances evil and unnatural. Still others thought the sisterly trio was mad. Privately, Maggie continued to wrestle with her own concept of reality. Complicating that was Leah's sudden insistence that the spirits were real -- a concept that her youngest sister, Katy, by then 12 years old, had readily accepted. Confused by her sisters' reaction, Maggie became increasingly introverted and moody.

Only once did Maggie decide to revolt, and she did so by refusing to rap for 12 days. Abruptly the séances stopped, Leah grew tense and the household funds dwindled. The resultant upheaval was too much for Maggie to bear and finally she relented. "Once heard again, the raps," Leah later recounted, "[were] like the return of long absent friends."

In the fall of 1849, Leah announced that the spirits had demanded that she and Maggie publicize spiritualism to the larger Rochester community. "Hire Corinthian Hall," Rochester's largest auditorium, they had proclaimed. The designated night was Wednesday, November 14, the time 7 p.m., the price of a ticket 25 cents. The audience, reported the Rochester Daily Democrat, was in the "best possible humor," ready to be entertained by what they anticipated as an exposé of the sisters who they thought were perpetrating a fraud.

That night Maggie sat timorously on a platform at Corinthian Hall next to Leah and Mr. and Mrs. Post as a jeering audience hissed. Grudgingly, the Rochester Daily Democrat later admitted "that THE GHOST was there...[but] the more the ghost rapped with that muffled tone, the higher rose the spirit of mirth."

Afterward, an outraged group of citizens demanded that a committee of Rochester's most prominent citizens examine Maggie and Leah to discover the source of the sounds. The following morning the sisters complied, but following the committee's investigation, its members remained perplexed. That Thursday night a committee representative confessed to the restive audience their inability to explain the phenomenon. Desperately, still other committees attempted to test Maggie and Leah -- placing them on glass, on pillows and even by appointing a subcommittee of ladies to discover if they had concealed any "machinery" in their underclothes.

With each unsuccessful committee report, the crowds at Corinthian Hall grew increasingly raucous. On the final night, Saturday, November 17, tensions in the auditorium were palpable: Already a barrel of warmed tar had been detected in a stairway and removed. Finally, as a committee representative began to admit that the sounds defied explanation, "Stamping, shrieking and all kinds of hideous noises...obliged him to desist," Isaac Post later wrote. Blinding cascades of light from firecrackers lit by raucous nonbelievers exploded in the back of the auditorium. In the resultant smoke and din, men howled that the "females" must have concealed lead balls in their dresses to make sounds and attempted to storm the stage. Thanks to police intervention, Maggie, Leah, the Posts and other terrified spiritualists were whisked out of the building.

Implying that the committee's studies had been at worst rigged, or at best incomplete, the Rochester Daily Advertiser complained that the "wary and eagle-eyed are kept out and excluded from [an] opportunity of investigation." A reporter at Horace Greeley's New York Tribune observed, "It is difficult to understand why spirits, who act with as little reason as children or idiots, would spend time thumping the wall." The attendant publicity nevertheless transformed Maggie and her sisters into celebrities, and they were now recognized, for good or ill, as leaders of a new social and religious movement. They began to carry their message further afield.

In early June 1850, after touring Albany and Troy, the Fox sisters sailed down the Hudson River and arrived in New York City, where they soon began receiving guests and giving séances. Within two days of their arrival, they were invited to appear before some of Manhattan's most illustrious literati -- among them, historian George Bancroft; William Cullen Bryant, poet and editor of the progressive Evening Post; poet and essayist Henry Tuckerman; Nathaniel Parker Willis, editor of the society-minded Home Journal; and author James Fenimore Cooper.

That evening Maggie and her sisters raised the spirit of Cooper's sister and so precisely described her fatal horseback riding accident of 50 years earlier that the famous author instantly became a believer. The New York Tribune's George Ripley, who also had been present, wrote: "We are in the dark as any of our readers. The manners and bearing of the ladies are such as to create a prepossession in their favor. They have no theories to offer in explanation of the acts...and apparently have no control of their incomings and outgoings." Some newspapers that formerly had accused the Fox sisters of devil baiting and fraud now retracted their comments. Even the openly scornful New York Herald admitted that its reporter believed the "ladies were in every sense incapable of any intentional deception."

Predictably, the Fox sisters -- or Rochester Rappers as they were dubbed -- were besieged with requests for séances. By summer's end actress Mary Taylor crooned a new song on Broadway, "The Rochester Rappers at Barnum's Hotel." Inexpensive souvenirs were sold emblazoned with the "Rochester Rappers." "Ladies, you are the lions of New York!" Tribune reporter Ripley finally told the sisters.

After that New York reception, spiritualism was hailed as one of the wonders of the age. Periodicals with titles such as Spirit World, Spiritual Philosopher, New Era and The Spiritualist Messenger appeared. To the nation's new believers, mediumship, with its odd knocking sounds and eerie messages, was a "spiritual telegraph" -- a name subsequently appearing on the masthead of the faith's leading periodical.

Mediums appeared from Vermont to California claiming that they, too, had spiritualist powers. Much like Maggie and Katy, many were pubescent girls and young women who were thought to have souls so pure that they were perfect intermediaries between the two worlds. In Boston, Mrs. Sisson, a so-called "clairvoyant physician," and Lucinda Tuttle, among others, attracted large followings; so too in Buffalo, N.Y., did a pretty blonde teenager, Cora Scott. In Providence, R.I., Edgar Allen Poe's former fiancée, Sarah Helen Whitman, wrote trance-inspired spiritualist poetry. In Hartford, Conn., crowds of ailing individuals waited to see Semantha Mettler, whose trances were said to effect miraculous cures.

Spiritualism, with its guiding principle of the equality of all souls regardless of race, gender, ethnicity or religious affiliation, was inspired by, and inspired the growth of, other reformist movements of the time. Like the women behind those causes, female mediums broke the rules of Victorian propriety and spoke out, albeit in a trance voice, and many became financially independent, encouraging others to follow suit. It is no wonder that there soon came to be a close link between spiritualism, temperance, abolition and women's rights.

But the spiritualist movement was not exclusively female. Among its most prominent spokespersons were former Universalist ministers Reverend Charles Hammond, author of the 1852 Light from the Spirit World, and Reverend Samuel Byron Brittan, co-publisher of The Spiritual Telegraph. In Athens, Ohio, musical spirits directed Jonathan Koons, an uneducated farmer, to build a "spirit room." In nearby Columbus George Walcutt and George Rogers painted portraits of people they never knew -- which, eerily, relatives later identified as deceased members of their families. In Connecticut a young Scottish orphan, Daniel Douglas Home, was already becoming famous for his levitations during séances.

Some of America's most distinguished men also counted themselves as believers, and several, such as General Waddy Thompson, former U.S. representative from South Carolina, General Edward Bullard of New York and former Wisconsin Territory Governor Nathaniel Tallmadge, were the Fox sisters' personal friends. To the astonishment of the scientific community, their renowned colleague, Professor Emeritus Robert Hare, the University of Pennsylvania chemist who invented the oxyhydrogen blowpipe, enthusiastically endorsed spiritualism.

By 1852 spirit circles had been formed in Boston, New York, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Cleveland, Chicago, Cincinnati, San Francisco and Washington, D.C., and even across the Atlantic in England and Europe. Paralleling spiritualism's spread was an array of new "spiritual manifestations" including table tipping, spirit music and dancing lights. There were, as well, growing demands for serious scientific investigations.

Between 1853 and 1855, spiritualism's popularity soared so dramatically that many of America's most prominent writers, thinkers and scientists became alarmed. Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson was so disgusted with the movement's rapid spread that he denounced it as a "rat revelation, the gospel that comes by taps in the wall and humps in the table drawer." Poet James Russell ridiculed the idea that spirits had the ability to raise tables and move chairs. Respect should be paid to all spiritualists, he sardonically remarked, including a certain Judge Wells, a man who was such a powerful medium that he was forced to "drive back the furniture from following him when he goes out, as one might a pack of too affectionate dogs."

By 1854, followers, according to the spiritualists' own estimates, numbered from 1 to 2 million Americans. In the spring of that year, the prevalence of reports about uncanny spiritualist phenomena appearing in America's cities attracted the attention of the U.S. Congress. On April 17, General James Shields, a senator from Illinois, and Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts presented a petition signed by 15,000 Americans requesting the appointment of a scientific commission to study spiritualist phenomena. Ultimately, in an executive session, there was a "pleasant debate" during which senators suggested that the petition be referred to one of several possible groups -- including the committees on foreign relations, on military affairs or on post offices and post roads -- the last because of the possibility of establishing "spiritual telegraph between the material and spiritual worlds." In the end the petition was tabled.

The debate continued. Spiritualism, founding editor of The New York Times Henry Raymond lamented in September 1855, had an appeal that "is wider, stronger and deeper than that of any philosophical or socialistic theory, since it appeals to the marvelous in man." He continued: "In five years it has spread like wildfire over this continent so that there is scarcely a village without its mediums and its miracles....If it be a delusion, it has misled very many of the intelligent as well as the ignorant...."

A month later, an increasingly alarmed Raymond added: "Clergymen, formerly preachers of evangelical denominations, are now lecturing on Spiritualism and its wildest heresies to large congregations. The whole West, and to a greater extent the whole country, has been deeply infiltrated." Yet, despite the ongoing protests, by 1856 several influential religious leaders embraced spiritualism -- among them prominent Unitarian ministers Thomas Wentworth Higginson and Theodore Parker. Ironically, spiritualism, with its promise of a joyous afterlife, the comfort it gave mourners and the confidence it imparted to America's early suffragists and social reformers would ultimately betray Maggie and Katy. As new mediums appeared and produced increasingly spectacular effects -- table tippings and levitations, for example -- and subsequent investigations exposed many as frauds, the Fox sisters were often pushed from center stage. At times believing the rappings were the manifestations of spirits and at times wracked by guilt induced by their deceptions, the two quarreled with each other and their supporters.

In the fall of 1888 when Maggie publicly admitted that spiritualism was a fraud, nonbelievers rejoiced. Advocates blamed it on the fact that for some time Maggie -- as well as her sister Katy -- had been slipping into severe alcoholism. A year later when Maggie recanted her confession, the credibility of the Fox sisters shriveled, and they slipped into obscurity. Katy died of end-stage alcoholism on July 1, 1892, and Maggie on March 8 the following year.

