My Conversion from the Occult

I wish to start by saying that everything this story contains truly happened to me. I have written this memoir twice before, but to my dismay the evil one has repeatedly destroyed my work. Praying to the Holy Spirit I decided that I would write this paper once more, and if God allowed it to be destroyed again, than I would give up and accept our Lord's Will. Well, as you can see, the third time was a charm. I pray that you, the reader, will see my life as an example of what not to do, and to steer your children from the dangers that I lived through. May God, through the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, bless you all.

Decent into Darkness

Now a proud father of 4 children, a loyal husband, and {hopefully} a faithfull survent of the Lord, I am so amazed at how my life has changed, at the person God has called me to be. Looking at my past, i can hardly believe that I, out of all others in my life, was chosen by God to work in his vineyard. (I truly feel inadequate for the job, but I try regardless.) I was born in the summer of 1976 to an unwed family and was baptized at the age of 3, but by age 6 my family stopped attending church services. Sadly, my childhood feet would never again touch the floors of a church until they were holding upon them a full-grown man.

By age 8 my parents had divorced, and I, along with two siblings, fell into the crossfire of two bitter people. We switched parents every year, which only created more confusion in our young minds. As the years gone by I became intrigued with videogames, science and horror movies. Ghosts and UFOs, psychic powers and (in later years) 'Dungeons & Dragons' consumed me. Then, at age 11, my mother (whom I love so dearly) unintentionally pushed me over the thresh-hold, getting me the Time-Life books "Mysteries of the Unknown". From there on I would eat, think, and breathe only the supernatural. To me, this was reality. A world woven with spirits and mysterious forces, of which I was totally hooked. Eventually, like most who become interested in the supernatural, I began teaching classmates how to perform OBEs, bending metals, and simple forms of divination.

Then came high school where I met a woman who later would lead me to the very brink of Hell itself. Her name was Shelly. Meeting during a play I performed in, we found ourselves irresistibly attracted to each other. Realizing we both had similar interests, she confided to me that she was a practicing witch, a Wiccan to be precise.

That evening, while talking on the phone, she insisted on me allowing her to prove she could invoke magical powers. Being skeptical I reluctantly gave in. She asked that I close my eyes and wait. Staring at the ceiling with a smirk on my face I told her they were closed. And then, silence. About five minutes had passed when she spoke up, "Can you see anything yet?"

"Nope," I answered, rolling my eyes.

"Keep watching," she said. I could hear the anticipation in her voice. Then, I noticed something. In the far corner near the ceiling I could see something looking like a bent beam of light hovering in mid-air. "Keep your eyes closed," she said. "I'm sending you a telepathic picture." Baffled, I closed my eyes, and there it was still in my sight. Slowly the light bent, increasing in size. It eventually took on shape as if the silhouette of a person. Excited, she told me to continue watching. Finally its blurriness dissipated revealing a picture of herself, completely unclothed. Exclaiming what I was seeing, she laughed with a sense of satisfaction and ended the spell.

Admitting defeat, I decided to buy myself books on witchcraft. I quickly found myself absorbed into a mystical world where dealing with spirits would become a normal part of my everyday life. She continued casting spells at me so to keep my interest in the occults going. On one such occasion she insisted that there was a spirit of a child that came to her regularly every night. Scoffing at her, she insisted she'd prove it to me. Seconds later, in the darkness of my bedroom, there appeared the face of a child within a mirror on my wall. For a minute or two it stood there, as if watching me, and then vanished.

Demonic Retaliation

As the school year passed our relationship faded, but my interests in the occults continued to grow stronger. Eventually I adopted the belief system of Wiccan followers, finding myself praying to two gods, the god of the sun, and the goddess of the moon. Never did I call them by name though because they had as many names as there are leaves on a tree. I also realized I couldn't get myself to worship two gods, so I found myself preferring to pray to the moon goddess.

