Pints With Aquinas - From Satan to Christ (Interviewing an Ex-Satanist) w/ Michael Davis

Episode Date: September 8, 2023

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I just want to offer a disclaimer before we get underway that in today's episode we're going to be speaking about many sensitive things and even some troubling things and so Certainly if you have children do not let them watch or listen to this unless you watch and listen to it ahead of time And then I also would advise against anybody who struggles maybe with the vice of curiosity anybody who struggles maybe with the vice of curiosity just to be very wary about this, maybe not watch it at all or just just just just to be cautious as you go through it. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I'm in. Almighty God, who delivered your people from the bondage of the adversary and through your Son cast down Satan like lightning, adversary and through your son cast down Satan like lightning. Deliver us also from every influence of evil and unclean spirits. Command Satan to depart far from us by the power of

your only begotten son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Rescue us from demonic imaginings and darkness, fill us with the light of your Holy Spirit that we may be guarded against all the snares of the cunning demons. Grant that your angel will always go before us and lead us in the path of righteousness all the days of our life so that we may give glory and honor to your most holy name Father son and Holy Spirit now and always and forever and ever amen Michael Davis Thank you for being on the show. I'm honored. It's good to be here. It's great to have you. It's yeah pleasure Is it weird being in this room? People always say it looks a lot smaller It's weird because all my favorite people have been here.

That's so cool. Yeah. Oh no, I just, I was, uh, I'm not going to keep saying I was telling you before the show, but um, yeah, I, um, I can do that if you want to. That's fine. It's a probably a nervous tick, but I, um, yeah, I, I never on principle, like I don't like anything that happened after the fall of Constantinople. So I don't like podcasts on principle,

or I didn't like podcasts on principle, but then when I, in my job, I had to start keeping up with the most popular authors and stuff, so I figured I should probably start listening to the podcasts, and this was the first one I listened to, because it's the Catholic podcast and You know after the first episode I was like, this is pretty good. I like the show I begrudgingly concede

Yeah, yeah, who was the first guest that you watched you remember mother Natalia. Oh, what a woman. Yeah. Yeah Yep, I I have a story about the Christ the Bridegroom after. Yeah. But let's announce it now. I don't know. A bit of news, bit of news here, which I haven't told you or you. I've shared with you. So we are going, just like we have Father Gregory Pine weekly running a show, you know, he does a little, we're going to have Mother Natalia has agreed to do it as well. So we're gonna start having a weekly Chat with mother Natalia. I don't know how she's gonna feel about the word Aquinas or pints

Maybe it'll just be pints of coffee with Maximus or something I don't know, but I always thought father Boniface Hicks should start a rival podcast and call it Heminas with Benedict Well, I like that. Yeah, or there's a beers with Bonaventure. Mm-hmm I'm gonna give everyone name ideas for their new podcast tequila with their scribble Yeah, just a quick shot. Huh? Yeah. Yeah, you should know that your eastern you should change it to pints with Palmas. Yeah I'm not you know, I could people have said that for sure. Oh, well, I thought that was my one joke So we're done I

I'm excited that I don't know a lot about you because it'll give us a chance to be sincere as I chat with you as opposed to pretending to not know things I already know. So where were you born and raised? Well, born in Massachusetts, raised, you know, I'm Presbyterian, a fairly, you know, fairly conservative Presbyterian parish and idyllic New England childhood. Grew up on an old disused farm, but in rural Massachusetts, so my first job when I was in middle school was working on a neighbor's farm and I did that through high school and

it was the best job I ever had and probably ever will have. Where did you grow up in Massachusetts? If you don't mind me asking exactly the town, because my wife was born in Weymouth and her family were on the Cape. and it was the best job I ever had and probably ever will have. So where did you grow up in Massachusetts? It's a mommy asking exactly the town because my wife was born in Weymouth and her family are on the Cape. Oh, I didn't know that. Okay. It's a town called Hayroll. Okay. City called Hayroll. We're on the North Shore. And if anyone's ever passed through Haverhill, they're going to say there's no farm country in Haverhill. But it's there is in the like the northern right up against the New Hampshire border. There's a gets very rural. I grew up on a property that was it used to be part of the property of the poet John

Greenleaf Whittier. So he was my neighbor. I would walk through the woods and through the fields that we had. And I was at the Whittier homestead, which is all preserved. And if anyone knows the, oh, I'm embarrassing myself. Well, the Barefoot Boy, it was written while he was living there and there's one about, this is humiliation, there's one about winter that everyone knows. Okay.

But yeah, so it was, I, my parents are wonderful, wonderful people, which I say to preface, nothing that happened was their fault. Were they practicing Protestants? My, yeah, my father was a raised-elapsed Catholic. My mother is a practicing Presbyterian. And so did you take to the faith as an early child? Did you say your prayers, read the Bible?

Yeah, I remember when I was a little kid, I mean, probably 12 maybe, 13, I told our minister that I wanted to be a Protestant minister when I grew up. I loved religion. I loved the church. I still love the Presbyterian tradition for everything that he gave me. Yeah, I have no complaints at all about growing up. It was the perfect, you know, New England childhood.

My family came, I was born in the city of New Breport and my family came to New Breport in 1624 I think. So like deep roots, knew everyone in the area. I still go when I run into, when I go to the market basket near my parents house, I still run into people that I know and yeah I just can't, yeah I can't say enough about my parents' house, I still run into people that I know. And yeah, I just can't, yeah, I can't say enough about my parents, my home, the schools that I went to, it was all idyllic. I have nothing but good memories. But before I forget,

I wanna just offer a disclaimer to those watching. We're gonna get into some very sensitive material today. So if you sometimes let your children watch the show or listen to the show, maybe don't do that until you've at least listened to it and then or watched it and then make that decision. Yeah. Because I'm sure you didn't go from Presbyterian kid who wanted to be a pastor to Satanism

overnight was, you know, so how did you gradually move down that path? Well I was, I was an M, a huge nerd. and so I was really into Greek mythology when I was a kid. Awesome. And looking back, one of the things that I realized, reading Greek mythology, studying as best I could, when the internet was still pretty new, Greek religion, I was really drawn to the two things. One of them was the fact that there was really no distinction

between the natural and the supernatural. At any moment, you could encounter a God in the river, the God of the river, the God of a pretty, a nymph could pop out of the trees. And there's a part of me that still really believes in that the world is charged with the grandeur of God, that there's, you know, I've experienced that, you know, personally.

I've never had any doubts about the supernatural. Yeah. Supernatural in one way of thinking of it could be thought of as a pejorative term, as if there's this distinction between what is natural and what's supernatural when maybe the natural and supernatural are one thing reality Absolutely, it's interesting. I in in Islam, you know, there's the the jinn or the genie and

The the I don't know if you know this but Muslims believe that they still believe most of them still believe in the jinn I mean, it's integral to the Quran But they believe that the the jinn are you mean it's in-jewels with the Quran, but they believe that the jinn are, you know, they're pretty much, they're like people, but just incorporeal. So some jinn convert to Islam, some don't, some are pagan, and they have these, they have personalities, they have private convictions, some of which are presumably right or wrong. And so this idea that we have in the West now of separating the natural and the supernatural is very foreign to our own tradition,

but it's basically unheard of in the rest of the world. And I think it's very artificial. And then when you encounter a tradition of people that don't make that insane distinction, coming from, you know, even the best of us, you know, the people, I should say, the people with the best upbringing like mine, we're still products of a secularist world, secular society. So when you encounter something like Greek mythology, it seems more true than what you

imbibe from the culture. It's funny you say that. Lately I've been on a kick of saying that I prefer nonfiction because it seems to me sometimes if it's good nonfiction, more factual than fiction. Sorry, fiction is more factual than nonfiction. You know, like reading Tolkien,

like this is more factual than reading the New York Times. Absolutely. And you get made fun of when you talk about the authors that influence your worldview most, and you say Tolkien and people. Do you?, you know, you get made fun of when you talk about the authors that influence your world of your most, you say Tolkien and people. Oh, I do. Oh yeah. That's true. I mean, yeah, it's a, that's good. Yeah. No, it, uh, yeah. So I, I encountered this, um, this other way of,

it was just the really the first way that I encountered this other way of, it was just really the first way that I encountered this other way of looking at the world. And I was drawn into it. And so in middle school, I made a friend who, she was Wiccan and her mother was also Wiccan. And we would hang out and they would take, we lived not very far from Salem, Massachusetts, which city city USA. And so we'd go and we'd buy, you know, ritual stuff.

How old were you? Middle school? Middle school. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know how old that is. 13. Did your parents know and were they concerned if they did? No, I don't think they knew. I did my best to hide it. I think I had, I mean, I had, I know that I left my idols out, but you know. What does it, what do you mean? Statues, like the statues of the gods and things like that.

Okay, you gotta back up. So you have statues of God in your house, in your bedroom and? Yeah, so these like these witchcraft shops, they sell idols, like statues. Oh, I see, so after you bought them, you would hide them. Oh yeah, no, I wouldn't hide them. I think my parents just thought that they were old artworks that I see. So after you bought them, you would hide them. Oh, yeah. No, I wouldn't hide them. I think my parents just thought that they were old.

Oh, artworks that I had. So I think they, and they knew that I loved Greek mythology. So I think to have like a, oops, sorry, to have a little statue of Apollo or whatever, I think that that wasn't something that gave them any pause. But I did hide my ritual tools. And I had the usual stuff. I had a chalice that I bought from a witchcraft store, and I would take the chalice and I

would steal wine from my dad, and I would, you know, usually like bread or something. And I'd take the idols and other tools of the craft, and I would go into the woods. We had very deep woods behind my house, and I had a special, it was hidden in a gulf with a stream, and I had a special spot that I would go to, and I would make offerings and say the prayers. And that was kind of how I got into it. And I still think of that period

as kind of the Arcadian phase of this part of my life, because it was, I was, the other thing that I was desperate for, I think, growing up as a Presbyterian, the thing that we have a natural need for is ritual, and to be able to take these elements, wine and bread, and to have these beautiful statues in nature, and to say these set prayers, these ancient prayers,

like the hymns of Orpheus, and to make these offerings, and to offer beautiful things to something beautiful or that seems beautiful. I think this fulfilled, I think this was a, in a way it was kind of a prefigurement, if you wanna say of a, or it came from a good instinct. It seems more innocent than anything else. And I feel like becoming, well, jumping ahead,

but I feel like becoming Catholic, you know, I look back now and I say, this is what I was looking for. Yeah, so it was the innocence of a child looking for something more. Yeah, yeah, and something fundamental. I love our Protestant brothers and sisters, and I love the church that I grew up in, but I don't, the truth of the mass, if you can say this, the truth of the mass aside, I don't think that man can go without ritual. I think that there's a deep need for that, and I think even though I had good Bible preaching,

great spiritual direction from my minister who was a wonderful, wonderful man, he's still active in ministry, and my parents were just wonderful, very supportive of my spiritual formation in the Presbyterian church, not knowing that this was going on at the same time. But what was it about the idols and the rituals that you were buying from this Wicker store? What was it about that that you

thought I can't let my parents into this? You must have had a sense that this was bad or did you just think this was weird, not necessarily bad and they wouldn't understand it? Why did you hide it from them? I think I know now that they wouldn't have minded but I think I liked the idea of it being a secret? I think, I know now that they wouldn't have minded, but I think I liked the idea of it being a secret. I think I liked the idea of being, you know, the secret pagan that was sneaking out into the woods and, you know, might be persecuted if anyone found out. My parents would have been, I mean, I think that they would have obviously had some objections, but they wouldn't have, you know, they wouldn't have castigated me or anything.

I mean, that's a quick transition from visiting a wicker store with a friend in middle school to ritual books and things like that. Was there much progression there, or did she kind of introduce you to it? Did you buy books that look cool and then learn how to do the rituals yourself? Yeah, yeah.