Yet the mysterious raps heard in Hydesville in 1848 sowed the seeds of spiritualism that have continued to sprout, evolve and flourish to the present day. Even today, spiritualism, represented by celebrity mediums, the practice of channeling, descriptions of near-death experiences, New Age philosophies, hundreds of books and a spate of new television shows and movies featuring conversations with the dead, continues to fascinate.

article was written by Nancy Rubin Stuart and originally published in the August 2005 issue of American History Magazine.

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7/2/05 Corpses on the Moors

2005-07-02T20:18:00.000-05:00

Corpses on the Moors

A Vampire Graveyard in Northern Europe?

By Matthias Schulz

A 2,600-year-old corpse has been discovered in the moors of northern Germany. It's not the only one. Such finds are frequent, but have posed an increasingly large riddle: Why were so many of the bodies victims of violence and dismemberment?

AP/ NIEDERSÄCHISCHES LANDESAMT FÜR DENKMALPFLEGE
The hand of the corpse discovered in the Uchter Moor in northern Germany.
Its blade plunging into the earth, the peat-cutting machine crept slowly through the Grosses Uchter Moor (Great Uchte Moor) in the northern German state of Lower Saxony. A worker stacked the sections of turf sliced free by the guillotine-like blade. Suddenly he paused, something having caught his eye. "What's this? An old leather jacket?"

It wasn't. In fact, what the worker had dredged from the moor was a large piece of human skin. It was followed by long bones, a foot, fingernails, an open ribcage and more and more hair, everything colored rust-red by acids in the bog.

The gruesome find was made in Sept. 2000, but it was only last week that the press got wind of it -- and hailed it as a sensation. It was, after all, the first time in 20 years that an ancient corpse had been pulled out of the German moors. "We're overjoyed," says Henning Hassmann of the State Office of Historic Preservation in Hanover.

The corpse found in the bogs is that of a teenage girl, between 16 and 19 years old -- and with perfect teeth. According to the radiocarbon dating method, the corpse is from 650 B.C., meaning she was likely part of an early Germanic tribe. But that wasn't immediately obvious. Because the well-preserved corpse was nude, the criminal investigation department concluded the girl had been the victim of a sex crime and sent the corpse to the forensic medicine department in Hamburg. But the forensic experts were unable to find any evidence of violence. The file was soon forgotten and began to gather dust. Only when peat-cutters -- working at the same location again in January 2005 --happened across more bones embedded in the moor did the officials begin questioning their earlier assessment.

Sliced up like a salami

The case has now been turned over to the State Office for the Conservation of Monuments and Archaeology, which says that the body has been "excellently" preserved -- indeed, comparisons have been made to Oetzi, the perfectly preserved, 5,000-year-old mummy pulled from an Alpine glacier in 1991. The newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine was also enthusiastic. The "delicate hand" of the dead girl, the paper wrote, is "curved, as if it had been drawn in prayer by Albrecht Duerer."

But the truth isn't quite so poetic. During the harvesting of peat for nurseries, the machine's blades sliced up the ancient Germanic tribeswoman like a salami. "We have 100 parts," Hassmann admits. One scapula and two ribs are missing entirely.

AP/ NIEDERSÄCHISCHES LANDESAMT FÜR DENKMALPFLEGE
The 2,650-year-old corpse was shredded by peat harvesting machinery.
Out in Uchte Moor, dig supervisor Alf Metzler is busy searching for more bones and says that 90 percent of the skeleton has so far been recovered. Endoscopes and computer tomographs will soon examine the insides of the corpse -- the researchers will be looking for worms and pollen and scanning the skeleton for growth disorders and other anomalies.

Their initial findings are already perplexing. The girl had ventured deep into the bogs, which surprises the researchers. "The next hard-surface path was two kilometers away," says Metzler. The woman had nimbly hopped from hump to hump -- dry islands that were covered with heather and stunted trees, offering a person walking through the bogs solid ground.

The moor covered an area of several square kilometers and -- like many highland moors -- was often covered in fog. And it was dangerous -- anyone unlucky enough to slip into the hollows between the dry humps was a goner.

Did the woman commit suicide? Or was she fleeing from something? Perhaps she was just gathering birds' eggs. Metzler introduces another idea: He imagines that the woman may have been some sort of a witch who used herbs to practice her art and had ventured into the bogs to gather bilberries. The blue fruits have an intoxicating effect, and were used as a drug by the early Germanic tribes. But at this point, explanations are premature and nothing more than conjecture.

Beaten to death and buried in the moors

DER SPIEGEL
Pre-historic bodies found throughout Northern Europe.
Around the time of Christ's birth, vast, foreboding highland moors covered the hinterlands along the North Sea coast. According to ancient sources, the farmers built their huts along the edges of these grassy swamps, and plank paths led through them. But despite precautions, people were constantly falling into the swamps. About a thousand moor corpses have reportedly been discovered, mainly in the Netherlands, northern Germany and Denmark. In some cases, the skin is well-preserved while the skeleton has decomposed -- leaving the corpses look like empty hoses.

These naturally preserved bodies keep revealing new details. The Danish "Tollund Man" was found wearing a leather cap. Others wore fine shoes or luxurious woven coats. Some mummies are tattooed, and some were found with apple seeds in their stomachs and round worms in their intestines.

Signs of violence are common among the moor corpses. Many were strangled or beaten to death before falling into their wet graves. Others had puncture wounds in their chests. The famous "Red Franz" was killed by a knife wound to his throat.

Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum Hannover
Red Franz was killed by a knife jab to the throat.
But why? It's known that the Germanic tribes offered human sacrifices to their supreme deity, Wotan. They also buried weapons and other spoils of war in the swamps. It is likely that they believed the gods were especially nearby in the lonely and barren moors.

But most of the dead in the peat bogs are apparently victims of the ancient Nordic justice system. The historian Tacitus reports that among the Germanic tribes ordinary criminals were publicly hanged on tree branches. But anyone who had committed "shameful acts," or violations of the moral decency laws, was secretly executed in the moor. This torture, Tacitus continues, was suffered by "cowards in battle" and, more importantly, the "lewd." This is probably a reference to homosexual men, and perhaps those accused of perverse crimes and adulterers. The "Girl of Windeby" ended up in the moor with her head shaved, and her thumb is obscenely placed between her index and middle fingers.

But the disabled also apparently ended up in the clutches of the secret courts. "A noticeably large number of moor corpses had a physical disability," explains Dusseldorf forensics expert Peter Pieper. The 16-year-old "Girl of Yde" suffered from abnormal curvature of the spine. The "Boy of Kayhausen," the moor corpse of a six-year-old boy discovered in 1922 and now on display in the northern German city of Oldenburg -- had last eaten millet and sorrel, and his abdominal wall is torn, the result, researchers believe, of a blow. The hip is crooked, the result of a condition known as ankylotic hip and the boy apparently had a heavy limp.

Sentenced to die by the "moral courts"

He was attacked at some point around 200 A.D. -- stabbed twice in the neck below the left ear, then a third time from the front, just missing the throat. The boy appears to have tried to defend himself, because the blade also penetrated his raised upper arm. Then the murderers elaborately tied up the boy with a noose.

Such signs of brutality are typical. Many moor corpses were essentially killed more than once; the experts call it "overkill." The true scope of these atrocities has only recently come to light. A few weeks ago, Canadian forensic doctor Heather Gill-Robinson examined the "Moor Corpse of Daetgen," concluding that the man (between 40 and 60 years old) was beheaded. He was also stabbed in the chest and his penis was cut off.

DPA
Parts of the skeleton from the new find in the Uchte Moor.
Researchers believe that there was an irrational reason for this overkill. The "lewd" had violated taboos and the holy moral decency laws. They were considered impure and shameful, tainted by the stench of what was considered evil sexual passion (because it was forbidden). It was believed they would return to the world of the living to exact revenge.

"The Germanic tribes were afraid of vampires," explains Hassmann. To render them harmless, they were ritually mutilated. Archeologist Michael Gebuehr, who will unveil a moor corpse exhibit titled "Paths into the Afterlife" in the northern German city of Schleswig this week, calls this superstition "fear of demons." According to Gebuehr, the wooden huts of the Germanic tribes were filled with tall tales and horror stories about living corpses, zombies and "Nachzehrern" -- demons that would plunge their teeth into the flesh of innocent sleepers at night.

To prevent all of this, the condemned had to be kept far away from this life. Some moor corpses were impaled. Others were covered with stones or weighed down with fencing material made of branches and twigs. These were all precautions intended to prevent them from leaving the moor as the undead.

Solving the ancient crime

Burning the unholy corpses -- a normal burial custom at the time -- was out of the question. "The evil spirits would have risen into the air with the smoke," Gebuehr explains, "and would then have been everywhere."

Instead, they were chained and banished. The mechanism that was used to kill the "Man from Juehrdenerfeld," discovered in 1934, was especially elaborate. His body was placed into a moor hole and weighed down with a grid of stakes. To prevent him from lifting the grid, the undertakers had pulled the man's two arms from his shoulders.

High-tech tests being performed on the most recent find, the Girl from Uchte, could reveal whether she ended up in the bogs as one of these victims of the court of morals.

It's possible, of course, that the girl simply lost her footing while gathering eggs. But perhaps she was tied up by court thugs, taken into the highland moor, executed and locked away in a vampire grave, a peat-encased tomb from which they believed she could never escape. "Anything is possible," says Hassmann.

In the region near Uchte, on a peat meadow and surrounded by the clamor of crows, archeologist Metzler keeps digging away. He plans to continue searching for body parts until the end of this week. He hopes to find broaches used to tie robes or bits of clothing.

"The police may have been barking up the wrong tree back then," he says, "but the episode remains a criminal case."

Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan

7/2/05 God or Nation

2005-07-02T20:15:00.000-05:00

WEBCommentary Contributor
Author: James Atticus Bowden
Bio: James Atticus Bowden
Date: July 2, 2005

God or Nation

What is sacred?

Is Nation holy like God? Are they the same or different in sacredness? Individual Americans should consider the proper order of things as the Sovereigns of United States of America if we are to remain the Sovereigns and keep the Republic. We will choose one National destiny or another. How we discern between the sacred and the state reveals our world view, and more than anything else, will determine which destiny we follow and how well we survive, let alone succeed.

On June 22nd, 2005 the House of Representatives passed an Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to make desecration of the American flag unlawful. Courts struck down flag protection laws as un-Constitutional restrictions on free speech. Likewise, the U.S. Congress passed legislation to make infanticide, called partial-birth abortion, unlawful. Courts struck down partial-birth abortion bans as un-Constitutional restrictions on an imaginary right for privacy. Yet, the U.S. Congress is utterly unwilling to pass a Constitutional Amendment to make murdering a healthy unborn baby illegal. Protect the cloth flag, but not the living unborn. Which is sacred - life or symbols? Both?

