A Satanic Panic?

 It was a Sunday I would never forget. I arrived at approximately 8:30 for the 9am Holy Sacrifice of the Mass at Fr. DePauw's Ave Maria Chapel in Westbury, New York with my parents. That was usual for me. What wasn't usual was what my parents and I witnessed on that balmy summer day in 1987. There was a police helicopter flying low and circling the Chapel; not less than a half-dozen uniformed police were patrolling the Chapel grounds, and there were plain clothes detectives at the entrance. At first, I didn't know if we could go there--maybe, God forbid--the Chapel had been vandalized. However, we were allowed to enter. As we reached the front doors, one of the detectives was looking me over (I was 22 at the time and appeared younger), and he asked my parents, "Is this young man your son?" They said yes, and he told us we could go on in.

Everyone inside was looking rather pensive. Father was not hearing Confessions that Sunday as he usually did 30 minutes before the first Mass at 9am. I knelt down and recited my prayers before Mass and Communion. When the bell rang and Father DePauw entered the sanctuary, he looked somewhat distraught. The Low Mass began, and after the reading of the Gospel, Father came to give the announcements and sermon at the pulpit. With a somber tone in his voice, he told us that the police had come because there had been a credible death threat made against him by some people involved in a Satanic coven. They said they were going to murder him to show their "hatred for Christ" and "everything he (Fr. DePauw) stands for" to "glorify Satan." The police (especially on Long Island) only reacted to such threats if they posed a true risk. I knew that with all this police coverage, law enforcement did not think this was some stupid prank, as they did in 99% of all such threats.

Father assured us that we were not in any danger. The police had secured the grounds and checked for explosives, etc. They remained in case someone would pose as a visitor with the intent of making good the threat to murder him. When the police suggested that perhaps he should shut down the Chapel for a few weeks and "get out of town" to take up residence with another Traditionalist priest friend, Father balked at the idea. "If they kill me for hatred of the True Faith, then I would die a martyr at the altar. I can think of no better way for a priest to die. But I'm not worried. My patron is St. Michael the Archangel, who beat Satan before and will do so again!" said a defiant and faith-filled Fr. DePauw from the pulpit. He then continued the Mass, and we left breathing a little easier. Nothing happened to Father, and he was told by the police and DA not to discuss the specifics of the incident. The following week, things went back to normal.

The 1980s were a time when the so-called "Satanic Panic" swept the United States. There were false and exaggerated claims of "Satanic Ritual Abuse" or "SRA." It seemed to culminate with the famous broadcast on October 22, 1988 of the show Devil Worship: Exposing Satan's Underground presented by Geraldo Rivera. I watched the show the night it aired, and it was sensationalistic in the extreme. The show would be the highest viewed documentary up until that time (and remains one of the most watched even as of this writing). The media, and the secularists, want us to think that the idea of people following Satan is nonsense in all cases. The fundamentalist Protestants want us to see the devil everywhere we look without exception. As always, "In medio stat veritas"---in the middle lies the truth. This week's post seeks to clarify the very real rise of Satanic influence in the world, while hoping to avoid both the dismissal of the supernatural on the left, and the uncalled for hysteria on the right.

The Real Evidence for a Rise in Demonic Influence

There are those who serve Satan knowingly and willingly, and those who serve him indirectly. There are also those completely fooled, for as Scripture tells us, "And no wonder: for Satan himself transformeth himself into an angel of light." (2 Corinthians 11:14). According to the New York Times, "It is unclear how many Wiccans ("witches") and other pagans there are. The 2001 American Religious Identification Survey by the City University of New York found that Wicca was the country’s fastest-growing religion, with 134,000 adherents, compared with 8,000 in 1990. The actual number may be greater, Ms. Berger said. Some people may have been unwilling to identify themselves as pagan or Wiccan for the survey. Others combine paganism with other religions." (See https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/16/us/16wiccan.html).

As to those who identify as pagans (polytheistic, animistic, or pantheistic pre-Christian religions), some studies suggest that there are at least 1.2 million pagans in the United States. (See Jason Pitzl-Waters, The Wild Hunt, "Parsing the Pew Numbers," http://wildhunt.org/blog/2008/02/parsing-pew-numbers.html; Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, http://religions.pewforum.org/). Also in the U.S., there are approximately 1.5 million Hindus, another 1.2 million are Buddhists, and 3.45 million Mohammedans.  The fact that there are currently millions of witches, animists, and other pagans in the country is reason enough for genuine concern. The Bible tells us, "But the things which the heathens sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God. And I would not that you should be made partakers with devils." (1 Corinthians 10:20). Let's not forget that Pope Pius XI clearly establishes Islam as dark (evil) as paganism in the prayer he composed for the Dedication of the Human Race to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, where we pray for those "still in the darkness of idolatry or of Islamism." 