And that was, I mean, I did have, that was, you know, that was the first time, around that time was the first time We had the internet in our house. And so I looked up a lot of the stuff on there. I Was pretty infatuated with this girl. So I think a lot I think that the the my my lifelong love of Greek mythology kind of It I was like, you know, oh, I want to impress this girl. This is kind of, and that was kind of the expression that I got out of it,

or the way that I found of kind of connecting with her and being part of her world. And so it's, but I didn't initially have any interest in what we would call magic, like Wiccan type magic. I mean, all pagan rituals are kind of magic. They're always, you're always, you know, what we would call magic, like Wiccan type magic. I mean, all pagan rituals are kind of magic. They're always, you're always, you know, saying to the gods, this is, I'll give you this if you give me that, or I'll give you this offering if you, you know, if you don't smite me. Usually it's in, historically it was mostly fear. It was, you know,

you make offerings to the gods so that they don't send another Greek nation state to kill you. But yeah, I mean, at first it was, I just wanted to have a relationship with something transcendent and taking the love of Greek mythology and bringing it together with the Wicca was kind of the first expression that I found for that. And then how did it develop or regress or however you want to phrase it? Yeah, well the first, so I had a particular devotion to Pan at first and then Apollo. And I was really fascinated by the idea of healing spells and or you know use of ritual to to heal and So when I started to go into true, you know magic

White magic as it's called because it's supposed to be benevolent I was I started doing rituals for healing to try to I wanted to be a healer, which again, I think is part of the innocence, you know? And, and I probably don't, I don't want to go probably into too much detail about what that looked like, but I, it was efficacious. It, you know, and I, and I, I, I would stand by that. I mean, I think that the, I believe that there was, that something happened. I witnessed stuff happen. As a middle schooler?

This was probably getting into high school. Okay. Yeah. But I was, yeah. So you realized at some point, this isn't just make believe, this isn't just nerdy things, there's some, this affects things. I wasn't surprised when it worked, because I did believe it.

And I think this is going back to the, I think that I, you know, it worked because I did believe it. I've and I think this is going back to that I think that I you know, I think that I for whatever reason from the time that I think recognizing the the truth in in the supernatural Immediately it clicked I've never doubted the supernatural this this is something that I've, nothing that happens really surprises me in the spiritual world because, you know, I don't know why, but for whatever reason, my temperament,

it's something that I believe in more than the natural. And so when these things started to work, it wasn't so much a, oh, wow, this stuff is real. It was more of a, yeah, I'm getting really good at this. This is cool. So I'm not gonna make you share what you don't wanna share, but do you mind me asking why it is you don't wanna go into detail?

I'm always worried about encouraging people. Sure. That because one of the, when I, so if I can just take a quick segue. I've wanted to talk about this for years and hoping to help people. And my old priest, who was a wonderful, wonderful fraternity priest, I love him to death, he urged me not to for a couple of reasons.

One of which was that if I relive it too much, he said, you could get sucked back into it. If your experiences were real, you know, you could get sucked back into it. If your experiences were real, you know, the demons are never going to be very far from you. And so he doesn't – I totally understand that. I had a conversation with my current spiritual father and he gave me the go-ahead. He said, if God is putting this on your heart, then you should do it. I wouldn't have done it otherwise. I wonder if this is similar to say other sort of obsessions people get into, say, with pornography. You know, there's a way to talk about one's experience with pornography without glorifying

it and you don't want to speak or let's say just a hedonistic lifestyle. And you can tell me if it's totally different, right? But I know when I'm say sharing how I came to Christ, I want to maybe point out the road I was going down, but I don't want to speak about it in a way that others would think, oh, gee, that's, that sounds kind of cool, fun. I want to do that. Is it like that or is it maybe that on steroids or is it different? Yes. I can't imagine myself ever going back to that, but my priest knows better than I do. And if I could get sucked back into it knowing what I do now, I would hate for anyone who has the whisper

for me to encourage them. Yeah, I mean, I'd rather just say that stuff happened. Yep, that's fine. You know, one of the reasons I thought this conversation was so important to have, uh, is that it seems that as Christianity evaporates from American culture and other cultures around the world, um, there's a vacuum there. And that vacuum seems to be being filled by new age spirituality.

And I mean, I think all of us realize there's been a rise in Satanism. Like we've been hearing a lot more about it. And I think this rushes to take its place. So I mean, I think all of us realize there's been a rise in Satanism. Like we've been hearing a lot more about it and I think this rushes to take its place. So I'm, I'm, I think that this will be by God's blessing, you know, um, a grace to those who may go down that road or maybe currently tempted or who, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think especially because healing is, um, I think especially because healing is, I think a lot of people in desperation, especially with illness, turn to,

can be tempted to turn to certain things. It reminds you of Thomas Aquinas's point that we don't commit evil for the sake of evil. We commit evil because we perceive it to be a good. It's why people go to tarot card readers and use Ouija boards. They're trying to attain information that they think would benefit them or others. Yes. Yeah. I did both those things. Yeah. And yeah. No, please. Did you then share these experiences with friends or

family or did you keep them to yourself? Yeah, I did. I, um, at that point I didn't have a ton of friends. Most of the friends that I had were involved with this stuff. Uh, and, and I did, and I, you know, they were impressed and we would sort of compare notes and see the Vesper was talking about this when she was on your show. It's, um, did that surprise you at all to hear her powerful stories? No. Yeah. No, I wept like the whole time. I love that woman. Yeah.

Yeah. And for those watching, if you haven't seen my interview with Vespa Stamper on her conversion from Wicca, please go watch it. It was glorious. My wife was I told my wife before we got married that I all this stuff happened. And but I didn't go into detail for the obvious reason that I explained. But when we were watching it together

and I think it hit her like what it was like for me. And she wept too, because it resonated so much. And she, you know, she was, she, she wept too. She, because it resonated so much. And that, yeah, that child, that childish experimentation and, you know, wanting power, wanting acceptance. And it, I feel that there's a part of me that doesn't want, I know there's a part of me that doesn't want to go into detail too, because people are going to say,

oh, he was just a stupid kid. He thought he was doing stuff that he wasn't. Which might be true. I mean, I don't know. I'm not a reliable narrator, but it felt real. And I know that the stuff that happened later was real. I mean, I would, if someone wants to say I wasn't a good magician, okay.

But if when we get into the satanist stuff, if anyone wants to say, wasn't a good magician, okay, but when we get into the Satanist stuff, if anyone wants to say, oh, that's all, I would push back hard on that. But we can go into that. Okay. Yeah. So, in the course of, so, you know, the circle that I had at that time, they were into white magic. The circle that I had at that time where they were they were into white magic They were I mean, I do believe really really good people, you know, mostly younger people Just trying to you know little love spells and stuff for the the girls and then I was into the healing stuff and

but then as I got really interested in in In rune casting rune spells and then I found demonic sigils. Can you explain both of those things to me? Yeah, so runes, I mean, people probably know what runes are. They're ancient symbols that have power, or are supposed to have, they probably do have power. But sigils are symbols that you draw as part of ritual magic to summon demons,

and every demon has his own sigil. Were you referring to them as demons at the time? Yeah, I mean, demon, I don't actually know the exact etymology, but demon is very closely related to the word daemon, D-A-E-M-O-N, which is a kind of powerful force. And so for me and for a lot of people that are not, at that point I was not a Satanist, I was probably some kind of Wiccan, I guess. And for people that practice white magic with demons,

they don't consider them evil, they consider them more like natural spirits, but particularly natural spirits that have been identified by Christianity as particularly powerful evil. So there's obviously a draw there. If you're kind of rebelling against a Christian upbringing, you gravitate towards that.

And it's like, oh, they're not really oh, it's not, they're not really demons. They're actually, and this is the, I had a, I don't even know if I want to say their names. I won't say their names. I had, I had, I had relationships with, spiritual relationships with a few different demons. And then- What does that mean?

I don't think I should probably talk about it. Okay. Is it like a person who would think they have a relationship with a saint or a guardian angel or something like that? Or is it much more involved? At first? Yeah, it was more like that. It was more like that. I mean, there was, there was, there was, there was presence. But then I worked my way up to Lucifer. And Lucifer, obviously, you know, in the Luciferian tradition, which is the belief that Lucifer is, you know, that he's kind of a Promethean hero. He rebels against God. He brings light. He's the morning star, right?

And he's always depicted as this beautiful angel, kind of cold and haughty. But that's because he has power and he gives you this power. And so I eventually I became pretty much just exclusively a Luciferian. And I and I remember, you know, being in high school and I, I, I can still I'm pretty much just exclusively a Luciferian. And I remember being in high school and I could still do it. I drew the sigil of Lucifer on my notebooks the way a schoolgirl would draw for the name of her crush. Like they're probably in my parents' basement.

I had notebooks, math notebooks and history notebooks and English notebooks covered with the sigil of Lucifer. And I was absolutely, you know, I was like, it was like a crush. I was infatuated with Lucifer. And this eventually, you know, again, through the influence of the internet, I developed into a satanist, a theistic, what they call traditionalist or theistic Satanist,

as opposed to a Leveian Satanist. Could you tell us the difference? Yeah, so Leveian Satanism is, if you read about the Church of Satan in the news, they're Leveian Satanists. They claim not to believe in a literal Satan, but Satan as a symbol of human freedom and of rebelling against Christian morality. But then there's a different path called theistic Satanism or traditional Satanism, which believes in Satan, literally believes in Satan, takes the side of darkness.

And it's kind of an interesting bait and switch. Because you come, I think, and I've talked to people that have had the same experience, they come to Lucifer because they want light, and then they find themselves going into darkness and they're craving the darkness. And I mean, I'm not gonna pretend like I was some great, you know, dark philosopher, like, you know, something out of Lovecraft. But I was like a punk, right? I was just great, you know, dark philosopher, like, you know, something out of Lovecraft.

But I was like a punk, right? I was just a punk kid. And I bought, you know, I had a sweatshirt that I got from, from Spencer's that had the sigil of Baphomet on the back. And I was like, I was all dark and grungy. And I was, you know, very proud of my Satanism. And I talked about it to anyone who would listen too. At this point did your parents intervene? No I don't know what they thought. I didn't really talk to them about it.

I'm not a very good son. I think that that's one of the pitfalls of being a really good parent and making sure that your children always know that you love them is that they take liberties with that. And I've taken horrible liberties with my parents' love my whole life. And I think at this point, I was kind of, I wasn't gonna talk to them about it openly, but I think that they probably thought

that I was going through an emo phase or goth phase. You know what I mean? I don't think that they knew how literally to take it. And at this point, I was kind of shunning my old, you know Wiccan friends I thought that they were you know weak because they were only interested in the white magic and I I honestly you know, I Yeah, I you know, I, yeah, I, it became less about the, I did still practice magic, but it became less about the magic and more about the worship of Satan. And I don't know, people listening

to this, this might not make any sense, but it was, it was just I became so consumed by this personality. And I think that, I don't know if the person is the right, I think they say that angels are persons, right? Yes. And it was a personality. And I had a relationship with this personality. And I remember when I was, one day I was in my room and I lit the red candles

and I was doing a prayer and I said, I don't even know if I want to, probably should say the, I told Satan, you know, I don't want to sell you my soul. I said, just take it. Take it. I love you. I want you to have this. I want you Yeah And I think we'll go into this but I think in the end that's probably what saved me Or at least God to keep a foot in the door, but um

because it was taken not given or because Because it was taken, not given? Because I don't think Satan can't do anything with love. Satan doesn't want love. Father Amort said that Satan doesn't have children because he can't create, he can't love. Satan doesn't want children, he wants slaves. And I think, you know, as John the beloved says, God is love. And I think as long as you're trying, as you're looking, oh, and Mother Ileana says in her beautiful

book, she says, we're born searching for the face of love. And I think at that point I was still looking for love and then Satan couldn't give me that. And he couldn't do anything with the love that I was giving him. By way if there are any exorcists watching this and I'm doing something wrong, please forgive me but um I I remember with the first time I read The Chronicles of Narnia, and I know you don't like these no I like them some of them for my kids Yeah, the in the last battle where?