The Flag Amendment places a national symbol on a public pedestal of sacredness. Meanwhile, what is truly sacred – prayer and life – are abused by judges with impunity. Also, the historical truth may not be holy, but most holy of all history, Jesus Christ, said, “I am the truth.” Truth must be special if not sacred. (In fact, since one Commandment is “Thou shalt not lie”, the truth is sacred – belonging to God - indeed.)

Then, what does it mean if Americans may not damage the flag nor place the Ten Commandments inside a public place? Something is wrong.

Nothing is sacred unless it belongs to God. Nothing is worthy of worship below God. ‘Nation’ may stand second, even ahead of family and self-preservation, to demand loyalty, duty and treasure. But, Nation is not God, unless it is the Israel of the Bible – not today’s secular, socialist State. Likewise, the secular American State, GOTUS (Government of the United States) is not of God. America may be blessed as a Nation, a People, or as individual Americans, but the government and its symbols are not sacred. Important, but not holy.

Liberals are hysterical that the U.S. is becoming a Christian theocracy. The more likely danger is that the U.S. is becoming a Human Secular theocracy. Human Secularism is a religion despite the protests from Liberals that they are un-church, un-God, and a-religious. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Human Secularism is a religion. Which makes the cultural cleansing of Judeo-Christian history, symbols and laws by the courts to promote their own religion – Human Secularism - all the more ironic. Yet, sinister trumps irony.

Human Secularism is a modern Paganism. It worships the gods of small ‘g’ like race, class and gender(s), but the chief god is ‘self’. Elevating Nation into its pantheon, even if it is our tenderly loved America, is wrong. Making the flag a graven symbol is wrong. Punching out a flag-burner is better, more personal and poetic justice. Fists exercise as much freedom of expression as the fire.

Tyrannical judges act like black-robed Priest-Kings for Human Secularism. Step by step they deny the God and Natural Law of the Declaration of the Independence. Judges made up when life begins, ends, and what is moral, right and wrong, during life. Judges legislate, appropriate money, enforce execution of their writs as law, limit political speech, and open property to unjust taking – despite the Constitution that expressly forbids such and gives the powers to the Federal Executive and, above all, the Congress and the States and individual citizens.

Judges don’t want the Ten Commandments in public buildings, especially in court rooms, because The People might be reminded there is a higher authority and power than lawyers in costumes. The judges brook no challenges in their temples. The Judiciary doesn’t want their equally political branch of government held in checks and balances by the other branches.

Congress should limit Court jurisdiction, as the Constitution empowers, on ridiculous rulings that a historical plaque establishes a church. The whole realm of establishment and free exercise of religion, like public prayer, can’t be left to Pagan Priest-Kings. Conflict of interest. Finally, there is a Religious Freedom Amendment in Congress.

Also, Congress should limit the Court’s jurisdiction on the family – birth, marriage and death – to keep what laws are needed at the appropriate place – in the state legislatures. Forget flag-burning. Focus on the right priority, please.

James Atticus Bowden

Biography - James Atticus Bowden

James Atticus Bowden has specialized in inter-disciplinary long range 'futures' studies for over a decade. He is employed by a Defense Department contractor. He is a retired United States Army Infantry Officer. He is a 1972 graduate of the United States Military Academy and earned graduate degrees from Harvard University and Columbia University. He holds two elected Republican Party offices in Virginia.

7/2/05 Demonic possession should be treated by psychiatrists, not just exorcists, author says

2005-07-02T20:06:00.000-05:00

Demonic possession should be treated by psychiatrists, not just exorcists, author says
Dark forces
By Peggy Fletcher Stack
The Salt Lake Tribune

SANDY - Three believers sit around a table in the prayer room at Salt Lake Christian Fellowship, casually chatting before the "deliverance." There's Mary, the one with the demons; Sharon Seevinck, a full-time exorcist; and John Sooklaris, who, they say, has a gift for seeing. They are all middle-aged and remarkably ordinary. No white collars in sight.

Mary (not her real name) had a great-grandmother, two grandmothers and mother with mental illness, as well as a brother who killed himself, she says, and she suffered from schizophrenia and a bipolar disorder for 20 years before being healed by prayer sometime last year. God banished the voices in her head, hallucinations, and her emphysema but she still battles depression, anxiety about witchcraft and thoughts of suicide. She wants these demons gone, too.

Sooklaris says he sees a white sign over Mary's head that reads, "witch" so they begin there. Mary bows her head and closes her eyes.

"I command the spirit of witchcraft to go, you go, you go from here. I cancel the spells, go, go in Jesus' name. I speak to the generational witchcraft, you go, you go. Go in the name of Jesus Christ, you leave. Be gone. We sever any ties to witchcraft and we say to this spirit of witchcraft you get out of her," Seevinck says quietly over and over. At times, she places her hand above Mary's heart, on her arm, her forehead. She anoints Mary's head or ears with oil.

Periodically, she exchanges glances with Sooklaris, eager to determine if he has seen the demons leave. He shakes his head. Not yet.

"I see a black lace veil over her face," he says, then gets up and makes gestures as if he is removing it.

They continue to badger and belittle Mary's demons. First, witchcraft, then suicidal thoughts, worry and finally, paranoia. They lean closer to her, focusing their intense prayers.

"You go, your powers are canceled, you come out of her, your assignment is over," repeats Seevinck in her calm, steady voice. Sooklaris is more impatient and insistent.

"You loose this precious child," he says. "You go Ð out her throat."

Mary's head rolls back and then forward. Sometimes her eyes are open as she stares straight ahead or down. During the attack on her suicidal thoughts, she yawns many times as if the air has been sucked out of her.

At one point, Sooklaris says he sees worry beads in her right hand and at another time a knotted bedsheet noose around Mary's neck. He again mimes removing it.

To that, Mary replies that she had considered taking her life that way. But she is mostly silent, absorbing the verbal assaults on her demons.

And so it goes for two undisturbed hours in the prayer room.

In the end, Mary straightens up, opens her eyes, puts her glasses back on and says, "That was fabulous. I feel much better."

She senses she is not entirely free, though, so makes an appointment for another deliverance in two months.

A centuries-old tradition: What most people know about exorcism, they learned by watching the "The Exorcist," a 1973 horror film re-released in 2000. It tells of a 12-year-old girl unexpectedly overcome with superhuman strength and supernatural effects like scratching walls, flying chests and rocking beds. She growls, levitates and makes her head spin around 360 degrees while spitting profanities and vomiting on Catholic priests trying to help her.

The movie is based on a William Peter Blatty novel, which drew on a 1949 published report of demonic possession of a Maryland boy. Because the movie and real exorcism involved priests, most people think it's exclusively a Catholic rite.

But ridding people of dark forces goes well beyond that ancient faith. Most other Christians including some mainline Protestants, Orthodox, Evangelicals, Charismatics like Seevinck, Pentecostals and Mormons have routine ways of wrestling with the devil. So do Muslims and some Jews.

Now comes best-selling author M. Scott Peck, who wrote The Road Less Travelled and People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil, with his own tale of exorcism.

In the 1970s, not long after being baptized into the Episcopal Church, Peck found himself officiating at two exorcisms, he writes in Glimpses of Evil: A Psychiatrist's Personal Accounts of Possession, Exorcism, and Redemption.

"They were two of the most extraordinary experiences of my life," Peck said in a phone interview from his Connecticut home. "I just felt as I got older I could not go to my grave taking these stories with me."

The first involved Jersey, a 27-year-old mother of two who had schizophrenic tendencies, had lost all interest in her life and family, and often wandered away from her children. During the four-day ritual, Peck saw Jersey's mouth contort into a "harsh, malicious grin" and her face was "convulsed with a haughty sneer."

One by one, four demons inhabiting Jersey identified themselves as Damien, Tyrona, Josiah and Emil. Finally, Peck would confront the Big Guy - Satan - himself.

"It is my belief - not wholly scientific - that these demons did have a kind of existence of their own, independent of Jersey's imagination," he writes.

Jersey's exorcism was successful, Peck said, and she became a responsible and relatively contented mother.

Peck's second case was with Beccah, a woman in her mid-40s, who had a bad marriage, difficult family relationships and severe depression. Though the exorcism initially seemed to work, Peck acknowledges in the book that he lost the war with her demons and she eventually killed herself.

Even still, Peck believes that demonic possession should be added to the list of mental disorders, with formal exorcism a viable treatment, if conducted under carefully controlled circumstances.

"I strongly suggest that demonology ought to be taken seriously and dealt with scientifically," he says.

But few psychologists and psychiatrists seem ready to make that leap.

"Even if we assume for a minute that there are such things as evil spirits and they can take over a person's body, how do you tease that out from other conditions that might mimic it?" asks Stephen Morris, past president of the Utah Psychological Association. "Back in New Testament times, some things were reported as evil spirits that clearly were epilepsy or some other physical condition."

Psychologists gave up the idea of evil spirits when they took up science, he says.

Adding demonic possession to the list of mental disorders would be "like teaching creationism in the schools," Morris says.

And if they did add it, what criteria would be used to determine the diagnosis? And who would be qualified to treat it, he wonders. "Would you have to be an ordained minister or have theological training to detect it?"

That's a big question, given that several would-be exorcists recently have produced disastrous results.

Two years ago, an 8-year-old autistic child died of asphyxiation in Milwaukee, during an exorcism carried out by members of the Faith Temple Church of the Apostolic Faith. And just last month, a Romanian Orthodox priest was arrested on murder charges for ordering a crucifixion for a 23-year-old nun because she was "possessed by the devil" and "had to be exorcised."

The need for deliverance: "Exorcism" is the term commonly used by Catholics. Other Christians, such as Seevinck, prefer the less controversial "deliverance."

Whether it's called exorcism or deliverance, she says, it is casting out demons. But she doesn't see these people as "possessed."

"Most people we pray for have a relationship with Jesus Christ," she says. "If a house has a cockroach in it, the house is not possessed by that cockroach. I see demons as irritations, squatters that are not supposed to be there. But the soul belongs to Jesus."

Before each deliverance, Seevinck asks participants to fill out a nine-page questionnaire that lists personal and family history including traumas, thoughts of suicide, depression, death in the family, involvement in a cult or witchcraft. Deliverance can undo curses, deal with trauma - especially sexual abuse - and bring emotional peace, she says.

She started this mission about 13 years ago when she prayed with a man who wanted to be freed from same-sex attractions. It worked miraculously, Seevinck claims.

"His wife saw significant changes in him. His eyes changed color. There was always a foul smell in the room when he woke up in the morning and that was gone. On top of that, he discovered her, fell in love with her."