The growth of these religions allows for greater demonic activity. Yet the Vatican II sect tells us that:

 "The Church, therefore, exhorts her sons, that through dialogue and collaboration with the followers of other [pagan] religions, carried out with prudence and love and in witness to the Christian faith and life, they recognize, preserve and promote the good things, spiritual and moral, as well as the socio-cultural values found among these men...The Church regards with esteem also the Moslems. (See Nostra Aetate, para. #2 and 3). Notice the absence of any mention to convert them to the One True Church (and now Bergoglio openly tells us "proselytism is nonsense"). Good people who were raised in the sect thinking they are Catholic come to accept, rather than reject, paganism. 

The main cause of the rise in paganism--and even Satanism--coincides with the Great Apostasy. It's no coincidence. There are three basic reasons for this cause and effect, based on sound theological principles. 

1. The False Ecclesiology of Vatican II. 

The heretical ecclesiology of Vatican II tells us that the Church of Christ is distinct from the Roman Catholic Church, but "subsists" there because it has all the "elements" of the Church of Christ. The Church of Christ "subsists" elsewhere depending on how many "elements" the sect possesses. To have all the elements is best, but just having some elements is good too, and leads to salvation. (See Lumen Gentium of Vatican II). This explains why Nostra Aetate (cited above) could praise the false and diabolical sects of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam. It also explains how "St." Wojtyla (JPII) could kiss the evil Koran--it contains some elements of truth. Using the same logic he could kiss the Satanic Bible because that has "some truth" as well. You will also frequently hear Vatican II sect clergy talking about baptism bringing someone into full communion with the sect. This clearly implies there can be partial communion. This notion is blatantly heretical. You can no more be "partially Catholic" than a woman can be "partially pregnant," or a man is "partially dead." You simply are or are not.

2. Religious Liberty. 

Dignitatis Humanae, the Vatican II sect document on so-called "religious liberty," overturns the perennial teaching of the Church on religious tolerance. Paragraph #2 of that damnable document states: "This Vatican Synod declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that in matters religious no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs. Nor is anyone to be restrained from acting in accordance with his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits."

Vatican II not only says that no one should be forced to believe (which the Church has always taught), but also claims that no one can be restrained from practicing the religion of his choice. The Robber Council announces a "natural right" of the members of all false religions not to be hindered in their equally false/evil practices, which includes the "right" to proselytize and have false worship in public. Vatican II promotes something (once more) that the Church always condemned previously. The result was that Catholic countries were not only permitted, but encouraged, to remove Catholicism as the State Religion. When the Church was the religion of the State, only Catholicism could be practiced in public. Proselytism and public worship by sects was strictly forbidden. The result is both obvious and devastating, as the formerly Catholic countries of Europe (e.g., Belgium, France, Italy, Spain, etc.) are overrun with Mohammedans and other sects, with their morals returning to those of pagan times having abortion, euthanasia, and sodomite "marriage" all legalized. 

3. The False "Mass" and "Sacraments" of the Vatican II sect.

When the True Church was driven underground, and the Modernists took over the formerly Catholic buildings, they evicted Christ. When the Mass was replaced by an invalid Novus Bogus bread and wine service, the grace that comes to humanity via the Unbloody Sacrifice of the Cross was diminished. As Christ decreases, Satan increases. Why else did missionaries have to perform so many exorcisms in foreign lands filled with pagans? As the Mass increased, demonic activity decreased.

Moreover, the sacraments have all been invalidated with the exception of most baptisms, and some marriages. Young people must try to fight all the modern evils and temptations without the grace of Confirmation. There are no priests and bishops to perform exorcisms and bless sacramentals. No graces from Holy Communion, and no forgiveness of sin outside of perfect contrition. It's a delightful time for the forces of Hell. 

 The Rise of Satanism

 In the 1980s, after two decades of the above errors, the rise of Satan was becoming apparent in many ways. Not far off from Father DePauw's Ave Maria Chapel, was the the infamous ritual murderer Ricky Kasso (b. Richard Allen Kasso, Jr. in 1967) aka "The Acid King" for his use of LSD. He became involved with reading the Satanic Bible as well as listening to Satanic rock groups like AC/DC and Judas Priest (he is pictured at the top of this post). Kasso murdered his 17-year-old friend Gary Lauwers in Northport, New York, on June 19, 1984 in a ritualistic Satanic slaying. Kasso attacked his friend in the woods with two accomplices, stabbing him multiple times and demanding that he say, "I love Satan." Instead, the victim replied, "No! I love my mother!" Lauwers bled out, and Kasso hid the body under branches and leaves. He bragged to his friends about the killing, even going so far as taking some to see the decaying corpse, and declaring  Satan was "pleased with [him for] the murder" and manifested himself to Kasso in the form of a black crow. 