Was it emeth the worshiper of Tash, the good Calamene. When Tash is exposed as an evil, and Emeth comes before Aslan and he says, oh God, now I'm gonna be smoten by the good God, right? And Aslan says, whatever good you did in Tasha's name, you did in my name because you can't do good in the name of evil, so to speak.

And I remember reading that and I have the gift of tears. And just weeping and thinking, you know, that's what I think, I think that's what Satan, I think when I said, you know, Satan, I love you. I want to give myself to you. I take my soul. I don't want anything in return. I think God said, oh, and he kind of snuck his foot in the door and said, you know, this is my opening. And yeah, so thank God, because eventually I did fall in

with a very different group. Did you maintain this relationship with the girl from middle school? No, spurned her, spurned everyone, spurned my parents. And, but I fell in with this other group and I, most, most, I don't know if most, some magic groups are not united by like a common cosmology. They're united by a desire for power, to practice magic together. Magic is more powerful when you practice it together, they say. That's probably true.

And so I fell in with this other group that was more interested in black magic. And some were Satanists, some weren't. Some were just wiccans who were interested in dark and some were... Oh, there's a term for it. It's a different... It's kind of like an atheistic magic sect. It's going to come to me later. But so we were united by the kind of ritual, the kind of magic we wanted to do, not by a common belief system. And I was involved with this group for a while and I was going through the ranks. And then the final initiation no one was supposed to talk about unless they, unless they'd been through it.

And I remember a friend of mine in the group went through the ritual and it was, then he told me afterwards, he came to me, he looked, he looked, he was, I mean, he was in his teens and he looked like, he looked like an old man. He was haggard. He was pale. He was haggard. He was Pale He was sickly he could he couldn't make eye contact with me And he said I went through the final initiation and I said oh And he said he said I need to tell you what happens

And I can't talk about what happens, but um it's horrible. It's it was horrible. It wasn't I don't think was. It's it was horrible. It wasn't Healthy was anything criminal but it was It was pretty well probably was I don't know shouldn't I'm trying to I'm trying to save you From an evil, I don't know legal problems, but it was it was terrible and And I was and I I was like I'm getting out I don't want I don't want anything to do with this. And years later, I thought about this

when I was reading the Chesterton's essay, The Diabolist, where his friend, the Satanist says, and he says he's listening to this evil art student talk to one of his friends. And he doesn't hear what the other person proposes to the Diabolus, but the Diabolus says, if I do this, I shan't know the difference between right and wrong anymore.

And it was like, it was a moment like that for me when I realized as much as I think that I love evil, I don't love this. I don't want anything to do with this. And so I got out, I just stopped talking to those people. I stopped answering phone calls and text messages. I didn't, and I pretty much, I gave the whole thing up completely.

I burned my copy of all of my ritual books. I threw away all of the garb and all of my, you know, Spencer's punk Satanist clothing. Were you afraid that not going through the final initiation or burning the books, cutting off your relationships would ruin the relationship you had with the demonic that you had come to obsess over and desire? Or did you not want that relationship anymore? I didn't want it anymore.

And I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't remember it as a moment of saying, oh my gosh, this was all, it took me, I mean, get into this, it took me about a year to realize how bad it had been. But I think that there was a part, again, I think there was a part of me that was still just looking for truth and beauty. And so I remember it as more of a, oh man, I really got off course. Let me try something else. I've struggled with my lack of guilt. My, ever since I've struggled with a lack of guilt.

And I've, that's been a lot of the spiritual direction that I've gone through. And my priests have said, my very good priests have said, you know, you've you've been to confession, you've been forgiven. I said, yeah, but St. Francis of Assisi wept over his sins every night. And they said that was a grace. You know, God doesn't necessarily want you to feel that sorrow. He wants you to feel forgiven. He wants you to feel lightness. forgiven, he wants you to feel lightness. But at that point, I have to trust that. But at that point, I was horrified and disgusted by what he told me. And it kind of shattered my illusions about black magic. And not that I, again, I still believe that something happens. I mean, I remember the, when I gave, when I surrendered myself to Satan, I remember

this, again, the bait and switch. I um, I probably shouldn't talk about that either. I saw, I had my first personal encounter with a demon and it was hideous. And this is how, I mean, this is the stupidity that I think is manifested every point in this story. But I wasn't, I wasn't horrified. I wasn't surprised and I wasn't horrified. Um, I thought I was so grateful that he finally showed me his true face,

which is, which is evil and, uh, and just in, in, in hideous. Um, but I think it was, it was when it intersected with the human. and in hideous. But I think it was when it intersected with the, when it became real, I mean, really real for me when I realized what other people were doing. It was in my, it seemed like it was something that was just happening in my head, to me, not in my head, but just in my, I don't know, this,

does this make sense at all? Um, say no. No. Well, is it, you're talking about like how you were processing these experiences and your kind of subjective experience of it all. And you were wondering if others had the same thing. Maybe I'm not understanding. It's hard to, it's a little hard to describe. Try it again.

I think that there was a Gnosticism, there is always a Gnosticism with magic. And I think that the spiritual darkness is very attractive. I mean, sometimes the physical, I'm not, sometimes the physical darkness is what's really attractive. You know what I mean? It's like the, there are very good people

that have very disordered physical, sexual, whatever desires, people that don't want them, people that shun them, but are yet drawn to them. I'm not, you know, thank God I'm not, I shouldn't say this, because this is where the, you know, this is when the devil goes at you. But I don't really struggle with sexual sins or physical. I've always struggled with spiritual sins like this.

So the separation of the body and the soul, I was so immersed in the spiritual darkness and I was drawn to that and I was feeding into it. But when it became, I don't know how to describe this without going into too much detail, but there was a ritual sexual aspect of this initiation. And that disgusted me. And it wasn't, it was, I mean, it's, yeah.

It's probably worse than you could imagine. Yeah, it's probably worse than you could imagine. And so I had been drawn to the darkness, the spiritual darkness, but I was repulsed by this part of it. Because you said you were coming up the ranks within a particular group, and it's, I suppose, surprising to me that the final initiation was so grotesque, it turned you off completely. I would think that it would be something of a, kind of a gradual process into, no, I had no idea we were doing, we were still doing, um, just rich magic rituals.

There wasn't the, um, the sexual aspect was only for the, the, the initiates. Um, I think probably because they didn't want, you know, the faint of heart to run off and talk about what they were doing. And I probably should have told someone, but it was, yeah, yeah. I didn't realize that that was a part of it. And I guess I should have knowing, having read about what happens in medieval black masses, right? There's always a sexual aspect. And that was not, that wasn't what drew me to it. And I didn't expect it to be a part of it,

but of course it was. I mean, I guess it was inevitable. I'm just processing this now, but I guess inevitably it had to become sexual, but it didn't occur to me. And so that was the final initiation. It was, and I'd never had any interest in that and it still disgusted me and I wanted nothing to do with it.

So I, yeah, that's probably a very unsatisfying answer. That's okay. I don't know how to, I don't know how to go into it in any more detail without. That's okay. Yeah. Yeah. So you cut off relationship with these folks. Yeah.

You burnt your punk satanic t-shirts and things. Yeah. Or got rid of them, burnt the books. Did you ever read the satanic Bible and what is that? The satanic Bible is a Levan Satanist text. I did own a copy. I found a copy of my, a girl that I dated later, after I had my reversion. I found a copy in her apartment. I was like, what is this?

And she said, oh, I was just having a look through and I threw it in the apartment. I was like, what is this? And she said, Oh, I was just having a look through. And I threw it in the trash. I said, you don't want this in your life. I said, this is, this is a very slippery slope. And I, I do believe I do. I am okay. I'm a hundred percent certain that the higher levels of the church of Satan and people like, um, what's his name? Lucius Grimes, that sounds like something from a cartoon, but he's the head of the Church of Satan or the Satanic Temple in Massachusetts. Thursdays on it. Yeah. Anyway, I'm certain that he's a theistic Satanist

and he's tricking people into thinking that, oh, you know, Satan is just a symbol of freedom. He's the one that's erecting all those Baphomet statues. Lucius Greaves, Lucian, Lucian Greaves. Yeah. And he's the guy that looks like a cartoon villain. You've seen pictures of this guy. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. He's an American, is he? Yes. I think so. I've never heard him speak. Did you see he's from Massachusetts? Born Detroit, Michigan. Okay. He's based in Salem. His group's based in Salem.

They were just firebombed last year. I didn't feel that bad. I shouldn't say that. World's smallest by any means. No one died. If someone died, that would be sad. Yeah. If the Satanic temple is destroyed. Yeah. But he, I mean, I'm, I, I'm certain that he's... A theistic Satanist.

Oh yeah. Yeah. He believes, anyone at the higher levels believes because they'll encounter it at some point. They'll know. So is there like a conversion experience that often happens between say, to get Leveian Satanists to theistic Satanists as they get deeper into it? I mean, I've never, there are other,

there are other converts from Satanism to Christianity that have talked about their conversion. I've tried to steer clear. They might have some insight. I was never a Levain Satanist, because it's technically atheistic and I don't believe that. But I just imagine that as you begin to encounter the supernatural as you delve into this, it's a little bit more difficult to deny. I don't

see how they couldn't, because they do black masses. They do you know old black masses with all the trimmings you know and there's I mean there's photographs, there's like there's texts that you could, any, wow, they're open about it. And you can't, and this is the thing, you can't, I know, yeah, you can't, this is why exorcists always say, don't mess with Ouija boards, don't mess with tarot.

Because if you invite demons into your life They'll come and they won't care if you're kidding or not They'll just come. Okay Keep going. I'm just looking for something Were you ever possessed and if not, why not? Yeah my my After I made my first confession years later That was the first question my my priest asked me was, do you want to talk to an exorcist?

And I said, I don't feel the need. I would tell you if I did. I mean, they say the classic signs of possession, well, besides the vomiting nails, which does happen, are you physically can't receive the sacrament of confession and you physically can't receive the Eucharist. And I did that. Say that again?