Now Seevinck is a full-time minister at Salt Lake Christian Fellowship who does between three and five deliverances a week. Neither she nor the church charges for her services.

A few years ago, the charismatic preacher converted psychiatrist Jean Zehnder to the value of these deliverances. Zehnder suffered from anxiety during her psychiatric residency and neither therapy nor medications alleviated her suffering.

"When I had a deliverance, it was total healing, not just a Band-aid," she says.

Now a member of the International Society of Deliverance Ministers, Zehnder works to establish professional stand- ards so that ministry is not used inappropriately on mentally ill patients. She definitely believes that anxiety, depression, shame or self-hatred, anger, violence, suicidal thoughts and sexual problems often have a spiritual component.

"I minister to a lot of people from incest backgrounds," Zehnder says. "You can counsel with those people forever but praying with them seems much more effective."

And she has even seen cases with paranormal elements like something out of "The Exorcist."

"You can sometimes feel that something move inside of them, like having your hand on the abdomen of a pregnant woman," she says. "It is a very specific spirit, the spirit of a python, like the one listed in the Book of Acts."

The medical profession has turned its back on demons, but so has most of the Christian church, Zehnder says.

That's dangerous, Peck says. The devil is real and has a mission to destroy the human race.

"I call Satan an 'it' because unlike God, it has no creativity, no sexuality and is consistently hateful," he says. "But it is also stupid. If it weren't trying to show off, you'd never even get through to it in an exorcism. It wouldn't allow you to see it."

pstack@sltrib.com
E-mail your thoughts about this article to religioneditor@sltrib.com

7/2/05 A witch doctor's prescription for the lovelorn: Slaughter three cows

2005-07-02T20:04:00.000-05:00

A witch doctor's prescription for the lovelorn: Slaughter three cows
Andrew Robinson

IT is a cautionary tale of spiritual healing, slaughtered cows and potions hurled in rivers.

And it cost a Leeds woman hundreds of pounds when she used a "witch doctor" to try to win her partner back.

Maria Mannion visited a man called Mr Bamba, who advertises himself in Yellow Pages as a healer with 21 years' experience in getting rid of "black magic and evil cases".
After handing over cash, Miss Mannion was asked for some pubic hair before being handed "medicine" to throw in the River Aire.

Miss Mannion, 48, from Gledhow, Leeds, has urged vulnerable people to steer clear of Mr Bamba – who is now at the centre of a Trading Standards investigation.
The mother-of-two first went to Mr Bamba in April and paid a £20 consultation fee. She returned to his home in Luxor View, Harehills, Leeds, and was told to hand over £180.

She said: "He asked for a picture of my partner and started praying. Then he asked me to go into another room and cut some pubic hair which he put in an envelope.

"About two days later he rang me and I picked up some rubber things with tape around them. He said they had medicine in and I had to put one in my partner's chair, one in my pocket or handbag and the other in the river."

She claimed that later Mr Bamba asked for a further £1,000.

"I only had £600 and gave him that. He gave me two more bits of rubber and said to throw them in the river and me and my partner would 'float back together'."

She added: "I feel silly now but there's something about him and the way he looks into your face when he's talking."

Eventually she was told to slaughter three cows to save her relationship. Mr Bamba offered to have a friend in Africa do it for her – at the cost of £120 a cow.

West Yorkshire Trading Standards officials are to send him a warning letter about making certain health claims, but they don't have power to close him down.

A spokesman said: "We have been to see Mr Bamba who says he is going to give some money back to this woman, but there is a dispute about it."

Mr Bamba said: "I can't explain what I do, my English is not so good. I know what I am doing, I know what I am talking about. Spiritual healer is my work."

He added: "I can't tell you what I can do. My techniques are secret. I have to ask the spirit. I can't do anything before I have information from him. If I want him at any time I can call him."

MP Fabian Hamilton (Lab, Leeds North East) now proposes to raise the issue in the Commons. He said: "This is witch doctoring and I will be asking how people like this can set themselves up and exploit people in this way."

02 July 2005

7/2/05 Constantine's stamp on early Christian art

2005-07-02T20:03:00.000-05:00

Constantine's stamp on early Christian art
By Roderick Conway Morris International Herald Tribune

SATURDAY, JULY 2, 2005

RIMINI, Italy The pagan Roman emperors were, in many respects, tolerant of diversity of belief. What made the Christians obnoxious was their refusal to recognize the emperor, and therefore the state, as the supreme authority.

One of the worst periods of suppression, the "Great Persecution" under the Emperor Diocletian, almost immediately preceded an extraordinary "volte-face." The Edict of Milan of 313, declared not only general freedom of worship, but mentioned the Christians by name and particularly favored them. A dozen years later, Christianity became the official state religion.

The prime author of the edict was Constantine, then one of the joint rulers of the Roman empire. In the following years, he eliminated the last of his rivals and reunified the empires of east and west. In 330, he inaugurated a new capital bearing his name on the shores of the Bosporus, and it would remain a bastion of Christianity in the east for more than 1,100 years. In the west, the primacy of the religion he adopted endured until the 20th century.

The long-term implications for Western and Near Eastern art of Christianity's official status were enormous, but what was the impact during this early, transitional period? This is expertly examined and illustrated by "Constantine the Great" at the Castel Sismondo, a gathering of more than 250 pieces of sculpture, mosaic, painting, ivories, glass and other objects from numerous European sources. (The exhibition continues until Sept. 4.)

While he protected and promoted Christianity, Constantine was for most of his life himself not strictly a Christian - he was baptized shortly before his death in 337. He was declared emperor by popular acclamation of the troops at York in England in 306, after the death of his father, the ruler of this northern zone of the empire.

In 312, he marched on Rome to unseat one of his rivals, Maxentius. On the eve of battle, with the odds heavily against him, Constantine had a visionary experience. He saw in the evening sky an image of the Greek letter "chi" (ch) combined with the "ro" (r), the first letters of Christ's name, and heard a voice saying: "In hoc signes vinces" (With this sign you will win).

He had this device, the "Christogram," painted on his soldier's shields and on his banner instead of the Roman eagle into battle. They routed Maxentius, who drowned in the Tiber as he fled.

From that moment, Constantine believed that he had forged a personal alliance with the God worshiped by the Christians, without formally joining the church himself. He rather enlisted the church, so long seen as an enemy of the state, into his personal service, presenting himself as the God-favored ruler of the Roman state. The "Christogram" became the first imperial Christian symbol to receive wide currency in both west and east. But it is conceivable that, had the God of the Christians not continued to deliver a series of decisive victories, Constantine might have eventually sought divine assistance from elsewhere.

As befitted an emperor, Constantine's main contribution to imperial Christian art was in the form of grand monumental architecture. In Rome, where he spent only a few months of his life, he had constructed the first Vatican basilica over the tomb of St. Peter, and the church of what is now known as St. John Lateran, as well as the largest Roman triumphal arch ever built. In the rest of the empire, he built imposing basilicas as far apart as the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople and that of Trier in Germany.

Constantine was born in Naissus, present-day Nish in Serbia, around 272. His mother, Helena, was a bargirl of humble stock, whom his father never married and whom he abandoned to make a more advantageous dynastic marriage. Constantine remained devoted to her, and she became an important force in advancing the Christian cause. She undertook serious archaeological excavation on the Hill of Golgotha, unearthing not only what was accepted as the "True Cross" but even the Crucifixion nails. Subsequently, she raised the basilica of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem.

Pre-Constantinian Christian art tended to be modest, which was inevitable given that it was an underground religion for much of the time. Subterranean cemeteries, which came to be called catacombs, were one of the principal clandestine meeting places for Christians. The secret language of the early Christians is still preserved there: the fish, representing Christ; the anchor, hope and steadfastness; the garden or a tree, paradise; the bird, the soul (or if a dove, the Holy Spirit), and so on. Most of these emblems took the form of graffiti, paintings or carvings of the utmost simplicity.

But as the religion came into the limelight, grander, more complex artistic expressions were possible. Basilicas of the Constantinian period were fairly plain externally but were sumptuously decorated within, with frescoes, glittering mosaics, rich silken fabrics and gold and silver vessels for the celebration of the Eucharist.

Richer Christians could advertise their faith even in death by commissioning ornate sarcophagi adorned with religious symbols, biblical figures and narratives. Indeed, a new form of "frieze sarcophagus" allowing for greater numbers of figures and scenes, emerged during this time. These sarcophagi seem to have been made in the same workshops that continued to cater to pagans, and in them we can witness the blending of pagan and Christian imagery - the persistence, for example, of cupids, typical pre-Christian funerary emblems.

There was, in fact, a great deal of continuity between the art of the new religion and the old. Candles and incense were burned before devotional images, as they had been before statues of the gods; holy water was placed in basins at the entrance of churches, as it had been at temples; Christ and the saints were depicted with halos, as the powerful and wise had been before. And in time the pagan roots of these practices were simply forgotten.

Constantine's consolidation of power ushered in an era of peace and prosperity. The life of the court was itinerant as the supreme leader tirelessly toured his domains, dealing with state affairs and supervising the military structures to ensure the security of the empire's borders. Senior officials, too, resided at different times in different places and might have properties widely dispersed in various provinces. The style of luxury goods surviving in locations throughout the empire is remarkably uniform, and increasingly they bore the insignia of the new faith.

Gift-giving at court and in the upper echelons of society was lavish. Objects such as intricately carved ivories and beautifully wrought silver dishes were produced in multiple copies, customarily at least 30.

Many of these luxury objects, secular in origin, were donated to cathedrals and churches, where - jealously guarded in ecclesiastical treasuries and regarded as sacrosanct by barbarian invaders who had also embraced Christianity - they survived the centuries, leaving us with precious evidence of the artifacts of a world gradually undergoing Christianization.

The church remained profoundly Roman, even when it more vigorously tried to repudiate its pagan cradle. Fears of these links with the past helped stoke at various times Iconoclasm in the east and later Protestantism in the west, while in the lands where the influence of papal Rome was greatest, the devotion to sacred statues, for example, remained as passionate as in times of old. Even today, Greek Christians colloquially refer to themselves as "romi" (Romans). And St. Constantine and his mother, St. Helena, are especially revered in the Greek Orthodox Church.

RIMINI, Italy The pagan Roman emperors were, in many respects, tolerant of diversity of belief. What made the Christians obnoxious was their refusal to recognize the emperor, and therefore the state, as the supreme authority.