The body of the missing Lauwers was discovered by police on July 4th, and Kasso was arrested two days later. He committed suicide in his jail cell by hanging himself on July 7th. (See Say You Love Satan, Dell Books, [1987]). Kasso was an early example of "self-styled Satanists." These are individuals that seek out Satan on their own for power. They are not affiliated with any formal "church" or "coven." This is in distinction to The Church of Satan founded by Anton LaVey in 1966, or other formal Satanists like the sect called the Temple of Set. 

The biggest lie perpetrated by LaVey was claiming that "Satan" only represented the repressed forces of nature but was not a real entity. In a book published posthumously in 1999 (LaVey died in 1997), he admitted in an interview: "If they’re at all intelligent [other Satanists] …they'll realize that there’s only so much I can say publicly…I will not advance things in print which make my position untenable…How long would the Church of Satan have lasted if I hadn’t appeased and outraged in just the right combination? It required a certain amount of discretion and diplomacy to balance the outrage." (See Lucifer Rising: A Book of Sin, Devil Worship and Rock ‘n’ Roll by Gavin Baddeley [1999], p. 133). 

The case of Ricky Kasso was shocking at the time; that someone so young would become involved with devil worship. We are now witnessing young children doing the same. On May 31, 2014, 12-year-olds Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier, admitted that they lured their friend, Payton Leutner into some woods near a suburban Milwaukee park. Geyser stabbed Leutner 19 times while Weier urged her on, according to investigators. Leutner was left for dead but she crawled out of the woods and got help from a passing bicyclist. Geyser and Weier said they carried out the attack to curry favor with "Slender Man," a fictional online horror character typified by spidery limbs and a blank white face. 

If you think the story is an anomaly, just a couple of mentally disturbed pre-teens, you'd better think again. Just last month, a story came out that sent shivers down my spine. It has been spun by the media in interesting ways. Two young girls (11 and 12) whose names have not yet been released due to their ages, wanted to murder their classmates, drink their blood, and commit suicide to be with Satan. According to USA Today:

Police say the girls — ages 11 and 12 — were found in a bathroom stall, allegedly with multiple knives, a pizza cutter and knife sharpener in their possession. The girls planned to commit suicide after stabbing other students, police say. "The plan was to kill at least 1 student but were hoping to kill anywhere from 15-25 students," an affidavit said. "Killing all of these students was in hopes it would make them worse sinners ensuring that after they committed suicide ... (they) would go to hell so they could be with Satan."

The girls allegedly hatched the plot after watching scary movies over the weekend, detectives said. The plan involved lying in wait for smaller students, mutilating their victims' bodies and drinking their victims' blood, according to authorities. (See https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/10/24/florida-girls-plotted-satanic-school-stabbings-police-say/1756036002/)

Rolling Stone magazine quotes a Satanic sect as saying, "I’m sure it will be established that these girls held no active role in any established form of religious Satanism, the major sects of which today are non-theistic, humanistic, and anti-superstitious,” Lucien Greaves, spokesperson and co-founder of the Satanic Temple says. “Their distorted perspective of what Satanism is, and their apparent supernatural belief in what Satan wants, is almost certainly the product of a Christian upbringing, possibly an attempt at the tired ‘the devil made us do it’ defense." (See https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/satanic-temple-responds-murder-plan-satan-worshiping-girls-747337/).

Am I the only one to see the media hype doesn't add up? Why would any middle schooler seek out such violent thrills, especially if the "type of Satanism" they followed was not at all according to its teachings?  Madness is not contagious. I'm not a psychologist, but it seems more than a bit odd that two pairs of young girls who are friends would both have severe psychological problems, to the point of sharing the same psychotic ideas and plot. Murder, suicide, and blood drinking from a weekend of horror movies? No, it goes deeper than that. It's the Satanic influences all around. Slender Man and the horror movies were just the proverbial "last straw" in kids who went from the implicit Satanism in our modern pagan culture to overt Satanism. It wouldn't surprise me if the girls had been reading the Satanic Bible and the press wishes to prevent so-called "Satanic panic."