Oh, I see, I see. Yeah, so I mean, I could be demonically, I think it's oppressed, but I was never possessed. And I think the very simple reason is that... He already possessed you in a deeper way Maybe I did do about possession being at least the exorcist I've spoken to when the demon has the body But not necessarily the soul and that's why one excess said to me that one confession is worth a hundred thousand exorcisms Yes. Yeah

Well, you know, it's, Satan will possess or not possess people, depending on, you know, whether he thinks that it will, it will serve his ends or not. But a lot of the times, this is a father immortal also said that oftentimes possessions, while obviously terrible in themselves, will lead many people to the church. The person who's possessed will all of a sudden realize that there's a supernatural dimension, and then oftentimes their families will convert because they'll see the power, the reality

of the devil and the power of the church. And so it doesn't – so Satan isn't necessarily going to possess everyone who gives him the opportunity. He'll use them – sometimes that could perhaps be counterproductive for him, like you say. He doesn't – he just wants you to go to hell. He doesn't really care how you get there. He'll use any means. And the gate that leads to salvation is very narrow

There's lots of different roads that lead to damnation And so, you know, I I was already on the road and he didn't need to mess with that formula I had you know, I can we say a prayer? Yes, he would you mind if I just read this prayer? Which one it's prayers against demonic influence. I say it every day in the name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit I'm in Almighty God who delivered your people from the bondage of the adversary and through your son cast down Satan like lightning Deliver us also from every influence of evil and unclean spirits Command Satan to depart far from us by the power of your only begotten son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Rescue us from demonic imaginings and darkness. Fill us with the light of your Holy Spirit that we may be guarded against all the snares

of the cunning demons. Grant that your angel will always go before us and lead us in the path of righteousness all the days of our life so that we may give glory and honor to your most holy name, father, son and Holy Spirit now and always and forever and ever. Amen. All right. I want to say thank you to Emmaus Academy. They've put out this brand new digital platform to help you grow in your love of sacred scripture and therefore your love of

Christ. If you're like me, you know how tempting it is just to waste so much of your day on YouTube like maybe you're doing now or listening to political podcasts and other things. The truth is we do often have the time to grow in our knowledge and love of scripture. We just need a helping hand, and that's what this brand new digital learning platform is going to help you do. It has short courses on scripture that you can take. You can learn from Dr. Scott Hahn, Dr. John Bergsmur, Father Boniface Hicks, many more. I've been on this platform, I have a subscription to it. And I mean it when I say it's actually really excellent and it'll help you love scripture. I think a lot of us want to

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Cancel it. You won't be charged ascent. But I think you'd be really impressed with what you see. All right. So where did you where do we so you burn your books? Good for you. Yeah, not I not not all of them at first. And this is the again, I didn't. In retrospect, it seems so linear, but I mean, I didn't I didn't get rid of my Greek pagan statues.

I didn't go back to that. But I I didn't think that that my Greek pagan statues. I didn't go back to that, but I didn't think that that was part of the problem. I didn't see that it was all connected. So I eventually, I decided to try Buddhism, just going to the next thing, and there was a Buddhist temple in Havel for some reason that met in the priest's apartment. And I was a Buddhist some, you know, the priest's apartment. And I was

a Buddhist for, you know, a fair while. How old were you at this point and how long did that last? At the time I get so... That's okay. But late teenagers, teenagers still in high school? Yeah, high school. Yeah. And I mean, I guess, I mean, I say a fair while it was, you know, it was a brief phase. It was, but it was enough that I, I wasn't really thinking about the Satanist stuff anymore. And it was, it wasn't, you know, it wasn't a part of my life. It wasn't a part of my, you know, my short term memory.

You know what I mean? And I thought, I thought I'd moved on. I thought that it was as simple as just walking away from it. And like you said, I mean, we're talking about, and yeah, it's amazing that it hasn't bothered me more. It has certainly has, it has had lingering effects. I mean, I've never talked about this at this length with anyone, partially because I still don't know how to talk about it. And to the point about that disclaimer, I'm still not totally convinced that this is the right thing to do, but the people that I trust, my spiritual fathers, have said that if God's

putting it on your heart, you should try to help people in any way that, you know, and, yeah, but it is it is remarkable that I, I guess I have, it hasn't had more of an impact on my later life. But that's that's God's grace. And that was I think that's part of why I feel like I can talk about it. I mean, I got because my someone asked me, you know, aren't you afraid of demonic attack? And I hadn't thought about it, but I thought, well, God's, God protected me without asking him to, you know, he was always, he was always there protecting me.

And I don't know how, I don't know why some people are protected and others are not, but he's always taken very good care of me. Like I said, I'm a very bad son. I'm a very bad son to my natural parents, but I'm also a very bad son to God. I'm not nearly as grateful to him as I should be, but it hasn't been something that has had any lingering as far as I can tell Yeah, was it I mean you talked about your initial obsession with Lucifer and it was like this relationship It was there a sense of breaking up Oh, that's a great question Did you miss it as a Buddhist? I was, when you asked me to send you an email with a brief rundown of my story and so we

could talk about it, you know, and I was going through, I'd never really, I'd never sat down and thought about it since it happened. I'd never, you know, especially after I, because my first priest, when I told him all of this, he said, as my other priest did, put it out of your mind, don't think about it. That's, don't give the demons an opening. And I remember when I, when I was writing you the email and I felt come back a little bit. What what did you feel come back? The the attraction.

Yeah. And in a weird way, the love and the infatuation, I guess, it wasn't love, it was infatuation. But, and I was, you know, I probably shouldn't go into too much detail. I didn't indulge in anything obviously, but I was, my mind just started getting carried away by it. And then I kind of snapped back and I said,

oh, that's what he meant. That's what my priest meant. It's not gonna go away. And it was, yeah, I, in a way it did, it was it was it felt like kind of a I Missed him I Missed what I thought we had like a first love, you know, it was it felt like In a way, it felt like a shattered illusion

I knew that I knew that it was kind of a dead end and it was I knew that wasn't what I was looking for but um, I I knew that it was kind of a dead end and I knew that wasn't what I was looking for. But I mean, I'd be lying if I said, I don't still, it doesn't still come back. I guess it does. I didn't expect it to. Yeah. But we should probably. Sure.

How did you go from Buddhism to accepting Christ? I stopped going to Bible camp for obvious reasons, but I'd gone to a great Presbyterian Bible camp in New Hampshire. My mother went there, my aunts and uncles went there, I went there, my mom was the nurse, and I stopped going for obvious reasons. But when I became a Buddhist, I was like, oh, that was fun. So I decided to go back as a CIT. What's that?

A counselor in training. Yeah, so I was, they didn't know, probably shouldn't have, if they had known, I was a bad choice, but it's not their fault. I don't want anyone that's watching this that knows the camp, they didn't, they knew nothing. But I was, yeah, I was a Buddhist. They knew nothing. But I was, yeah, I was a Buddhist.

But being back, I had always loved this camp and I had always felt so close to Christ there. And then going back, I realized that what I'd been looking for, I'd had all along. And you know, things like retreats and Bible camps are so special. You know, you wish you could just take that with you everywhere. You wish you'd never had to leave retreat. You wish you'd never had to leave. And part of that's a childish, you know, camp's fun. But part of it, looking back, I still, whenever I need to refresh myself, I think about that

and I listen to the worship songs that we sang at Bible camp. And I remember sitting on the cots and studying scripture. And going back into that, yeah, it was like coming home. It was like, it was like coming home. It was coming. It was coming home. And, uh, and I remember we, I was the CIT for three weeks and I, uh, I was slowly, you know, I realized that, you know, meditation had mind clearing meditation has nothing on, you know,

worshiping the real guy. And at on, you know, worshiping the real guy. Yeah. And at first, you know, I was just, and I say, you know, I say, I say worship just because at first I wasn't, I wasn't doing it as a Christian or I wasn't thinking of it as a, as a true religion. I was just having a lot of fun. And, and then over the course of the month, I felt my heart softening and I was doing some soul surging. And then we went all the CITs and I think some of the older

campers went on a trip to the pastor that led the camp. He has a house on Cape Redmond Island. And we went up there and we were rafting. In Canada? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Most Presbyterians in New England are Canadians. It's like the Canadian ethnic religion. Yeah.

And so we went to his house and he was just a wonderful, wonderful pastor. I love him to death. He gave me his Bible after I told him all of this, and I still have it. I cherish it. He was a total hippie. It's called the Green Bible. Someone can look it up. The cover is hemp. All the passages that relate to ecology are in green text. There's no red letter for the words of Christ. There's just green. Total, total hippie, but a wonderful guy. And I pulled him aside one night and I said, I said, Mark, I have to tell you something. And I told, I spilled my guts.

And he listened to it. He cried. He said, you know, do you, do you want to be a Christian again? Or something like that. I said, yeah, I do. He said, do you want God to forgive you? I said, yes, I do.

And he put his hand, he put his hand on my shoulder. He said, then you've got it brother, you got it. He said, he loves you. He said, he's not, he's not going to let you go over. He's not going to, you know, you, you, you, you try to give your soul to the devil, you know, it's not his, everything is God's. And, uh, it was such a relief. And that was my literal come to Jesus. And I keep, when I read Faust, have you ever read Marlowe's Faust? Do you know the plot? There's a magician who sells his soul to a demon in exchange for wealth and women and stuff like that. And then finally, Mephistopheles comes to collect his deal and he's dragging Faust to town. The angels say, �Just repent. Just repent.� And Faust says, �No, it's too late. It's too late.�

And they say, �No, it's not.� And they're begging with him to repent until the moment he's swallowed. And, and this is the, this is the, in the, you know, in the Eastern church, we talk about this, the metanoia, the turning back. And it's, you know, when you, you, when the, uh, when the prodigal son turns back to the father, you know, he doesn't, he doesn't even get to his father's house yet. The moment he turns back, the father books it down the road. He's like, I got you. He doesn't even, he doesn't even begin to apologize before the father starts rushing over with

his cloak and his rings. And, uh, and that was my, uh, that was the moment that I, you know, I, I, I still consider that, you know, I didn't become Catholic for years later, but that was my turning back. That was when I repented and the Father just rushed. It was like, oh, you're back. I knew you'd be back. And yeah, so that was, so after that point, I was, again, hadn't quite, yeah, I was on the road, I guess, to Catholicism, but I do consider that my real, the converse, my moment of repent, my come to Jesus moment. During your Satanist days, did you hold any animosity towards Christ?

I tried to. And this is what I mean. I, I, I, I never, I wanted to hate him more than I did. I couldn't really, there was the idea that, you know, that I think I hated God. I hated what the Satanists believe about God. What does Satanist believe about God? That he, you know, he, he oppresses us. He enslaves us. He, he puts all these restrictions

on our natural appetites that don't belong there. And Satan gives us freedom. He lets us indulge. He gives us power. God calls us to be meek and weak. And, and I hated that. Of course, that's not true. But um, I Didn't hate you. I couldn't I couldn't really bring myself to hate. I couldn't think of a reason to hate Jesus

You know me because he's he doesn't talk about that God and I didn't really I didn't really think about it I was I I I hated the God I hated who I thought was God But the This is I this is what I mean. Like, somehow God was keeping me, in at least my peripheral vision, on the right thing. And I couldn't really bring myself to have any healing against Jesus. I know that there's emphasis on the black mass say, and so as a Satanist, did you have any opinions about the Catholic church per se? I hated the, well, interesting.

My grandparents were very anti-Catholic. I hated the Catholic church before I was a Satanist. That didn't change. What did you hate about Catholicism? I had, I had, I had a, I, okay, can I tell the whole story? Cause I don't want to say this and then stop halfway because it's a, it's a beautiful story. When I was, my grandfather, who was my, my middle name is Warren, his name was Warren, he's the best friend I ever had. Ever will have.

He was the deputy fire chief in our city, and he loved to tell the story where when the city got its first Italian mayor, and he didn't like him. He's a master mason. My grandfather was a master mason. He was all, and he said, one day the chief, the fire department was having problems and my grandfather blamed, you know, the Irish and stuff. And so the, so the, he called, the mayor called him in to his office and said,

he said, Deputy, what's wrong with the department? He said, do you wanna know what the problem with the department is, Mayor? He said, yeah, I do. And he said, I slammed my hands on his chest. There's two GD, many Roman Catholics. And so I had this- Prejudice.

Yeah, but I have to tell the rest of the story. Years later, after I'd become Catholic, my grandfather was dying and he was living with us. He had congestive heart failure. And I used to catch him watching EWTN in the middle of the night. He couldn't sleep, he was so afraid of death. He couldn't sleep, ever.

And he'd nod off in his chair for a couple of hours a night. But I catch him watching the mass on EWTN. And then one day he said to me, he said, Mike, I want to go to confession. I said, why do you want to go to confession? He said, I just feel like it's something I have to do. I said, I can call my priest. He said, would you? I said, yeah do you want to go to confession? He said, I just feel like it's something I have to do. I said, I can call my priest. He said, would you?

I said, yeah, of course. So you're a Catholic at this point. Yeah, yeah. And so I brought him to my, one of my priests at the time, Father Raymond van de Mortel, the Archdiocese of Boston. And I dropped him off. He couldn't drive. He could barely walk.