One of the worst periods of suppression, the "Great Persecution" under the Emperor Diocletian, almost immediately preceded an extraordinary "volte-face." The Edict of Milan of 313, declared not only general freedom of worship, but mentioned the Christians by name and particularly favored them. A dozen years later, Christianity became the official state religion.

The prime author of the edict was Constantine, then one of the joint rulers of the Roman empire. In the following years, he eliminated the last of his rivals and reunified the empires of east and west. In 330, he inaugurated a new capital bearing his name on the shores of the Bosporus, and it would remain a bastion of Christianity in the east for more than 1,100 years. In the west, the primacy of the religion he adopted endured until the 20th century.

The long-term implications for Western and Near Eastern art of Christianity's official status were enormous, but what was the impact during this early, transitional period? This is expertly examined and illustrated by "Constantine the Great" at the Castel Sismondo, a gathering of more than 250 pieces of sculpture, mosaic, painting, ivories, glass and other objects from numerous European sources. (The exhibition continues until Sept. 4.)

While he protected and promoted Christianity, Constantine was for most of his life himself not strictly a Christian - he was baptized shortly before his death in 337. He was declared emperor by popular acclamation of the troops at York in England in 306, after the death of his father, the ruler of this northern zone of the empire.

In 312, he marched on Rome to unseat one of his rivals, Maxentius. On the eve of battle, with the odds heavily against him, Constantine had a visionary experience. He saw in the evening sky an image of the Greek letter "chi" (ch) combined with the "ro" (r), the first letters of Christ's name, and heard a voice saying: "In hoc signes vinces" (With this sign you will win).

He had this device, the "Christogram," painted on his soldier's shields and on his banner instead of the Roman eagle into battle. They routed Maxentius, who drowned in the Tiber as he fled.

From that moment, Constantine believed that he had forged a personal alliance with the God worshiped by the Christians, without formally joining the church himself. He rather enlisted the church, so long seen as an enemy of the state, into his personal service, presenting himself as the God-favored ruler of the Roman state. The "Christogram" became the first imperial Christian symbol to receive wide currency in both west and east. But it is conceivable that, had the God of the Christians not continued to deliver a series of decisive victories, Constantine might have eventually sought divine assistance from elsewhere.

As befitted an emperor, Constantine's main contribution to imperial Christian art was in the form of grand monumental architecture. In Rome, where he spent only a few months of his life, he had constructed the first Vatican basilica over the tomb of St. Peter, and the church of what is now known as St. John Lateran, as well as the largest Roman triumphal arch ever built. In the rest of the empire, he built imposing basilicas as far apart as the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople and that of Trier in Germany.

Constantine was born in Naissus, present-day Nish in Serbia, around 272. His mother, Helena, was a bargirl of humble stock, whom his father never married and whom he abandoned to make a more advantageous dynastic marriage. Constantine remained devoted to her, and she became an important force in advancing the Christian cause. She undertook serious archaeological excavation on the Hill of Golgotha, unearthing not only what was accepted as the "True Cross" but even the Crucifixion nails. Subsequently, she raised the basilica of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem.

Pre-Constantinian Christian art tended to be modest, which was inevitable given that it was an underground religion for much of the time. Subterranean cemeteries, which came to be called catacombs, were one of the principal clandestine meeting places for Christians. The secret language of the early Christians is still preserved there: the fish, representing Christ; the anchor, hope and steadfastness; the garden or a tree, paradise; the bird, the soul (or if a dove, the Holy Spirit), and so on. Most of these emblems took the form of graffiti, paintings or carvings of the utmost simplicity.

But as the religion came into the limelight, grander, more complex artistic expressions were possible. Basilicas of the Constantinian period were fairly plain externally but were sumptuously decorated within, with frescoes, glittering mosaics, rich silken fabrics and gold and silver vessels for the celebration of the Eucharist.

Richer Christians could advertise their faith even in death by commissioning ornate sarcophagi adorned with religious symbols, biblical figures and narratives. Indeed, a new form of "frieze sarcophagus" allowing for greater numbers of figures and scenes, emerged during this time. These sarcophagi seem to have been made in the same workshops that continued to cater to pagans, and in them we can witness the blending of pagan and Christian imagery - the persistence, for example, of cupids, typical pre-Christian funerary emblems.

There was, in fact, a great deal of continuity between the art of the new religion and the old. Candles and incense were burned before devotional images, as they had been before statues of the gods; holy water was placed in basins at the entrance of churches, as it had been at temples; Christ and the saints were depicted with halos, as the powerful and wise had been before. And in time the pagan roots of these practices were simply forgotten.

Constantine's consolidation of power ushered in an era of peace and prosperity. The life of the court was itinerant as the supreme leader tirelessly toured his domains, dealing with state affairs and supervising the military structures to ensure the security of the empire's borders. Senior officials, too, resided at different times in different places and might have properties widely dispersed in various provinces. The style of luxury goods surviving in locations throughout the empire is remarkably uniform, and increasingly they bore the insignia of the new faith.

Gift-giving at court and in the upper echelons of society was lavish. Objects such as intricately carved ivories and beautifully wrought silver dishes were produced in multiple copies, customarily at least 30.

Many of these luxury objects, secular in origin, were donated to cathedrals and churches, where - jealously guarded in ecclesiastical treasuries and regarded as sacrosanct by barbarian invaders who had also embraced Christianity - they survived the centuries, leaving us with precious evidence of the artifacts of a world gradually undergoing Christianization.

The church remained profoundly Roman, even when it more vigorously tried to repudiate its pagan cradle. Fears of these links with the past helped stoke at various times Iconoclasm in the east and later Protestantism in the west, while in the lands where the influence of papal Rome was greatest, the devotion to sacred statues, for example, remained as passionate as in times of old. Even today, Greek Christians colloquially refer to themselves as "romi" (Romans). And St. Constantine and his mother, St. Helena, are especially revered in the Greek Orthodox Church.

7/2/05 Reality series pulled because it may be illegal

2005-07-02T20:01:00.000-05:00

Reality series pulled because it may be illegal
07/02/2005The Washington Post

ABC has pulled a reality show scheduled to debut this month after it was suggested to the network that the plot -- three couples considering race and religion to help decide which contestant family becomes their neighbor -- violates the federal Fair Housing Act.

In "Welcome to the Neighborhood," seven families competed to win a 3,300-square-foot, four-bedroom, 2 1/2-bath house on a cul-de-sac near Austin, Texas.

They were a religious, African-American family; a Wiccan family; a Latino family; an Asian family; a picture-perfect white family (except mom is a stripper); a young white family headed by staunch Republicans, only mom and dad are covered in tattoos; and a white gay couple with an adopted African- American infant.

The couples who determine their fates, housing-wise, are white, Christian, Republican and close-minded.

Over the six episodes, ABC said, the locals learn "to see people, not stereotypes."

Shanna Smith, president of the National Fair Housing Alliance, said residents on the show make statements about the contestants' ethnicity and religion. The act makes it it illegal to deny housing because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability or family status.

The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation also cautioned ABC. GLAAD entertainment media director Damon Romine, who has seen the entire series, said that although it's clear "the producers intended to send a powerful message about the value of diversity, if they only watched the first episode or two, viewers could come away with a message that prejudice and discrimination are not that big a deal. Regardless of how things turn out at the end of the last show, it's dangerous to let intolerance and bigotry go unchallenged for weeks at a time."

Whether the show airs or not, one family was awarded the house. The other contestants probably cannot challenge the outcome based on discrimination, Smith speculated, because they probably had to sign waivers to appear on the series.

ABC issued a short statement defending the show and declined further comment.

Updated 3:02 pm

7/2/05 Journaling the Magical Life

2005-07-02T20:00:00.000-05:00

Journaling the Magical Life

In addition to keeping a Book of Shadows, many Wiccan practitioners keep other records of their spiritual life & practice. While the Book of Shadows primarily is a record of magical and spiritual activities, these other books provide a place to record thoughts and feelings and other less tangible aspects of the practice. There are two main types of magical journals, the “Book of Mirrors” and the “Book of Light”. These books may also have other names, but these are the ones I have found most often to refer to them.

Book of Mirrors
As we walk the Wiccan path we are continually learning and striving to grow and change. Often this growth requires deeper personal exploration and sometimes hard, emotional work. The Book of Mirrors is a repository for the information gleaned from that work.

It is a place to record your reflections on the work that you are doing. This can include impressions felt before, during, or after a particular spell or ritual. You may also choose to record your dreams and life's amazing synchronicities in your Book of Mirrors and analyze how they fit into what is happening in your life at that time. In addition, the impressions you get or the things you see and feel during meditation or shamanic journeys can be recorded and explored in the Book of Mirrors.

Book of Light
While the Book of Mirrors is a place to explore the deep parts of your self, the Book of Light is a place to record your blessings and gratitude. It is a way to keep track of the wonders that you have experienced and the blessings that come your way as you become more open to them spiritually.

Many people have talked about the use of a gratitude journal. They believe that by spending time listing the things you are grateful for in your life, you will open yourself to receive more blessings. The Book of Light works on a similar principle. The focus or intent of the Book of Light is to appreciate and recognize the good things that have come from your practice. When you build a fire in the hearth, that fire must be tended to. Logs need to be added to keep the fire going and build its warmth. The Book of Light is like a hearth fire and the entries are the logs that keep that fire going.

The Book of Mirrors and the Book of Light are two types of journals that can be just as valuable to a Wiccan practice as the Book of Shadows. Though they serve different functions, when used together they can help create a well-rounded practice.

7/2/05 Wiccan halts 'Jesus' prayers at town council

2005-07-02T19:59:00.001-05:00

Wiccan halts 'Jesus' prayers at town council
Supreme Court's refusal to hear case upholds decision

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: July 2, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com

Prayers in the name of Jesus will no longer be offered at council meetings in a small South Carolina town after the Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal of a case brought by a Wiccan.

The high court's decision this week not to take the case effectively upheld a 2004 appeals court decision barring prayers at town council meetings in Great Falls, reported The Herald of Rock Hill, S.C.

The paper said people around town were talking about the case that pitted Wiccan Darla Wynne, who filed suit in 2001, against the council.

"Even though the Supreme Court upheld this ruling, no one has stopped us from praying," said the Rev. John Paul Sellars, pastor of Mount Dearborn United Methodist Church. "We may be stopped from verbally expressing ourselves, but God knows our hearts and our minds."

The Herald said Wynne has been ostracized by the town.

"It's been an eerie silence," Wynne told the paper Wednesday. "The mailman is always very talkative to me. Today, he didn't even speak to me, and that was an odd thing."

Local resident Carlton Day, 78, said people should be able to pray anytime and anywhere.