And lest anyone suggest that this latest duo is hardly a trend, there have been more and more grizzly murders in the name of Satan since Kasso. To list but a couple:

• In Italy, a rock group aptly named The Beasts of Satan, were involved in Satanic ritualistic killings. According to The Guardian: Andrea Volpe and Pietro Guerrieri had confessed to roles in the 1998 killings of Chiara Marino, 19, and 16-year-old Fabio Tollis in woods outside Milan. Volpe - considered to have been the mastermind of the ritual killings - was sentenced to 30 years, 10 more than prosecutors had asked for. Guerrieri was given 16 years. Mario Maccione, who also confessed to the killings, was cleared because he had played a secondary role. Five other members of their suspected Satanic cult have been ordered to stand trial in June. (See https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/feb/22/italy). 

• Italian police stated their intention to create a special unit focusing on new religious sects, particularly Satanists and other violent ritualistic groups. It would be dubbed "The Satan Squad" (See http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6168827.stm)
• In September 2014, while awaiting trial for the murder of a 40-year-old in Pennsylvania, 19-year-old Miranda Barbour confessed to the murder of more than 22 people across the United States. "After 22, I just stopped counting," she told a local newspaper.The young woman explained that she started killing at the age of 13. At the time, she was dating a member of an Alaskan satanist sect. After being arrested for the murder that took her to court, her car was searched and a satanic bible and a medieval dagger, which was presumed to have been used to kill the victim, were found. [Barbour was sexually abused and it led her into evil companionship]. (See https://www.dailyitem.com/news/barbour-body-count-at/article_2d85b849-c9e6-508b-96f3-4e80639a867a.html). 

So is it Demonic Possession?

 What is causing the unbelievable crimes being committed (at first) by teenagers, and now even by young children in the name of Satan? Are they possessed? Some may be, but it isn't a stretch to see how children get caught up in things covertly demonic until they reach the point of giving themselves (literally) over to Satan. Consider:

• The Harry Potter franchise portrays witchcraft in a positive light, and promotes moral relativism. Something is only right or wrong depending on who does it and for what reason; the end justifies the means  
• The Star Wars franchise promotes Eastern pagan pantheism and an impersonal "Force"
• Rock, pop, and rap music is rotten to the core--see my once per month series "Singing For Satan" on the first Monday of every month
• The Twilight franchise promotes evil as good, and implies statutory rape
• Video games desensitize children to violence
• So-called mediums, "psychics" and "ghost whisperers" pervade entertainment on TV and are even invited into homes by adults to "speak to deceased relatives"
• The "Charlie Charlie Challenge" has inspired millions of ­youngsters to dabble with Satanic rituals by using a simple Ouija board made from a sheet of paper divided into quarters. They write “Yes” in two corners and “No” in the remaining squares. They then make a cross by stacking one pencil on top of another and summon the demon "Charlie" who answers questions – or even gives them instructions – by turning the top pencil to point to "Yes" or "No." The Daily Mirror reports: "Players have reported strange phenomena after contacting Charlie, especially if they believe they failed to sever the spiritual link after the game. One player from Buckinghamshire claimed her laptop malfunctioned, then the power failed. When she tried to call her parents the phone cut out. Another from Texas said he had seen a black figure with red eyes at the top of the stairs. Others reported hearing sinister laughing and objects moving without any obvious explanation."
• Pagan practices such as yoga and reiki are promoted not only in public schools but in Vatican II sect schools and churches
• Horror movies are seeped in the occult 
• The Satanic Bible and Wiccan books are readily available to children in public libraries and schools
• The Vatican II sect tells its members that all religions are more or less good, so no need to combat Satan or convert others--Christ is thereby rendered "one among many options" (at best) or totally irrelevant (at worst)

Conclusion

The so-called "Satanic Panic" of the 1980s was not all mass hysteria as the media portrays it. The incident with Father DePauw was not reported in the media, and neither were others. The hysterical stories were given the limelight. In the wake of the Great Apostasy, we are seeing the insidious growth of demonic influence. The first organized religion based on Satan started less than a year after the close of Vatican II. We see the growth of paganism, and evil in all forms. I find it interesting that one source I read called the two Satan worshiping pre-teens wannabe "vampires" because they wanted to drink their victims' blood. The story conveniently left out all reference to Satan, which is analogous to reporting on 9-11 without mentioning Islam. 

 I will not be like some Protestant preacher saying "Satan is everywhere," and everything that goes wrong is because of him. That is hysterical, theologically unsound, and does more harm than good. However, he is in many places and his influences grows. In the wake of this Satanic influence, the answer for those of us who hold on to the One True Faith, is not to panic. It must be a resolve to expose it and fight it with all natural and supernatural means we have at our disposal. May St. Michael the Archangel lead us, and defend us in battle against the malice and snares of the devil.