And I, they were there for me. I dropped him off. He couldn't drive. He could barely walk and and I They were they were they were there for an hour just talking I don't I mean they were they weren't in the confessional They were talking in the in a private room. He couldn't go into a confessionally But they they You know, they were there for about an hour. Hmm then my grandfather came out tears, tears. And he got, I helped him to the car. I said, was it good? And he said, I want to start coming to mass with you. And that was on a, I think that was on a Wednesday.

And then Saturday he went into renal failure, slipped into a coma and died. And it was cool. Praise the Lord. Yeah. And EWTM. Oh, mother Angelica, we love you. Pray for us. Yeah.

I know of at least one convert, you know, that she's helped to win from. Did he, did he, did he watch her as well or just the mass? He was always watching you. WTN. He must've come across her. Yeah. Yeah. She was the kind of person he would have liked. It was awesome. It was amazing. Yeah. And I was, uh, I was worried about him cause he wasn't just not Catholic. He didn't like the Catholic church. He was a master Mason.

He was, he, he, I remember when he was first checked into the hospital, they added, they said, your name. He gave his name, birthday, da da da, religion. He said, I'm a free Mason. I said, I called him pal. He said, pal, you're not supposed to say that. He said, what? He said, I said, you're not supposed to say, it's a religion. He says, but it is. I said, I know that. He said what? He said, you're not supposed to say it's a religion. He says, but it is. I said, I know that. I said, but you're not supposed to tell people. He said,

oh, well, you know, I'm dying. So what do I have to lose? So, uh, yeah, it was, um, yeah, I can't, I, you know, I'll know. I can't, I couldn't be more grateful just for that, that assurance that he found it at the end. That's great. Yeah. So you had, you kind of had more of a prejudice against the Catholic church that wasn't based on factual things. Well, I didn't know. I just think it's weird because you don't, I imagine you don't have many groups of Satanists conducting black Baptist services, but you do have them conducting black masses. And so I would imagine that Satanists have a particular opinion about the Catholic church. Oh yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, the Catholic, but this is, I don't know. I don't want to go into this for a different reason, but I will. Okay. I went, I went to Catholic schools for fifth grade through 12th, and they were, no offense to anyone listening to this, they were really liberal, Novus Ordo Catholic schools. And I- I grew up in one of those. Yeah. It was hopeless. And so I read about what Satan has stated

about the Catholic church. But I never found it. Yeah. Gosh. And so I, I read about what Satan has stated about the Catholic church. I'd never found it. Yeah. I, I, I was like, you know, oh, it's patriarchal. It's oppressive. And, uh, well, yeah, yeah. And, um, so I, I had it, I kind of an intellect, I, you know, I hated Pope Benedict because, you know, I hated, I would, like, I would, I hated the Catholic church as a prejudice and I hated it Benedict because, you know, I hated, I would, like I would, I hated the Catholic Church as a prejudice and I hated it in theory, but I was just going to, you know, come to the feast.

And there wasn't much there for a saint. No demons are getting scared of that kind of stuff. Yeah, yeah. And I, you know, there are people that go to those masses that are much holier than I am. And I hate to say stuff like that, but there was just no, there was no connection. connection. This was the tradition bequeathed to them You know, this is their tradition. Yes. A lot of us didn't have any choice

We were just given on Eagles wings without asking for it. Yeah, that was our school song. Yeah. Yeah and it was uh, yeah, I so I I Would have hated the Catholic Church if I'd encountered the traditional Catholic Church. I know I would have. I hated it in theory, but I never encountered it. That's so funny because converts will say, I loved it in theory and then I never encountered it. You hated it in theory and never encountered it.

Yeah. Yeah. Let's take a break. Let's take a break and then we'll come back and we'll talk about how you became Catholic. Sweet. We're going to have three people smoking in this room, so we'll have to see. So yeah, I know. We'll have to see how bad it filters. Hopefully your landlord doesn't want to.

He's okay with it. Alright. Steubenville. Are we good? Is he too far away from the camera? Just come in a little bit? Yeah, right there. Me? Just pull it down a touch. Yeah, perfect. So all right. So Presbyterian, by the way,

everyone watching on locals right now, feel free to put in comments into the post I posted about this interview and I'll try to get some to some of the comments. How did you become a Catholic? The first meaty book that I read after my reversion was Mere Christianity. I found it in a bookstore in Canada when we were going back to visit family.

And I, the thing, and this is funny, the thing that grabbed me about it, I loved it. I loved everything about it, but I had a crisis because it uses the word sodomy in it or something. And I'd never, I never realized that you could have use a word like that and still be like a true intellectual Christian. It struck me because my, my church was fairly theologically Orthodox, but they, we didn't talk about that stuff. I think that was more Yankee reticence than anything else, but

they, there was this guy talking and what did you find? What did you not like about it? Well, I would grow up, you know, my, again, my family was, my family was Republican church going, but, you know, I was, I was from Massachusetts and my schools were really liberal. What do you want from me? Yeah. I was like, I thought it's either something you don't talk about or you, you love it and it's fantastic. And, and I, there was this guy that was like really down on it openly and was a, you know, clearly a very kind, good humored, brilliant. And I've to this day that still strikes me that it was like,

you know, there was the possibility to be something that there was clearly this like tradition of Christianity that was, I shouldn't say, it wasn't just that, but it was a big part of it. But it was also this kind of like the gentleness and the good humor. That's all everyone's gonna take away from this interview now I know. But I realized that there was this whole other world,

this whole other kind of Christianity that I hadn't been exposed to that was both intellectual, beautiful, but also counter-cultural. And so I wanted to know more. And so I started reading every C.S. Lewis that I could read and also T.S. Eliot, his essays, as well as his poetry.

I love his poetry too. I went to Australia to become an Eliot scholar. And so, yeah, I was reading these, and I decided that I wanted to be an Anglican Catholic. And so I went to the local Episcopal Church, which was also just flamingly liberal, pride flags. Was not thrilled about that, but it was ritually, it was very beautiful.

And then I discovered the Church of the Advent in Boston, which is a true conservative-ish, I mean, it's conservative. It's, it has an LGBT community. Yeah. But it was, yeah, so I did that and I became an Anglo-Catholic. I went to, when I went to Australia, I went to an Anglo-Catholic church.

When I was, I did a brief stint in D.C., I went to an Anglo-Catholic church there. And I was a very proud Anglo-Catholic. And I got involved with a group that doesn't exist anymore called the Secre Society, which is a society for conservative, traditional Anglicans in the church, in the Episcopal Church. So there's lots of groups for traditional Anglicans in the Episcopal Church. So there's lots of groups for conservative Anglicans,

some in the Episcopal Church, some in the continuing Anglican movement. But the Secre Society was particularly oriented to sort of re-evangelizing the Episcopal Church. And I was very committed to the idea that, I loved Eastern Orthodoxy and I was very committed to the idea that, I loved Eastern Orthodoxy and I was very convinced that the Anglican Church was the patristic church of the British Isles.

And that by extension, America is Anglican territory and so apostolic succession in the United States should reside in the Episcopal Church. This all sounds so nutty talking about it now because of how far gone the Episcopal Church is. But I believe this. I was like, this is the church of the Anglo-Saxon world or whatever, of the Anglosphere. And so I was very, and so I had a particular bedbug about the ordinary. I hated the ordinary because it was siphoning off all of these conservative Anglicans into the Catholic Church, which is the worst thing they could do.

The continuing Anglican movement is at least Protestant. It's at least not part of the Catholic, but to become a Roman was just the ultimate betrayal. And so I wrote a bunch of pamphlets and a book about attacking the ordinary. And then, and then I, but I had, I had Catholic friends cause you can't live in Boston and I have Catholic friends, especially if you're a conservative,

you wind up with a bunch of TLM friends. And so one of my TLM friends was also very involved in the ordinary at parish in Boston. And he said, you know, Mike, you talk about this all the time. He said, have you ever actually been to an Ordinary at service? I said, no, of course not.

He said, will you just come with me once and just see it? And I said, yeah, all right, if it'll make you feel better. I said, good opposition research. And so I went and it was in the, it was in the, the, the, the mass was in a side chapel, in a Roman Catholic church, outside of Boston. And the priest who is now a very dear friend of mine, Father Jurgen Lias, started off as a charismatic

Episcopalian Anglo-Catholic. And he's a big friendly guy with a big booming voice who preaches like a Baptist. He's always talking about Jesus, you know? And so I was sitting through this service and I was like, this is the worst of every world. It's not the's like, it's not the book of common prayer. It's close, it's pretty good. But, and it's in this, like this small, rinky-dink chapel in a Roman Catholic church. And the priest sounds like a Baptist.

I was like, this is confirmation bias. And I was really happy that I'd gone. But then it came time for communion. And going to Catholic schools, I always, you know, I was told to go up and cross my arms and receive a blessing from the priest, which I obviously didn't do when I was involved in Satanism, but then my last year or whatever of high school,

I started doing it just to help the line flow. Involved in Satanism, but then my last, you know, my last year or whatever of high school. I I started doing it just to help the line flow and And so I was you know, I did that I went out to get a blessing I figured it I you know, my opinion was that the Roman Catholic Church was fine for continental Europe. It's a true church I had nothing against them, but they don't belong in the Anglosphere and so I went up to receive a blessing and blessing and I was the last person because I was sitting in the back. And I knelt and I crossed my arms and I've said this a bunch of times, so it's possible that someone's heard this story before. But as the priest was coming down the line, the communion line, and giving the Eucharist,

I had this feeling that I've only... It's a feeling that I used to get when I was picking up a friend of mine, my ex-girlfriend from the airport, because she was Australian. And when this person that you love very much is coming through the gate, you can sense them before you can see them. And I had this excitement, this expectation. And I was like, oh, I wonder what this is.

This is odd. And he came down, he was going slowly and he came coming down, coming down, coming down. And I said, Oh, it's Jesus. It's Jesus Christ. And he stopped over me, you know, I bless you in the name of the father and of the son and of the Holy Spirit.

I felt like my heart stopped. C.S. Lewis says, and he, cause you know, he was wounded at the Psalm, I think, and he was shot through his shrapnel. And he said, I was certain that I was dying. He said, in a way I probably was. He said, I wasn't afraid. He said, it didn't feel like the moment

for either courage or fear. It was just, and I had that feeling. I was like, I'm dead, I died. And I sat there and it took me a couple of seconds and then I realized I wasn't dead. And so I stood up and my knees were weak and I walked back to my pew and I just cried and cried. And then I went and then it was over and everyone went to coffee hour and I and the priest, Father,

the most wonderful man I've ever met. He walked up to me, he said, hey, you're new here. And and he looked at me and he saw that my eyes were red. And he said, he said, he said, what's wrong? I said, I wanna become a Catholic. And I've never from that day had a moment's doubt. So I didn't wanna become ordinary. I love the ordinary, but I didn't want to become ordinary. I love the ordinary,

but I didn't want to become the ordinary because I wanted to be absolutely sure that I wasn't just accommodating myself to the Catholic church. I wanted to make sure that I wasn't just going to where all the conservative Anglicans were going. I wanted to make sure. So I went to the Latin Mass, which I hated. A friend of mine took me in college once and I hated it.

Because it's in many ways very similar to the Anglican liturgy. But the priest doesn't face the people, there aren't as many hymns, it's in Latin. There's none of the Qu Cranmerian English. A lot of it's very quiet. And I didn't like it at all. It was, I could probably use in a cerebral way,

recognize that there was beauty there, but I didn't care for it. And so I went to this beautiful parish in Adelaide in Peabody, Massachusetts. And- To a Latin Mass. Yeah. And that was, and that was, but over time, you know, I figured it out.