"I don't think it's right with her telling the council what to do," Day told The Herald. "I think the council should be able to pray the way they want."

Willie Patterson, 60, said governments should seek spiritual counsel before making decisions.

"Jesus Christ -- that's the only name given in the Bible that you can be saved by," Patterson said. "So why not use it at council meetings. The council meeting is for people to get things together. You can't succeed at nothing without Jesus."

Wynne vowed, however, she would keep up her fight.

"I'm still going to live here and one of the primary things that keeps me here is I'm not going to reward [the council's] bad behavior," she said.

Sellars, 26, asserted, nevertheless, the prayers at council meetings won't end.

"The Christian is not going to pray to anyone else but Jesus Christ," Sellars said. "No matter if we're prevented from praying out loud, God hears our prayers."

7/2/05 Legalities sink reality series

2005-07-02T19:59:00.000-05:00

Legalities sink reality series
By Lisa de Moraes, The Washington Post
July 2, 2005

WASHINGTON -- ABC has pulled "Welcome to the Neighborhood" after it was suggested to the network that a reality series in which three couples consider race and religion to help decide which contestant family gets to become their neighbor violates the federal Fair Housing Act.

In this social experiment, which was scheduled to debut July 10, seven families competed to win a 3,300-square-foot, four-bedroom, 2 1/2 -bath house on a cul-de-sac near Austin.

They were a religious black family; a Wiccan family; a Latino family; an Asian family; a picture-perfect white family (except mom is a stripper); a young white family headed by staunch Republicans, only mom and dad are covered in tattoos; and a white gay couple with an adopted black infant.

The couples who determine their fates, housing-wise, are white, Christian, Republican and close-minded.

In the course of the six episodes, ABC said, the locals learn that "while on the outside we may appear different, deep inside we share many common bonds" and "to see people, not stereotypes."

In the first two episodes, which were sent out to the media, residents make statements about the contestants' ethnicity and religion that violate the Fair Housing Act, Shanna Smith, National Fair Housing Alliance president and CEO, told the Washington Post.

Because the network does convey a home as a result of the show, Smith's organization believes the "Welcome to the Neighborhood" program is covered under fair housing laws, which make it illegal to deny housing or otherwise make it unavailable because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability or family status.

Smith's group spearheaded a campaign against the program and was hoping to block the debut when word came Wednesday that ABC had scrubbed it.

The network would not comment other than to issue a statement saying, "Our intention with 'Welcome to the Neighborhood' was to show the transformative process that takes place when people are forced to confront preconceived notions of what makes a good neighbor, and we believe the series delivers exactly that.

"However, the fact that the true change only happens over time made the episodic nature of this series challenging, and given the sensitivity of the subject matter in early episodes, we have decided not to air the series at this time."

The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation also had cautioned ABC after seeing the first two episodes.

GLAAD entertainment media director Damon Romine, who has seen the entire series, said that although it's clear "the producers intended to send a powerful message about the value of diversity and embracing the differences of others," the episodic format "created serious issues in terms of depicting the neighbors' journey from intolerance to acceptance ....

"If they only watched the first episode or two, viewers could come away with a message that prejudice and discrimination are not that big a deal," Romine said. "Regardless of how things turn out at the end of the last show, it's dangerous to let intolerance and bigotry go unchallenged for weeks at a time."

In the first episode, the homeowners are introduced to the would-be neighbors, one family at a time. After meeting the white family with the stripper mom -- still a secret at that point -- one resident comments: "My first impression of the Morgans was, very ordinary, very like us, white family, two kids, good-looking -- this is going to be easy if they are all like this."

But, of course, they aren't. When the same resident meets the Gonzalezes, she says:

"When the family came around the corner in their very large vehicle, kids kept coming, and kept coming and kept tumbling, and I realized right away, OK this is a Hispanic family."

The Gonzalez family has four children; other families have three.

In the second episode, the residents decide unanimously to boot the Eckhardt family because they are Wiccan.

Smith said she was told that ABC's lawyers advised them the show did not violate the Fair Housing Act because it did not involve the sale or rental of a home.

"But they ignored the case law and the language about 'otherwise make unavailable,'" she said.

Whether the show airs or not, one of the families was awarded the house. The other contestants probably cannot challenge the outcome based on discrimination under fair housing laws, Smith speculated, because they probably had to sign waivers to appear on the series.

But her organization could sue because, Smith said, it would be harmed if the show airs. The National Fair Housing Alliances' injury comes in the form of "frustration of mission" and "diversion of resources," she says. That's because the organization has spent millions of dollars trying to educate real estate agents and the public about housing discrimination.

Other families in the neighborhood could also sue if the series aired and they felt their neighborhood was stigmatized.

7/2/05 Winnipeg’s Museum For Human Rights: Canada’s $300 Million Temple of Ideology

2005-07-02T19:55:00.000-05:00

Winnipeg’s Museum For Human Rights: Canada’s $300 Million Temple of Ideology

By John Jalsevac

• Powerful Propaganda Institute Being Planned
• Museum For Human Rights a $300 million Shrine to Trudeau’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms
• Charter of Rights “boring”, “philosophically vague”, “fraught with loopholes”
• Trudeau’s “dictatorship of relativism”
• The Charter and “Canada’s Judicial Captivity”
• Canada’s one-world priests leading the world into the ideological abyss – quietly
• Conclusion – The Temple of Propaganda
• Related Articles

Powerful Propaganda Institute Being Planned

Right at the heart of Canada a host of the most influential, wealthy and socially liberal Canadians and world leaders are planning to construct the most powerful propaganda institute the country has yet seen. A giant glass blaze of light constructed at the crux where the Red and Assiniboine rivers meet, with deliberate architectural ties to mother earth and native Indian earth spirituality, the Museum For Human Rights will eventually serve as the temple of Canada’s new state ideology. It will be a ‘sacred’ spot where Canadians can come together and learn to worship Canada’s most destructive political document, the deceptively named ‘Charter of Rights and Freedoms’ of former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.

This secular temple will be a place for Canadian schoolchildren to be taught to marvel at their country’s ‘achievements’ in advancing what are questionably, if not outrageously, called ‘Human Rights’ since the implementation of the 1982 Charter. Mingling with legitimate exhibits about the internment of the Japanese in WWII and other true human rights violations justly mourned, will be exhibits championing reproductive ‘rights’, sexual ‘rights’, same-sex ‘rights’.

The Winnipeg museum will be the Sunday School of the left, where police, military and political personnel will be taught the new double-speak of ideologically defined and dangerously limited “human rights”, and be trained in the most effective means of discovering, discouraging and punishing ‘bigots’ and ‘extremists’. And it will be a place for the more ambitious to consider the next logical step of introducing these ‘rights’ to the rest of the world, of evangelizing the globe in the light of the Charter’s new world religion of humanistic ideology.

But, there is something deliciously right about architect Antoine Predock’s winning design for the museum. A huge, shapeless construct of glass in the tradition of the Crystal Palace, to be erected in Winnipeg, the building is designed, according to the architect himself, to be an “apparition” resembling a cloud, “light filled and buoyant”. When all is said and done the delightful final impression is a building designed to look as vaporous and vacuous as the false religion and the empty idol which it will have been created to celebrate.

Museum For Human Rights a $300 million Shrine to Trudeau’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms

With a price tag quickly approaching $300 million dollars, the museum—apparently, and thankfully, to be the only of its kind in the world—is the brainchild of the late Israel ‘Izzy’ Asper, the famed media mogul and owner of the National Post. It’s obvious from the get-go that the building is little more than a $300 million dollar shrine where liberals can adore Pierre Trudeau’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The announcement of the museum coincided with the twentieth anniversary of the signing of the Charter.

Unsurprisingly the federal government has already pledged to the project a hefty $100 million of the money it takes from taxpayers. So far, besides the $100 million from the federal government, $20 million has also been pledged by each the city of Winnipeg and the province, another $40 million from private sources, and $20 million from the Asper family.

The monies, however, weren’t as easily come by as that. In early July 2004 the Liberal government nearly torpedoed the project by briefly reneging on what the Asper Foundation insisted was an agreed $100 million pledge. Curiously enough this sudden change of heart came almost immediately after the National Post, owned by ‘Izzy’ Asper, gave a boost to the Liberal’s competition before the late June election by printing an editorial supporting Stephen Harper and his Conservatives. No reason for the sudden withdrawal of the funds was given by the Liberals. But that’s another story altogether. The hissy fit over with, Paul Martin is now leaping on the once-in-a-lifetime chance to place Canada on a high pedestal on the international stage as a world leader in so-called “human rights”.

Repeated remarks by those involved in the costly venture have indicated that all the exhibits of the Museum will be seen through the lens of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Trudeau himself will most certainly be one of the museum’s most celebrated personalities. This is hardly surprising as Trudeau’s disciples are powerful, influential, and passionate; but it doesn’t bode well.

Canada seen through the lens of the Charter is the mere skeleton of a formerly strong, free and solidly grounded nation, stripped of its flesh and its life.

Charter of Rights “boring”, “philosophically vague”, “fraught with loopholes”

Typical of the delusional liberal attitude towards the Charter, in a 2003 interview shortly before his death, ‘Izzy’ Apser went so far as to compare it to the American Declaration of Independence.

This is laughable at best. The Declaration of Independence is one of history’s most eloquent, articulate, and philosophically sound political documents. It begins with an invocation of God and then appeals to the inalienable human rights which flow necessarily from His eternal and unchanging laws. Beneath its list of claims and demands the Declaration rationally and systematically lays a foundation of bedrock, objective truth, the spirit of which lends credence to its every subsequent word.

The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, on the other hand, is boring and philosophically and legally vague, fraught with juicy loopholes, ripe for exploitation by one who knows how.

God’s name is mentioned, but was only added by the Charter’s architects as an afterthought. Nothing contained in the Charter flows from the invocation of the Ineffable. Rather, His name is placed at the head the document more as a kind of rubber stamp of approval than as an invocation rising from an understanding of God as the well from which all truth springs. And the stamp itself is only little more than a forgery, not the real thing at all.

Trudeau’s “dictatorship of relativism”

One way of coming to a true understanding of the Charter, and through it the purpose and meaning of the so-called Museum For Human Rights, is to understand the man behind the Charter, former Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau.

