“And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee . . . . for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived.” (Revelation 18:23)
The Catholic blogosphere was in a tizzy last week over an article that appeared in the National Catholic Reporter. “Not for the first time,” you say. And that’s fair enough. But this one really is a doozy. The author, a Jesuit regent named Patrick Saint-Jean, urges the Synod on Synodality to embrace voodoo.
Dr. Saint-Jean (who is Hatian) says of his enslaved forefathers:
For them, this ancestral spiritual practice was a doorway to meet Christ. Vodou was a way to come to gather, to pray, discern and open themselves to the work of the Holy Spirit. This was their culture and spiritual avenue where they encountered the Spirit.
Like many other local spiritual systems, Vodou appeals to many who take shelter in the margin of the Gospel. This helps to connect them with all spiritual possibilities, including how people speak, eat and pray, as a way to connect with the Divine.
Many Westerners—and not a few Hatians—believe that voodoo is evil. Not true, according to Dr. Saint-Jean. Rather, it has been “misunderstood by the Eurocentric mind of the enslavers.” These slavers then “forced their enslaved to undermine their own spiritual practice.” In fact, voodoo is fully compatible with Christianity.
Dr. Saint-Jean goes on to explain: “This synod in Rome will be a new way for us to challenge the lack of spiritual imagination that was inculcated in us” by white slave-traders, etc. And if you feel inclined to point out that the Catholic Church—well, don’t. “We ought to believe in the possibility of everything from the Holy Spirit,” says Dr. Saint-Jean.
Now, let’s get the obvious points out of the way first. Voodoo is not compatible wiith Christianity. It incorporates both sorcery and idolatry; both are forbidden, completely and unambiguously, by all of Scripture and Tradition.
Many will point out that certain voodoo spells, known as juju, are designed to harm or even kill other people. In Africa, for instance, human traffickers use juju to intimidate their sex slaves, threatening to curse their victims and their families if they try to escape or alert the authorities. But the Church makes no distinction between (benevolent) “white magic” and (malevolent) “black magic.” Whether you’re trying to kill an ex-lover or bring about good weather, it doesn’t matter. Sorcery and idolatry—in all its forms—are categorically forbidden by the Christian faith.
And in case you were wondering, race has nothing to do with it. I’m sure it’s true that European Christians tried to suppress the practice of voodoo among their slaves. But these Christians also tried to suppress the practice of voodoo among their fellow Europeans. At the height of the Atlantic slave trade, Protestants from New England to Germany were embroiled in their infamous “witch trials.” And just a few generations before, the Catholic Church had fought against hermetic and alchemical magic, which came into vogue during the Renaissance.
So, this has nothing to do with race or class or creed or sect. The simple fact is that Christianity and magic are incompatible. Period. Full-stop.
Speaking of Renaissance magic, though, Dr. Saint-Jean’s article reminded me of a series of essays that appeared earlier this year in The European Conservative. Its author, an academic named Sebastian Morello, asks: “Can Hermetic Magic Rescue the Church?” He answers his own question over the course of three articles, but let’s skip to the end of number three:
I declare that Christ alone can rescue His Church, but we have ousted Him in a diabolic effort to divorce Bride from Bridegroom. We have lost the primacy of the supernatural: however much the Lord may seek to rescue His Church from its current trajectory of self-destruction, He finds a Church whose members largely don’t believe they need rescuing. They are under a spell, and that spell must be broken. Perhaps the sacred magic of Hermes Trismegistus is what’s needed to banish the black magic of Enlightened man. And thereby, we may begin to retrieve meaning, and in turn start the Church’s process of humbling itself before the true King of the Universe.
The essay deals broadly with the theme of “disenchantment,” which is a major buzzword among conservative/Christian intellectuals at the moment.
For those who don’t know, the idea of disenchantment stems from the writings of Friedrich Schiller and Max Weber. It refers to the materialist, naturalist, “this-worldly” mindset that defines our post-Enlightenment world. It’s as though we lack a sixth sense, one that allows us to perceive spiritual realities.
Here’s where things get interesting.
Dr. Morello is, avowedly, a man of the Right. And I think it’s fair to say Patrick Saint-Jean is a man of the Left. Yet both identify the same malaise afflicting the Western world. (When Dr. Saint-Jean refers to Europeans’ “lack of spiritual imagination,” he’s basically talking about disenchantment.)
Each blames the other’s side for stealing Modernity’s soul. Neither apparently believes that Christianity possesses the necessary tools to heal that malaise. Both also feel the need to reach outside the Christian tradition for answers. And both settle on magic as the solution.
I point this out for two reasons.
First, conservatives shouldn’t pretend that dechristianization—or, more accurately, repaganization—is just “something that happens to other people.” It might be more common on the Left, but the Right is by no means immune. And if Christians believe that “conservatism” will shield us from the coming Dark Age… well, I’ve got bad news.
Look, I’m not a prophet. Hopefully this won’t come as a surprise to most of you. But I feel confident about one thing. Whatever the future may hold for Western civilization, it will not (for our purposes) be a matter of Left vs. Right. It will be a matter of Christians vs. non-Christians. In other words, neither half of the ideological mainstream will align with Gospel principles. I expect that—at the very least!—large factions within both camps will be hostile to the Church, her teachings, and her faithful.
Second, I think it’s important to acknowledge that this is why dechristianization/repaganization is happening. It’s happening because Westerners, including many self-professed Christians, believe that Christianity is ill-suited to meet the current “moment.” Whether or not they admit it, they don’t believe the Church possesses the tools to meet the needs of modern man. So, they’re using outside sources.
No one has made this point more clearly, more powerfully, or more compellingly than Blessed Seraphim (Rose) of Platina. If you haven’t read his book Orthodoxy and the Future of Religion, do yourself a favor and order a copy right now.
Seraphim devotes a chapter to each of the New-Age movements that gripped America in the late 20th century, from yoga to the Charismatic Renewal to Ufology to (of course) neopaganism. Satan will rejoice in—and even promote!—any and all of these phenomena, for one simple reason: they’re not Christian orthodoxy. Some are psuedo-scientific; others are pseudo-religious. They all serve the Enemy’s purposes, however, because they distract us from the ordinary praxis of Christianity: prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and righteousness.
It’s especially dangerous when Christians embrace these fads, he explains, because we poison the well of Christianity, as it were. Say I grow up in a liberal Protestant sect, or a “Charismatic” Roman-Catholic parish. And say I find that spirituality to be deeply unsatisfying. Am I going to seek out a community that practices a more traditional, mystical, ascetical form of Christianity? Or am I just going to write off the Faith? Statistically speaking, the latter scenario is more likely. There are far more apostates from pseudo-Christianity than there are converts to authentic Christianity. Alas.
The Enemy wants only to lead from the difficult path which leads to the Gate of Life (Matt. 7:13-14). He doesn’t care if we veer to the Left or to the Right. He doesn’t care if we become materialists or magicians. Both suit his purposes nicely. The best thing for us Christians to do—the only thing for us Christians to do—is keep walking that narrow path, and help others to do the same.
This is why Seraphim warns Christians to “walk in the fear of God, trembling lest they lose His grace, which by no means is given to everyone, but only to those who hold the true Faith, lead a life of Christian struggle, and treasure the grace of God which leads them heavenward.”
Amen.