And I grew to love it, and I still love it. And the priests there, Father David Lewis and Father Raymond of Vandenmorteil, they did everything for me, they were wonderful. And I was received, yeah, within a couple of months and I made my first confession. I wanna get to that, but before I do, it's not as if you hadn't experienced the ritual of something like the Eucharist in your Anglican church.

Oh yeah, do you know what I'm saying? Because I can say someone's saying, well, you were just moved by this beautiful ritual, but no, you were in an Anglican Church that presumably did something that looked very similar. I mean, practically the same thing. I mean, they believe that they have the Eucharist. The Anglo Catholics believe that they have the Eucharist, and they reference it, and they have Eucharistic adoration.

And I'd been to Catholic churches churches and I've done it, I've been to, sorry to the ordinary parish, but I've been to nicer Catholic churches. I'd done this many, many times before, but God decided that was the moment to reveal himself. And yeah, that was the, I had this experience of the Eucharist and I've had, yeah, that was the, I had this experience of the Eucharist and I've had, yeah, it's, I've never had a doubt about this.

And I, the sacraments are efficacious and you know that. And I think that, but I think people that aren't part of the Catholic Church don't realize what it's like. I was at Divine Liturgy the other, a couple of weeks ago. And my daughter, my daughter is at the, uh, the perfect height right now, where if I hold her, she can kick me between the legs. Nice. And, uh, and she kept doing it during Liturgy, but she was being naughty. And I was just, I was not in the right mood. And so I went up to, uh,

I went up to receive the Eucharist and then, and it was like the very first time, you know, the first time in the Ordinarian Chapel. And I felt, I just felt it washing over me. And so I took her out back. Cause I had to take her with me, but I went out back outside the church and I started to cry and cry and cry.

And I kissed her on the forehead and she got very distressed. She said, Papa, why are you crying? I said, because I'm happy. And I'd been so mad at her and I just loved her. And she started to cry too and to laugh and we were just laughing. And I said to God in my heart, I was like, what happened?

And he said, he said, we tried fatherhood your way. Now we're gonna try it my way. And he just, and this is the, and I've had, I mean, He said we tried fatherhood your way. Now we're gonna try it my way and He just and this is the and I've had I mean This is the God's been very good to me. He's at time and time again. He's just the sacraments just work You know, they just they change you the grace the infusion of the grace and you know, we're Christians We believe the God is everywhere. We believe the grace is everywhere But the sacraments really are something special.

And you can feel that inferiorly. I mean, not always, sometimes, you know, you just go through the motions, unfortunately. But there's sometimes, I mean, there's absolutely no reason why that should have happened. I should have just gone back and grumbled in my pew. But he flipped that switch in my heart. And he does that sometimes, you know? I mean,

I'm sure you've had experiences like that where you receive the sacrament. It's usually when you least expect it. It's like when God catches you completely off guard and just bombards you with grace and sweetness and light. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't have, this is, again, I'm just a very bad son. I don't have as much of a devotion to the sacraments as I should, but I think it's because I take it for granted. God's been so good to me with all of this. I've never had a moment to doubt. Hello, I wanna say thank you to Hello,

which is the best, not just the best Catholic app on the App Store, any App Store, it's the best app out of any app that's ever existed, Catholic or otherwise. I think it's finally time to say that. If you wanna grow in your prayer life, please check out hello.com slash Matt. If you sign up on their website at hello.com slash Matt, you can get the entire app for free for 90 days. That's ridiculous. After those 90 days, if you don't agree with me that it's worth the money that you're going to

get charged after that monthly, which is a relatively small amount, you can just cancel, you won't be charged a cent. They have sleep stories, they have My Catholic Lo-Fi on there, they've just added the gospels, a dramatized version of the gospels. They have daily exegesis on mass readings, which you can listen to.

It is fantastic! So if you haven't done it already, hello.com slash Matt, sign up over there, try it for free for three months to doubt tell us about your first confession. Oh Yeah, well it took a long time I Might my priest knew that I was into some into some some stuff and I And I said I said I don't think that I can because I was, you know, I, I did, I did some

bad stuff apart from the magic. And so I, I said to my, my priest, I said, I don't think I can remember everything. And he said, write it, he said, write it down. He said, just this one time. He said, write down everything that you want to tell me. And I said, okay. So I did. And it was a very long, very long list.

And what was that experience like? Trying to remember and then putting pen to paper. Horrible. And that was when it really, that was when stuff really started to sink in because I had been, I had been, I've been going to this beautiful church with these beautiful holy priests. And you know how you have these moments where you just think, oh my God, you're so good, I suck. This is terrible, this is terrible, I'm so bad.

And I just had this moment, I was writing everything down and I went to confession with him, and I told him everything. And then afterwards, he pretty said, God through the death and resurrection of his son, I don't know what it is in English, but he did it in English, I think because he wanted me to know what was happening.

And he pronounced, he gave the absolution. And then he smiled and he said, do you need to talk to an exorcist? I said no, I said I'll let you know, but I think I'm okay right now. He said okay. He said there's mass, there was an evening mass, it was a feast day I think. He said, okay. He said, he said, there's mass after there's mad. There was an evening mass. It was a feast day. I think he said, he said, you should go to mass. I said, I will. He said, you can't receive yet. I said,

I know, I know. And he said, then when you get home, he said, burn that piece of paper. He said, and never think about any of this ever again. He said, I said, okay. And he said, Michael, he said, don't think about it. He said, I said, okay. And he said, Michael, he said, don't think about it. He said, don't let it trouble you. Don't let it burden you. He said, you are, it was like, what's that? What's that? It's not your fault. I know it's not your fault. And, uh, and finally I was, it sunk. And I said, okay, easy. No, God doesn't want us to carry that. It says in the scripture, he wipes the slate clean.

It's like it never happened. And that's, and I, that was, I felt that. I felt that. I felt like the slate was washed clean. And I remember I called my mom I said I

Didn't know it was possible to feel this way and my mom my poor mom. She she She's not her. It's not her tradition. She's so wonderful. She's so supportive But she was like, oh wow, that's great And he's like I I've been unburdened by things I didn't know I was burdened by. Like I had anxiety, which I'm sure was partially demonic. And that was gone. I felt it. I felt the slate being wiped clean. clean but I didn't the the mope the moment that I it all it all came

together was at the at the mass when I realized I was ready it was you know my I I I didn't realize it in my head, like, oh, now it's just confirmation and Eucharist, right? I realized in my heart, I knew in my heart that I was ready now, that I had done the thing that I needed to do to be received into the church. And kind of God putting His hand on me, and I was like, now is the time, buddy.

And I remember the, during, it was the Marian Feast. I don't remember which one it was, but the, at the end, they sang, you know, Immaculate Mary, our hearts are on fire. And one of the big hurdles for me as a high church Anglican, and one of the things that had always even kept me in a distance from the Anglo-Catholic movement,

I was never like a really true like died in the wool Anglo-Catholic because I was not in the Mary. And it's something that had bothered me and that I've been talking to my friends about. And they said, you know, it'll come. It'll come, just be patient, just keep trying. I said, okay.

And at that moment, it was like, that was the final piece, you know? That was the moment that I loved Mary, that I had the love of Mary in my heart. So then my... Time goes by, and I go to, and I get confirmed and communed and everything.

And I, every convert has this experience. After confirmation, I go back and I'm praying in the pews and all these beautiful people keep coming up to me saying, welcome home, congratulations. And then the little old lady saying, are you gonna become a priest? Nope. But I was like, you know, and I loved it.

I was very grateful, but I said, I need some time alone. And I felt Mary in my heart say, come to me. And I went up to them. I had some experiences with Mary before that I pushed out of my, this is a lot, you know nothing's linear but I'd had some I'd had some very powerful encounters with Mary when I was younger and

And I'd never let her into my heart but I had no and so I went out And she'd she'd protected me from a lot of things And I went to the marrying grotto It was it was like yeah, it was pouring rain, and I was in my good suit And I fell down in the mud. I said You for everything that you've done for me It was just, oh. Yeah.

I don't deserve anything that I have. I know what you mean. I've been there. I've been there arms wrapped around a Saint Joseph statue weeping like an idiot. I think no one's looking. I'm sorry that this is so incoherent. It's not incoherent. You're doing a fantastic job.

Would you like Thursday to grab you a tissue? Oh yeah, would you mind Thursday? You might just come there. Look at that. Okay, so we don't have a tissue. Let's see if this works. But we do have a very sandpaper ish paper towel. You might want to mute.

Hold on, hold on, hold on. Time out, time out, time out. He's not going to blow. He's not going to blow. He's not going to blow. OK, I muted the two microphones because you dropped the tissues on your thing too, Matt. All right. Yeah, we're good.

You're good. You're good. I unmuted you. Thank you for sharing. Oh, you're welcome. Yeah. What a gift. What a beautiful.

Being vulnerable is difficult because you open yourself up for attack, but it's the most beautiful thing a human can do. So thank you for doing that. I feel very safe. I feel very safe. There's a story one of the mystics tells where there's a man, a soldier who's lived a very disreputable life, committed every sin in the book and stuff and he's shot. And as he's dying, he cries, you know,

mother Mary save me. And then he's at the judgment seat. And you know, he's being read the list of his sins and all the people that he's hurt and all the offenses that he's made to God. And then Christ says, is there anyone that you can call to speak in your defense? And then our lady is there and she wraps him

in her blue mantle. He called for me. He's mine. I'll protect him. I will, I'll vouch for him, you know, and I wish that I I probably should have I Didn't want to think about this too much before I came on the show just because I you know I wanted to speak from the heart and let God guide me but I wish I talked more about Mary and

But I know that she's protecting me all the way. What advice do you have to our many Protestant viewers about the Virgin Mary? Maybe it's a hang-up they currently have or an obstacle they're not sure how to overcome. That's a good question. I still wrestle, I don't wrestle with the theology of Mary, um, in the sense that it's not, but I, uh, I have Protestant arguments still in my head and I'm always trying to like kind of bounce them. I have, I love Mary, um, but I'm not a theologian and I was kind of steeped in Anglican theology. And I, you know, so, but I, the thing that, but it really, it really clicked after we

became Eastern Catholic and the title of the Theotokos, the mother of God. And you know, I think sometimes in the West you get, I think a lot of Protestants are responding to a particular kind of Marian theology that can sometimes be unhealthy. Like there's a story about, there's a medieval apparition where there's a monk who never ceases to repeat the angelic salutation.

And it's kind of like the cash and sort of the prayer of the heart way. And Mary appears to this monk and says, my son thanks you for saluting me, but asks that you salute him also. So by no means the majority of Catholics, but I think a lot of Protestants encounter and then sometimes with selective memory, choose that sometimes, yeah,

the Marian devotion can eclipse devotion to the Lord. That's obviously not what the church wants, but I remember one story. I don't, this is nothing against my dad, who I love, but he always, he, one of the, I remember he, when I first became Catholic, he loves to tell this story about my great grandmother, who had a great devotion to the Blessed Mother,

and was always the Blessed Mother. And my dad loves to say, he asked her once, you know, Nana, why do you always pray to the Blessed Mother? And she said, because if you want something from a man, you go to his mother. And there's something beautiful and true about that. But at the same time, you want to go to Christ

Yeah, you want to be feel like you can go to Christ, right? And so I think a lot of Protestants. I mean my great-grandma, I'm sure she's in heaven. I mean, this is not this is not like a but I think that a lot of Protestants see that and they say, you know, why isn't Jesus enough and and in the East in the Eastern Christian tradition, the Our Lady is always the Theotokos. And she's always holding Christ in her arms. And she's always pointing us to him. And I think also,

this is getting into the weeds, I hope it's okay. In the, one of the things that I've, I carried with me from when I was kind of an Anglo-Catholic with Orthodox sympathies was the, was the, I don't think you can have Christianity make sense without a pretty robust understanding of theosis and, or divinization. And really, besides the fact that she's Jesus' mom, the reason that Mary is so important in the East is because she was the first person that did it. You know, she's revered not just as the mother of God, but as the model of all Christians. And she does the thing that you need to do if you want to become like Christ.