Beloved by Canadians for his remarkably un-Canadian gusto and charm and his politically untypical intellectualism, his most lasting legacy has been a confusing and contradictory personal credo of professed Christian faith and practiced moral relativism. By applying this credo to politics he personally pushed Canada over the edge into a ‘long and lovely suicide’ dive into the abyss of social liberalism. Much the same as Canada’s current Prime Minister, Trudeau was a self-professed “devout Catholic”, who hailed the country’s most infamous abortionist, Dr. Morgentaler, as “a good friend, a fine humanitarian and a true humanist.” An admirer of China’s mass murderer, Mao Tse Tung, and Cuba’s Fidel Castro (he was once heard to remark that things would be so much easier done “the Cuban way”) Trudeau branded onto the Canadian consciousness the paradoxical aphorism of “the separation of Church and State”.

Besides being philosophically untenable, Trudeau’s phrase is paradoxical because Trudeau, more than any Canadian PM, shoved his personal convictions, including the Charter of Rights, down the gagging throat of his country. Western Canadian columnist Link Byfield, wrote in a September 2000 Globe and Mail article that “Parliament annoyed [Trudeau], so he bulldozed his Charter of Rights into the Constitution (1982) and surrendered statutory supremacy to the court.”

Trudeau did not, as he would have one believe, personally espouse the separation of Church and state. But neither was he, as he claimed, genuinely Catholic. Rather, he was one of the earliest Canadian members of the new religious, humanistic ideology which informs and interprets the Charter of Rights, and which is currently gaining considerable force in the United Nation’s in the form of a one world order. And though the ancestor of this ideology of relativism breathed its first breath centuries ago, born of the Godless womb of the French revolution, in many ways Trudeau is the modern father of its most evolved descendent.

Pope Benedict recently warned against this religion in a homily saying, “A dictatorship of relativism is being constituted that recognizes nothing as absolute and which leaves only the ‘I’ and its whims as the ultimate measure.” Trudeau may have rejected fundamental Judeo-Christian principles, and the God of Abraham, but he certainly had his own idols which he worshipped and forced Canadians to worship along with him—the idol of his beloved Charter, the idol of libertarianism, of political correctness, of social liberalism.

The Charter and “Canada’s Judicial Captivity”

In the last twenty-two years since its inception the Charter has lead to the worst abuses of judicial authority in Canadian history.

Ian Hunter, in an article entitled “Canada’s Judicial Captivity”, printed in 1997 in First Things, explains. With the advent of the Charter, he says, “Canada ceased to be a country of parliamentary supremacy and became…a country of constitutional supremacy, where the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is ‘the supreme law the land’.” However, “the problem with constitutional supremacy is that constitutions are not self-interpreting.”

There, as Hamlet would say, is the rub.

The Charter is an amalgamation of various rights which in the very act of being placed in writing are stripped of their breath and soul and instead exist in a permanent and antagonistic tension with one another. That is, none of the rights in the charter are absolute, and all are left completely open to the interpretation of a small number of un-elected judges who enjoy years of unaccountability with extended periods of tenure. In the midst of a conflict Canadians are now reduced to yelling out “I have a right!”, and then sitting back to observe which right will come out on top this time around.

Hunter quotes an unnamed Ontario judge commenting on the frightening political consequences of the non auto-interpretative nature of the Charter: “Elected representatives of the people create constitutions, leaving it to un-elected judges…to decide what exactly they have created.” What they have created is a monster, which in true horror-film fashion has run amuck to disastrous consequences. In the past two decades, Canada, under the lazy, conveniently distracted eye of the Charter, has thrown off the common cloak of parliamentarian democracy and assumed the official gown of the judiciary.

“The Canadian voter still goes to the polls quadrennially” says Hunter, “but is it is judges who have imposed abortion on demand (R v. Morgentaler), who came within a single vote in the Supreme Court of creating a Charter right to physician-assisted suicide (R. v. Rodrigues), and who are systematically eradicating any normative distinction between homosexuality and heterosexuality (M. v. H.). Canada now has same-sex ‘marriage’ especially thanks to several activist judicial decisions based on the Charter, despite the fact that the Charter’s framers specifically rejected including ‘sexual orientation’ in it. However, this didn’t stop Paul Martin, just before the June 28 vote that passed Bill C-38, from stating, about the marriage redefinition bill, “this is about the Charter” and “a right is a right and that is what this vote is all about tonight”.

Not only have the Charter and its authors introduced a powerful dictatorship of relativism, but so too have they imposed the added scourge of the dictatorship of the judiciary. Better yet, the relationship can be explained thus: the dictatorship of relativism is the religion, the Charter its idol, and the judges and certain politicians the priests who sacrifice truth on the triple altars of ‘tolerance’, ‘freedom without responsibility’ and ‘political correctness’.

All that the members of this new religion of ideology need now is a place to gather and worship - a temple. And they are determined to build themselves one—Canada’s Museum For Human Rights.

Canada’s one-world priests leading the world into the ideological abyss – quietly

‘Izzy’ Asper, when expounding on his dream for the Museum For Human Rights lamented “We Canadians have a tendency to aim for the middle, not the top, not for the stars.”

But this statement isn’t true. Although Canadians on the whole seem to be increasingly unimpassioned, certain wealthy and powerful Canadians, the high-priests of the new-world religion, have stepped into influential roles and are leading the world in a most unobtrusive, deceptive—and effective—manner. For years they have been carefully guiding the fate of the world using their favorite vehicle—the United Nations.

The Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the activist judges who have used it as a platform to ‘discover’ or create never before imagined ‘rights’, are merely the Canadian branch in this experimental new world-wide movement, which with the quiet unobtrusiveness of a creeping vine consumes and crushes the walls of tradition and the rock foundation of Judeo-Christian principles on which Canada, and so many other nations, were built.

Few realize that Canada is one of the most influential forces at the UN, pushing hard and skillfully for a one-world order dominated by leftist liberal ideologies. Canada has done considerable work in paving the way for global eco-extremism, ‘sexual rights’ and ‘reproductive rights’ (read: homosexual ‘marriage’, abortion, forced sterilization, contraception). Ask any of those who’ve lobbied in the UN on the behalf of family and life issues who it is they often spend the most of their time fighting – Canada.

And few, if any, have been more influential in pushing the one-world, ideological agenda than Canada’s own Maurice Strong. Strong, coincidentally enough, is one of the members of the advisory board for the Museum For Human Rights.

Maurice Strong is a notoriously soft spoken, deceptively Canadian businessman. He has served as senior adviser to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, as well as the president of the World Bank, and has more awards and honorary degrees to his name than it is worth the time to recount; most have been for his extensive work in environmentalism. A mere handful of his many, many powerful connections include communications magnate Ted Turner, Mikhail Gorbachev, Al Gore, Pierre Trudeau, Jean Chretien, and current prime minister Paul Martin, and he is especially tied into the powerful web of influence of Canadian businessman Paul Desmarais. But that’s a story for a different article. A few of Strong’s many nicknames include the ‘godfather of globalism’, and ‘custodian of the planet’. In 1990 the Globe and Mail, with unusual insight, reported that on his 160,000 acre Colorado ranch he is “laying the groundwork for what amounts to a new world order.”

That 160,000 acre ranch once called by Strong’s wife the “Valley of the Refuge of World Truths” (now renamed “The Place of the Heart”) is a gargantuan new-age colony. It is a haven of religious and moral relativism. It brings together representatives of the world’s ‘traditional’ religions in the hope of fusing them together and creating a new world religion which is heralded by a return to the pagan earth spirituality of native Indians. Indeed, it isn’t at all surprising that a huge portion of the Museum For Human Rights will celebrate the supposed original innocence of the natives and lament their supposed subsequent corruption and destruction by white, male Europeans. The odds are minimal that it will mention the horrors of the frequent tribal warfare and violent practices which often appear throughout native history.

As Oscar Wilde would say to a friend at the height of his dissolution: “While we wait for a new religion of light, let Olympus serve as a shelter and refuge. We must let our instincts laugh and frolic in the sun like a troop of laughing children.” Paganism is in vogue.

Maurice Strong is only one such member of the list of advisers and donors, albeit one of the most noteworthy. The list reads like a who’s who of liberal ideologues—extreme feminists and environmentalists and homosexual-rights activists. It includes such groups as Egale Canada, Equal Marriage for Same-Sex Couples, Canadian Human Rights Commission, The Permanent Mission of Canada to the United Nations and the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF). They are the priests and the priestesses that are quietly leading the world into the abyss of new age, one world, relativistic paganism.

Conclusion – The Temple of Propaganda

So far, it is unlikely that there will be much public criticism of the $300 million Human Rights Museum. Even Conservatives with the insight to see through the farce probably and sadly won’t have the courage to point out the emperor’s nakedness; instead they will gush enthusiastically about the mad project.

The left has long waged a war of words, a war of propaganda, and they have won almost every battle. They have usurped and made a monster of the word ‘tolerance’, they have raped the word ‘gay’, and they have beheaded the term ‘human rights’. To speak out against the museum is to risk being labeled ‘intolerant’, to risk finding your face in the Museum’s planned Hall of Shame which documents past violations of human rights. There you will annually be mocked and jeered at by hundreds of thousands of schoolchildren as a ‘bigot’ and an ‘extremist’.

To speak out against the museum might be to risk being in the shoes of Bishop Henry of Calgary who faces an expensive and exacting trial in the hands of a Human Rights Commission for simply laying out the teachings of the Catholic faith on homosexuality. To speak out is to risk being prosecuted and persecuted, like Chris Kempling, the British Columbia teacher whose teaching license was suspended for writing letters to the editor in defense of marriage. And then there is Scott Brockie, the Christian printer who refused to print letterhead for the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives whose battle with the Human Rights Commission left him doubled under the weight of a $5,000 fine and $40,000 in legal costs. The list goes on. The human rights of these persecuted Canadians of principle are anathema in the new temple.

Will there be a section devoted to China’s notorious forced one child policy, and its violent forced aborting of women and infanticides, of which so many of those on the board of the museum are supportive of?

Don’t count on it.

What are the chances that violations against human rights committed by Human Rights Commissions will be granted an exhibit in the Museum?

None at all.

The completion of the Museum For Human Rights will be the coup de grâce, the last button on the sash of liberal propaganda. After all, how did the Liberal federal government finally justify committing $100 million to building the museum? According to Martin Knelman of the National post, the realization that they could use the museum as a “training centre where police officers, military personnel and government employees will be sent for courses and seminars designed to make them more knowledgeable and sensitive to issues of cultural diversity, racial bigotry and the human rights of Canadian citizens under the Charter of Rights.”

God save us from the hands of these ideologically brainwashed individuals who are meant to protect us.

With the completion of the Museum Canada will finally have the means to create a bureaucracy passionately dedicated, and a police and military force fully equipped, to defend the new state ideology. The full coercive power of the state will stand vigilantly against detractors against the new order. And with such passionate and powerful protectors, who would dare speak out against it? Who would dare risk a place in the Museum For Human Right’s Hall of Shame?

I can think of a few who would. And they had better speak up now – about the museum, about the Charter, judicial activism, institutional corruption and so much more that is genuinely threatening to usurp our freedom.

Nothing about the Museum project is yet final. It is still thankfully almost $100 million short of its goal. And the museum website states that construction will not begin until full funding is put in place. Perhaps full funding will never be found. Perhaps Canadians will start vociferously objecting to this obscene waste of multi-millions.

Let us make it clear to our government and our fellow countrymen that the Museum for Human Rights is, at best, little more than a dangerous throwaway of $300 million.

7/1/05 Pagans challenge textbook

2005-07-01T14:03:00.000-05:00

Pagans challenge textbook
City attorney says chapter does not violate rights
This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press on Thursday, June 30, 2005.
By ALISHA SEMCHUCK
Valley Press Staff Writer

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PALMDALE - Outrage at what they view as erroneous and prejudicial references in a textbook brought members of the Antelope Valley's pagan community to the City Council meeting Monday night to voice their objections.
The book, "Changing Destructive Adolescent Behavior," is published by The Parent Project, a nationwide organization that subscribes to fundamentalist Christian principles and is used in a city-approved program called Families in Action - a parenting class intended to teach dysfunctional families more effective ways of resolving conflict and dealing with typical issues that arise in everyday life.

For some program participants, attendance is court-mandated.

Those in the pagan community find the book's content offensive - particularly a chapter that includes several pages of signs and symbols described as Satanic.

The text refers to Satanism as "self-destructive and frightening behavior" linked to violence and hate. It draws parallels with the activity of Latino and white supremacist gangs.

During the public comment portion of the meeting, Darren Parker, president of the Antelope Valley Human Relations Task Force, told council members that Section Five in the parenting class text is especially objectionable because it affiliates symbols used by practitioners of the occult and witches with gang symbols, when there is no connection.

Parker said the city's Web site mentions one of its goals is to eradicate "hate crimes."

"We talk about Palmdale as a place to call home," he said.

However, Parker contended dissemination of the offensive misinformation could have the opposite impact by perpetuating negative impressions.

"It is not a hate crime. It is not a hate incident," he said, but "misinformation breeds fear. We learned in the task force, fear breeds hate."

Parker said the city attorney reviewed the chapter in question and determined that it "does not violate constitutional or First Amendment rights."

He was referring to a letter from Assistant City Attorney Cesar Bertaud to Lisa Morganstern, president and founder of AV Pagans, that read, "In our opinion, use of the materials does not violate the California or United States constitutions, as the materials do not constitute either an establishment of religion or a preference of one religion over another."

"It is a very fine line between First Amendment rights and things that harm the community," Parker said. "That class is causing turmoil in our community. We're asking for your help. We believe that class is crucial to parenting."

Morgenstern's husband, John, said the class offers a lot of good information, but the chapter in question "stands out in contrast to other chapters."

It "labels occult practices as evil and says, for occult, there should be zero tolerance," he said.

"I'm a practitioner for 15 years," Pagan group member Amy Walsh said. "When I came across these documents, I was very outraged."

Based on information in the book, Walsh said, black clothing represents evil.

"The Star of David, they say is a Satanic symbol," she said, adding that the literature also mentions meditations performed to cause violent death.

"I've been a school bus driver for the past five years. I'm the smile every person sees with their child in the morning." She pointed out she delivers the children safely to school and safely home again.

Lisa Morgenstern described herself as a mother, a task force member and an elder priestess in the Covenant of the Goddess. That's her religion.

She performs weddings and rites of passage for the First Pantheistic Center, Antelope Valley. She's also coordinator for Antelope Valley Pagan Pride Day.

Morgenstern said the situation disturbs her because, based on that text, anyone who reads his or her astrological horoscope could be viewed as an evil-doer, she said.

"You don't have to be casting spells to be occult," she said.

Morgenstern said if the chapter contained a cross with a slash and the word gang beside it, the "book would be pulled so fast it would make your head spin."

Because the issue was not an agenda item, the City Council took no action.

Mayor Jim Ledford said he understood that offending chapter would be removed from the text.

However, Morgenstern said she had heard it was being kept in.

"You can expect letters coming in the future," she said. "It's not over."

In an earlier interview, Ledford said, "I don't think the city is hiding or running from (this). I'm not looking to offend anybody."

asemchuck@avpress.com

7/1/05 Appeal deserved to fail

2005-07-01T14:01:00.000-05:00

Appeal deserved to fail

The refusal of the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the Great Falls prayer case was predictable reaffirmation of sound constitutional principle. It is regrettable that the town wasted taxpayers' money in a symbolic but futile legal battle.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court declined to hear the Chester County town's appeal of a lower court decision that invoking the name "Jesus Christ" in prayers at Town Council meetings improperly favored one faith over others. This was the town's final avenue of appeal after losing at every juncture of the case.

The case was born in 2001 when Darla Wynne, a Great Falls resident and Wiccan high priestess, sued the town for using the name of Jesus in its council prayers. Wynne contended that council members refused to use nonsectarian prayers or to allow those of other faiths to lead the prayers.

Her view prevailed. A federal court ruled against the town in August 2003. A three-judge appeals panel ruled against Great Falls in July 2004. In November 2004, a unanimous ruling by another three judges on the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals ended any chance that the appeal would be heard by the full appeals court. And on Tuesday, the Supreme Court made it final.

The conclusion to the case, however, had been obvious from the start. Town fathers simply chose to ignore it.

Human obstinacy is understandable. Squandering public money on a hopeless cause isn't.

We also fault town leaders -- and state Attorney General Henry McMaster, who waded into the case and should have known better -- for failing to acknowledge the legitimate legal position of the courts. The council's use of Christian prayers to open its meetings was an unconstitutional act. It deliberately excluded those of other faiths, abandoning religious neutrality as required of governmental bodies by the U.S. Constitution.

Great Falls deserved to lose this case. Too bad taxpayers will have to pick up the tab.

IN SUMMARY
Outcome of Great Falls appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in prayer case was predictable.

7/1/05 The witch doctor report

2005-07-01T13:56:00.000-05:00

The witch doctor report

Mr Bamba charges £1,000 to get a boyfriend back ... with the help of a bag of hair clippings, a magic parcel and three slaughtered cows. Now Trading Standards want a word...

Exclusive
By Grant Woodward

HE's the witch doctor who claims he can banish black magic curses, cure impotence and make women fertile.

But the man who calls himself Mr Bamba was today at the centre of a Trading Standards investigation after charging a woman nearly £1,000 in a failed effort to get her partner back.

Maria Mannion paid up and was then stunned when Mr Bamba told her to slaughter three cows.

She was also asked for some pubic hair before being handed "medicine" to throw in the River Aire.

Miss Mannion, 48, told the YEP: "Something has got to be done about this man. Someone will end up killing themselves over the things he promises them."
The mother-of-two, from Gledhow, first went to Mr Bamba in April and paid a £20 consultation fee.

Praying

She returned to Bamba's home in Luxor View, Harehills, and was told to hand over £180 before being made to sit on a rug.

She said: "It was surrounded by these sort of hieroglyphics. He was wearing this white robe and hat and there were beads everywhere.

"He asked for a picture of my partner and started praying.

"Then he asked me to go into another room and cut some pubic hair which he put in an envelope.

"About two days later he rang me and I picked up some rubber things with tape around them. He said they had medicine in and I had to put one in my partner's chair, one in my pocket or handbag and the other one in the river.

"When my partner left me a little while later, Mr Bamba said I needed stronger medicine and asked for £1,000.

"I only had £600 and gave him that. He gave me two more bits of rubber and said to throw them in the river and me and my partner would "float back together"."

Maria said: "I feel silly now but there's something about him and the way he looks into your face when he's talking. You're like another person when you go in there."
Eventually Maria was told she would have to slaughter three cows near some water to save her relationship. Bamba, who advertises in the Yellow Pages, offered to have a friend in Africa do it for her – at the cost of £120 a cow.

She said: "He rang me five times over the weekend asking for more money but I haven't given him any. At one point he said the medicine wouldn't work unless I helped get a council house for him and his wife.

Medical

"People need to be told about this man. He's trying to drain money from vulnerable people."

Paul Smith, of West Yorkshire Trading Standards, said they would be paying Mr Bamba a visit.

"Potentially there could be some offences being committed here," he said.
"If he is making medical claims he needs to be able to back them up. I urge people to think very carefully before handing money to this man."

Miss Mannion's MP Fabian Hamilton (Lab, Leeds North East) vowed to raise the issue of so-called "spiritual healers" in Parliament.

He will also check his immigration status and whether he receives any benefits or pays tax.

He said: "This is witch doctoring and I will be asking how people like this can set themselves up and exploit people in this way."

grant.woodward@ypn.co.uk

Mr Bamba lives in an ordinary-looking terrace in the middle of Harehills.
When the YEP paid him a mid-afternoon visit, he was on the phone and ushered us into his front sitting room.

Printed cards pushed through letterboxes in the area advertise him as "an international spritual healer/advisor with 21 years experience" who can help with "marriage, love, jobs, exams".

When asked about the services he offers, Bamba, dressed in T-shirt and shorts, stated confidently that he could help people, but refused to reveal his methods.
"I can't tell you what I can do," he said. "My techniques are secret. I have to ask the spirit. I can't do anything before I have information from him. If I want him at any time I can call him."

Bamba, who says he is 37 and from The Gambia, told the YEP he moved to Britain four years ago and has lived in Leeds for three-and-a-half years.

He claims he discovered his "gift" as a young boy in Africa when a figure came to him in a dream.

He said fees for his services, beyond the £20 consultation fee, depended on what "medicine" was required.

"I contact the medicine man in Africa and see if he has it," he said. "If you don't want it you can leave it."

Bamba showed the YEP a set of beads and a small stitched leather parcel which he said contained his special medicine.

He confirmed he had "helped" Maria Mannion but denied taking advantage of her or pestering her for money.

He also denied blackmailing her into getting him a council house, saying she had offered to help him and his wife.

Bamba was adamant that Miss Mannion must slaughter three cows and distribute the meat in her community in order to be reunited with her partner.

His friend in Africa would kill the cows on her behalf, he said, but it would cost his friend £360 to buy them.

"Many people come with black magic problems and I can help to stop that black magic," he said. "I can't count how many people I see." A neighbour of Bamba's, who asked not to be named, said: "We have seen a lot of people going into his house but had no idea what was going on. I think it's a bit creepy having someone like him living in the street."

01 July 2005