And this is why, you know, St. Luke was painting, St. Luke painted an icon of Our Lady. And it's why, you know, this isn't like a modern innovation. Some of the stuff in the West, some of the more, what they call the Marian excesses in the Western Church, again, this is no judgment, is medieval. But you go back to the early Church and there's huge devotion to Our Lady. For that reason, they didn't have a very complex Marian theology, but they knew her personally. They saw how Christ loved her. They saw what her prayers did.

And when she prayed on her deathbed to see the apostles one last time, they appeared to her. She was clearly this very special lady. And she's the perfect Christian, you know? And I found that so compelling when I discovered it. Yeah, I would recommend to Protestants that they read the Catechism of the Catholic Church and what it has to say about our Blessed Mother. Because to be a Catholic does not mean you have to resonate

with how every saint speaks about every Catholic devotion. I mean, I've been a Catholic since I was baptized as an infant, and I read certain saints in the Blessed Virgin Mary, and I think to myself, yeah, it's not doing it for me. Maybe it will later, and maybe it's my fault, but maybe it isn't. It's okay. You know, we don't have to gravitate towards every particular saint, what they have to say about the Blessed Virgin Mary.

So yeah, don't let that be a stumbling block, I suppose I would say. But yeah, if it's good enough for the earliest Christians. Yeah. Also, I mean, I know this has kind of been said, but she has a unique relationship with each person of the blessed Trinity in a way that no other creature can be said to have said to have, uh, you're a son of God, the father. And I, she's not only the daughter of God, the father, she is in a very real way, the spouse of God, the Holy spirit and the mother of God, the son.

I mean, I never thought of that. Yeah. That's really cool. And like one saint said that she's, she's like the moon, which reflects the radiance of the sun. Yeah. Yeah. It's all from him.

Yeah. But just like God, just like God doesn't get jealous when we marvel at the beauty of the moon or a mountain range or a baby or our spouse. Yeah. You know, it's his creation. It's like, he's not jealous. Well, it's funny because in the sense of sinful jealousy. Oh yeah. Yeah. You know, God, God wants us to love everyone infinitely. So why wouldn't you try to love his mother infinitely? I mean, surely he,

he thinks very highly of her. You know, I think the Protestant would say it's not that I'm not willing to love her. It's that I don't believe the things Catholics and Orthodox say of her. And it's like, all right, well, fair enough. And, you know, that's why, that's why I would kind of try to think of an analogy, right? Like I'm trying to think of maybe a Muslim, Muslim accepts Christ as a prophet, right? And you want this Muslim to come to believe that he's more than a prophet, that he's the second person of the blessed Trinity. It may not be helpful for that. I'm not meaning to compare Protestants to Muslims, but there's an analogy here. It might not be helpful for that Muslim

to read, you know, the, the acathist to Christ or some beautiful poem to Jesus right now, because it might be far too confusing for him. So you want him just to come to accept who Christ is. Then once he's accepted who Christ is, then the rest begins to follow. And I think something similar with the Blessed Virgin Mary for the Protestant to realize that she's the mother of God, that God has no absolute need of her, but chose her, chose to have need of her, as it were. And that if it weren't for Mary, you wouldn't have Jesus. And if you can just kind of get on board with like the bare minimum and then just to be

patient and to not impose upon yourself the many devotions that exist within orthodoxy or Catholicism regarding the blessed Virgin Mary. You don't have to do that. And then I think it kind of follows. Yeah, I would say, yeah, I think one of the things, Protestant identity is so often negative. And so growing up, I had a- I'm not this, is that what you mean?

I'm not that. Yeah, we don't do Mary because the Catholics do it. And of course they have a theology, but they also have this instinct. And I think that many times the instinct is harder to overcome. It's like, you know, the Catholics do the Mary thing. And for me, I think that that,

you know, it's true that Protestants will say, you know, I love Mary, I'm just not willing to pray for her. I know from experience as a Protestant, talking to Protestants and ex-Protestants, that that's not true of everyone. There are a lot of people that don't want to love Mary, that will actively sort of minimize her role. Take an even lesser opinion of her than in the gospel because they don't want

to be Catholic. And I think that that's, I think oftentimes that instinct is the hardest thing to overcome. So I would say to Protestants, if you can just recognize that and try to take that out of the equation, you know, let's forget Catholic versus Protestant, just go to the Gospels and go to the early church and see what they say about Mary, and then go from there. Don't prep yourself for a great Marian conversion or anything like that, but you will certainly take a higher view of Mary afterwards. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. We have some questions from our local supporters. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We have some questions from our local supporters. So let's, uh, I saved one from the chat, but it's heavy. A lot of them are very heavy. All right. Well, we'll see how we do. Ask anonymously. Yes. Sometimes I'm like, John says, ask it. Darn it. I'm someone with deep ties to the North Shore of Massachusetts from time to time while hiking, I'll encounter people in the local woods

who are toying with Ouija boards, et cetera, and regularly see the Beverly Beverly City Department. Yep. Of recreation advertising monthly witchcraft ceremonies led by high priestesses on the beach. Generally, what should one make of the theistic Satanist community around here? Is it growing? Are most people participating in these activities, non-theistic? Yeah, I, uh, there's a rail trail near our house and I took my daughter for a walk, um, down the rail trail and, um, we made it probably about 10, 15 minutes and

I said, B, we have to go back. I, I, I, I went home and Helen, my, my wife said, um, that was a quick walk. I said, something's, something's wrong in those woods. And then I went back a couple of days later by myself to go for a walk and there were pentagrams carved in all the trees. I don't know percentage wise, how many of these people are atheists

or think that they're atheists. There there's a lot so much so much more. Which real witchcraft, real Satanism out there than anyone realizes so much more when you're involved in the community, you meet people everywhere. Yes, it's real, it's growing. This sounds like satanic panic stuff, but it's happening in the woods near your house.

It's, I'm sorry, but it's, these are the times that we live in. And part of the reason I wanted to stress that I had such a great childhood is not just because I did, not just to take the blame off my parents, but to say it can happen to anyone, anywhere, even people with the best of intentions. You can be coming into it seeking goodness

and beauty and truth and get sucked into the darkness and then fall in love with the darkness, seeking the light and then falling in love with the darkness. So yeah, does that answer the question? It does, yeah. It's a huge problem. I mean, I'm of the opinion that if you expose people to the reality of the demonic in the proper context, say from a Christian author like Father Gabriel, or even a couple of the episodes I've done, like I've had a couple couple of I've had two exorcists on my show

I throw this out here because if you're watching right now and you think okay, like how do I? You know, my child's old enough to hear some of this stuff Maybe they don't listen to this episode But maybe they want to listen to something like that to show them that because I think it shows the power of God That's what those episodes do with the exorcist shows the power of God It shows that the demons are nothing to fear But it also shows their reality and why they are something to fear

if you give yourself over to them, you know? So in a way, I hope that those episodes I've done with Exorcist can be something of a, you know, what do you say? An antidote or a, that might be the wrong word. Okay, I'm not gonna read any of these people's names just in case they want them to be anonymous. But this person says I have a co-worker that has a Ouija board themed backpack.

Should I take all of her belongings out and burn it? Probably not. I would think that there's a multi. I'd like please disagree with me. Okay, but my initial thought is all right. That's a co-worker. So this probably wouldn't go well for your job if you need it to you are committing theft and then damaging someone's property. So you would have to suffer the consequences of that. Those would be things you would have to consider before doing something like this.

Finally, I would imagine it would only harden their resolve. That's the big one. Yeah. Yeah. I think she would love to feel persecuted because this is the thing, I mean, from the very beginning, I wanted so badly to be the pagan in the woods, hiding from the, and they all talk about this.

They all talk about how hard it is to be a Wiccan, how hard it is to be a Satanist because of the Christian patriarchy and stuff. And it's not true. It's not true. What's that? If only it were. I know, yeah.

And there was, in my first book, the reaction I'm in, I have a chapter on the Inquisitions and why Thomas More defended the burning of heretics. We don't have to go too deep into that, but the church's position is that, historically, that violence, fighting evil with violence is not always a bad thing. I mean, St. Bernard says that, when the Christian night falls in battle,

he dies for God. This is historic church teaching, but it's always, but he also says, it has to be a question of, is it going to help? You can't just lash out at evil. Sometimes, it may even most of the time, the correct answer is to

turn the other cheek to those of you who are spiritual, correct those who have fallen in the spirit of gentleness. You do so much more good by... Bless it with holy water, slip a miracle into a bag, pray for her. A little green scapular. Green scapular, yeah. This person, again, I'm not going to read any names just in case. Powerful interviewer, says, so far. And what a great testimony. Thanks for this.

Praise be to our Lord Jesus Christ for the power of his love and grace. Yes. This woman asks, can you ask Michael, if he's comfortable answering, of course, if black masses are in Latin, if they are, would that be a sign that the traditional Latin mass is the proper form I don't know if we want to take our cue from Satanist, but just as clarification. I don't hold that opinion I believe the novus order was just as valid as Latin Extraordinary form or however you want to phrase it Michael you will be included in our daily rosary intentions. God bless. Thank you very much gosh

That perk all the people that please pray for me. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone pray. Yeah. Um, I don't know that. I thank God. I didn't get that far. Um, this man says, can you ask Michael if he has anything to say about Saint Michael and the good angel, this side of his conversion, I'd imagine that their characters and his experience of them are a stark contrast to that of the Satan and demons. Yes, yeah, it's interesting. I feel like I have a special relationship with him

because, well, I mean, in one sense, we all do, because he's kind of the, almost, this is theologically wrong, but like the universal guardian angel, you know what I mean? He's the prince of the angels. But I have, but you do, you feel like you go into battle with Michael,

you do go into battle with Michael in a way that you don't go into battle with any other, with anyone, and I have, I was talking to a friend of mine who's, oh gosh, this is a, he was a Catholic seminarian, dabbled in paganism, and that was Jewish. He's ethnically Jewish, he reverted to Judaism, whatever. But he said, he said, I experience demonic oppression

because of what I did when I was a pagan. He said, and I prayed the St. Michael prayer. He said, it doesn demonic oppression because of what I did when I was a pagan. He said, and I prayed the St. Michael prayer. He said, it doesn't have Jesus in it. He said, I consider myself a pious Jew. He says, but I know it works. He says, I know it works. And I, it worked when I was a Catholic and it still works as a Jew. So Michael, Michael's Michael, yes, is fighting for us.

Sarah says, disclaimer for melancholics. She said you may cry throughout the interview. This is her. Thank you for sharing your beautiful story. Te Deum, she says. Thank you. Yes. Yeah.

Oh, the person who asked about the Ouija board, I think is now saying this was more of a joke. Okay. Text is tone deaf. It's a valid question. It's a valid question. Again, I'm not against the burning of evil materials, just only if it's going to do more good than harm.

Do you find that you have a sensitivity to when evil is glorified in art and movies? Yes. In a way that others may not. Yes. Because I find like because of my history of pornography, I can't watch any movies that have any kind of sex stuff in it. I don't have anything to do with it. First thing I do is I look up is there anything like that? And I can't do it. Sometimes we'll be watching a movie and something quite brief will happen. Or it's not even, it's not even, I'm not even talking about things that tempt me by viewing them.

I'm talking about making light of what is holy in marriage and bringing it down to the level of the beasts, even in language in a way that isn't lust-inducing, say. I find myself hurt, like hurt in a way that feels almost inordinate. And so I wondered if you would have, is it something similar when you've been down this road? Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. I'm, uh, in, well, I mean in both, you know, it's, um, you think about how I still, like I said, I still feel the draw in some ways. It's kind of a latent, I mean, probably what, it's the opposite of what you're talking about.

Like with, for me, it's titillating, you know what I mean? It's still attractive in a certain way. And I find that objectively disgusting. But yeah, it breaks my heart to think about how many people are doing what I did, which is just peeking at this darkness and getting slowly drawn in. So on both levels, yes.

It's hard to, it's hard to see how a country which slaughters its unborn babies doesn't gradually become a satanic nation. Of course. It not only slaughters their babies, but then celebrates it, you know, publicly and as a nation. The satanic temple is suing one state government in the South, um, that has now has an abortion ban saying that abortion is a satanic sacrament.

And as under religious freedom laws, they should be allowed to have abortions. Yeah. This is, this is child sacrifice. It is. and they're open about it now. Yeah, this is this is Beyond post Christianity. This is we are this is satanic. Yeah. Yeah How can we help you know, it's so funny Usually if I'm having an interview with somebody who left Protestantism say and you know, I love my brothers and sisters As you said, I really do and so I I'll say, well, how can we help our Protestant friends? And you know, so, but I would think that many people don't have and probably shouldn't have almost certainly shouldn't have close

acquaintances with Satanists. So how I imagine the answer is be a saint. But yeah, other than that, how do, how do people help their friends and family members, maybe especially, who are dabbling in witchcraft or who are full-on Satanists? How could people have helped you at the time? I'm afraid to answer that question because I think that would be better for a priest. I don't want to give anyone advice on how to deal with a circumstance like that. Well, let me ask a personal question. How do you think you could have been helped when you were a 15-year-old or whatever, full-on into Satanism? If I... I wish that I had this hole, this God-sized hole in my heart, you know, I had this longing for true and good and beautiful things.

And it's no guarantee, but if my first exposure to the Catholic mass had been St. Adelaide's in Peabody or the Fraternity Parish in New Hampshire, instead of the Nova Sordo, that might have made all the difference. I think, yeah, beauty and if we, if we, our culture loves, it fetishizes evil and ugliness and architecture and in art and irreverence. And I think the most powerful witness against that is to be,

is to be kind and, and to, kind and to create beautiful things. I mean, how many people have been converted by good literature? How many people have started down that path through things like Tolkien? These are the weapons of the angels. And I wish I'd known Christ better. I think that so many people, this is what struck me about C.S. Lewis is that he was so, his Christianity was compelling because it was authentic.

It wasn't embarrassed by itself. It wasn't ashamed of itself. And I was reading this and I was like, oh, this is the Christianity the Satan has warned me about. You know what I mean? That's what we need. We don't need to, to try to accommodate the culture of death. That's, that's doom. That's the end. I think the most, the starkest

possible contrast with evil, sainthood, holiness, beauty. That's what I, that's what would have, if someone had said to me, look, this thing that you do with the the statue the little statues the little metal chalice a Million times better over here that they could have they could have made all the difference This person from locals asks how do theistic Satanists go around the concept that Satan was created by God Do they not think the creator has more power than the angel Do they know it's an unfair battle they are getting into? That's a very interesting question. The thing, so this is why Faust, I think, is such an important

work, because Satan and the demons rebel knowing that they're going to lose, but they have so much pride and so much hatred for God that they do it anyway. And Faust is the same, you know, he's the same, kind of the same thing in human form. He knows, he's letting himself be dragged into hell. And there comes a point where you're so enslaved to the darkness that you don't care. You don't care that you're going to lose

your pride and your ambition. And you hate God and everything that God stands for so much that, you know, Stephen Fry said something about how, you know, if God is the kind of person that condemns homosexuals, then he's a cruel SOB, and I'd rather go to hell or something like that. And you hear people like that, say, oh, Christopher Hitchens said something similar.

Yeah, yeah. And it's like, yeah, okay, well, that's- That's an option for you. Yeah, yeah. And that's the, I struggle, you know, it's hard to imagine how, because we believe that you only go to hell by choice. God gives you every grace, every opportunity,

but the only thing that he can't do is he can't force you to love him. And if you choose to hate him, that's like, as C.S. Lewis says, God can't give you peace outside of himself. It's not there. And if you hate God, if you truly hate God, he can't do anything about that. He gave us that free will. You know, this, this reminds me of arguments in the past, more particularly, bad arguments I've had with my wife, where I don't want to say, sorry,

I know I'm wrong. Yes. But I, I I cannot and all of us have had this experience I would imagine one degree or another way. I just cannot bring myself how many times you hear people say I cannot bring myself to There's a there's a power in Destroying yourself. Yes, it's demonic. That is demonic and I we were talking about this in the walkover And we were talking about this in the walk over. I've never struggled with the problem of evil just because it is to me, it has been in my life the most powerful evidence of the supernatural. And having been so deep into it,

little things like, you know, I love the Jesus prayer. I've loved the Jesus prayer since I was an Anglican. It's my favorite thing to do. Physically, I find it so soothing. Intellectually, I find it so satisfying. And then obviously, spiritually, I get something out of it every single time I say it. It's like a sword that won't blunt. Yeah. And, uh, but I don't say it as much as I should. And I, and whenever I say, whenever I say to myself, you know, I'll say that I should say,

I should say a rope, right? And, um, and then I, and then I, then I'm, but there's a part of me that doesn't want to. And it's like, what could that possibly be? There's everything to recommend it. I don't like doing anything more than that Why wouldn't I do it? Why do I say no more times than I say? Yes, that's evil. That doesn't make sense There's no reason why that should exist Especially if you don't have pressing needs or duty isn't requiring you to do something else. Yeah, I'm a journalist. I never do anything This person asks with regard to your response about walking in the woods with your family, with when you talked about the pentagram, quick question.

I know what a pentagram looks like. Where does it come from? Do you know? Thursday? I had never thought about that. If you look that up for us. Thank you. What do Satanists believe they are doing to the geographic locations where rituals take place, if anything? Should we be asking priests to come and bless these locations if we come across ritual locations? So what do they think they're doing? I would. I mean, I guess I should. Yeah. Oh, they're doing what you do when you pray for someone, or when you pray for your, in the divine liturgy, you pray for our city, right? They're doing the same thing in reverse.

I mean, at least the Satanists are doing the same thing in reverse. They're wishing evil on you. They're invoking evil, they're invoking darkness. They're trying to bring the darkness into our lives. I remember there was a, I think it was a priest I met in person, but it might have been a video I watched.

He was talking to someone on a plane about how the Catholics fast on Friday and whatnot. And the woman said, that's very interesting. She says, I'm a Satanist and I fast on Sunday. Because I want to try to cancel out what you guys are doing. I, you know, this is, this is the day of great morning for us. You fast on Friday because that's when Christ died. We fast on Sunday because that's when he rose.

God have mercy. Yeah Wackadoosie, uh I got Something I think This is really hard to tell it's like one of those weird things It's like in every single culture for all of history. Mm hmm. Like they've got.

Oh, I see. You know, like it's literally in Sumerian poetry from like 3500 BC. So if what I'm seeing is correct, it originates as a sign in occultism because it was used in Faust. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Because it was used in Faust. The line is Mephistopheles says, I must confess I'm prevented through though by a little thing

that hinders me the Druid's foot on your door sill Faust the pentagram gives you pain then tell me you son of hell if that's the case How did you gain entry our spirits like you cheated? Mistoffelees look carefully. It's not completed one angle if you inspect it closely Has as you see been left a little open so Okay, it might be seen as powerful from fouls. It's hard to tell because it's everywhere. So yeah. How do you feel? Because you just said a moment ago that evil has never because it's been so prevalent in your life. It hasn't been a compelling argument against

God's existence. How do you feel? We talked about this before, but I want you to talk about it now. How do you feel about ghost stories and horror as a, as a genre? Do you cause you, cause you also said there's a sensitivity to that. So I would imagine you would have an, Oh yeah, that's interesting. Well, I guess what I've seen is so much worse than reading a story that it doesn't bother me on a visceral level. And if there was a story, so one story that does bother me

is because it's about a diabolist, it's an MR James story and the main character is based on Alistair Crowley and I don't read that one. But the most part, I mean, ghost stories as such are like Cthulhu mythology. Doesn't really have much in common. I mean, it's evil, but I think that, you know, there are people who say that, you know,

you shouldn't touch this because it's evil. I don't know anything, but in my, uh, in my humble opinion, I mean, I wouldn't, I would rather people get a taste of how horrible that is, uh, through literature and then never have to actually encounter it. that ghost stories or horror stories and obviously there's a distinction that needs to be made between something that's glorifying evil or pressing your face into something disgusting for the sake of it that sort of thing and other works like I think Hansel and Gretel is one of the most terrifying stories has ever written I'm not joking I think Dracula is you know Bram Stoker I think but I think these are beautiful books and I think they can also kind of put us in touch with the reality of the fact that the world is stranger than we had first supposed. It almost does battle against the secular interpretation of the world that we've been given in a way, or it can. Absolutely. You agree or no? I do. I do. Yeah.

You know, it's interesting. This is, there's a story, a novella called the great God pan by Arthur Macon. And, um, it's, uh, in many ways, very revolting. It's considered the first, you know, horror. This is the first horror story. And, um, you might care to, I don't know if I could, might care to read, I don't know if I could recommend it, but there is a, there is a satanic aspect and I didn't know that, I thought it was about the god Pan. You can imagine who Pan actually is,

but the, one of the things that I was struck by, I read about it afterwards and it was castigated by critics for being so explicit and so grotesque. of the things that I was struck by, I read about it afterwards and it was castigated by critics for being so explicit and so grotesque. And so, and I was reading that and I was like, I didn't think it was that bad. And that was something, I wrote a sub stack post about this, but I was, I realized how desensitized we've been. Like I, it's still like Thursday, I was, one thing I might criticize my parents for, they gave me a TV when I was a kid.

So I remember when I was quite little, staying up all night watching Silent Hill and that shattered me, that haunts, that will haunt me forever. And those things really desensitize you to evil. It takes a lot to shock people now. Yeah. And that's not good.

Yeah. I remember what hearing of Braveheart. You ever watch that movie? Yeah. It was a big deal. When did it come out? I was probably about 11 or 12, but there's that scene of the decapitated head in the basket. Yeah.

And now that's like every single episode of every single show on Hulu. Okay. Not really. But yeah. Yeah. No, that's a good point. All right. Well, as we wrap up, I want you to tell people where they can go to find more about you. I just want to hold this up for the camera here Thursday. This is called the reactionary mind. Why conservative isn't enough by our guest, Michael Warren Davis. Rod Dreher. Cool. Endorsed it. Where else? I love that guy. Yeah, he seems like a good chap.

I was just in. Where was I? Istanbul. Oh, he's in Romania. Isn't it? Hungary. Yeah. I was I was supposed to go to Hungary, but we missed our flight and the hope was to meet up with him. You should. I will. I'll go back. We're hoping to go back to Ukraine again. So next time. He's done more for me than I could ever say.

Wonderful. Yeah. My And then we write these down to put them in the episode. So like your substack page was that? Yeah, it's um, commonman.substack.com I think. And you can also preorder my new book. Yes, which I'll promise to promote big time when it comes out. Thanks. I appreciate that. I have to make my plug for my publisher. But it's called After Christendom and it's through Sophia Institute Press and

publisher of Great authors like father Boniface Hicks and mother Ileana and also me Not so great, but that's uh, yeah, I it's available for a pre-order now Awesome. Well, thank you for agreeing to come on the show for driving all the way here and God bless your wife and your family And it's an honor. you Matt thank you so much longtime fan and I really can't believe that I'm here well my head do a lot of good I hope so amen thanks thank you