Countless nights I hid myself in the woods casting incantations, or sitting alone in my room learning new spells. My soul was lost in this mystical realm that appeared to be just beyond my grasp. The most difficult part about witchcraft though is that it required one to remain active in incantations. That is because as a person uses 'magic', (my books taught that) evil spirits begin attacking the individual. So, to prevent any harm or influence from evil entities, one must use spells to put a 'shield of protection' around themselves. And as these spirits appear to always grow immune to these 'shields', it becomes essential that you learn more powerful spells to protect yourself. And a person who decides to stop using magic thinking that everything would just stop find themselves sadly mistaken, for the evil one will scare them and set such harm to them that they would immediately resort to using magic to stop the attack. With this vicious cycle in place, it doesn't take long for a person to become totally imprisoned within its walls. Either you feel as if evil surrounds your every move, or you convince yourself that you are master over it, as if you were more powerful than the imagined 'wimpy devil' Christians feared. And that is exactly where I found myself. To me there were no other gods. And no one else knew better than I unless they were in the occults as well. The rest of the world appeared to be asleep, unaware of the fact that us witches can control anything around us. (Or so I thought.)

{Another trap one doesn't realize until he or she escapes from its clutches is that the evil one will perform the spell the person is casting so to confuse them into believing they are doing this. But, as time goes by, these evil spirits step back and wait until the person concentrates harder on the incantation. Continually it becomes harder for one to cast spells unless they meditate long and hard, continuously learning more to please their 'gods'. I relate this to gambling at the casinos. Everyone knows that newcomers have beginner's luck. At first the person wins over and over, but eventually the winning streak fades. To win now means to give up more, until finally you're broke and have lost everything. I have always attributed this addiction to evil spirits as well who, by helping you to win at first, are really trying to lead you to addiction and perdition.}

My eyes were further blinded with the notion that magic was separated into different categories, the most common being white, gray, and black magic. White magic is what is falsely called "good magic", and since I was taught that whatever magic you send out would come back 10-fold, I always chose to perform white magic. It would take me several years to realize that there was no such thing as 'good' magic, but only bad. But by then it would take an act of God to save me from damnation.

As the year came to an end I found myself noticing a change from within. No longer was I a joyous young man, though to everyone else I appeared fine. My heart was greatly troubled. A depression came over my sorrowful heart of which no spell I knew could lift. I couldn't put my finger on it. I felt that something was just not right, like something was missing in my life that was preventing me from feeling any happiness. And the more spells I used attempting to fix my problems, the worse I became. I felt hollow, as if my heart contained some hidden void that I couldn't fill.

I finally found myself alone one summer night. The stars were so beautiful and the moon full and brilliant as could be. Nights like this always made me feel so at peace, yet tonight peace was the only thing I couldn't find. I was lost and bewildered, confused at why, with all these powers, I felt so alone. I decided to pray to the goddess of the moon hoping to find some hidden answer. But as I prayed I found my mind wondering aimlessly through my past, as if searching for the happiness that I have now lost. I began reminiscing of a time in my life when I was young and innocent. My mom was dressing me nicely to go somewhere. I remembered pulling into a stone parking lot with my family and then entered into a building. There, in this building, I could see a statue in the distance hanging on the wall. It was a man, as if dead, hung on a cross. Then, a single word welled up within me and poured softly out of my lips, "Jesus". There, in the image of that statue, inside this building long hidden within my mind, was that which my empty heart was searching for. I suddenly recalled everything, as if an illumination of memories and emotions were flowing into me. I could see how happy I was there, my heart full of life and love. Though I was ignorant as to what was going on there, I was truly alive. I could see now that He, Jesus, was the only one that could fill the void that plagued my soul for so long.

Coming to, I found myself still looking at the moon, though not in the same way. I seen its craters, its plains, and without thinking I said, "Why am I talking to a piece of rock?" I instantly lost all belief in the two gods I had in vain prayed to for so long. I could see now that He, Jesus Christ, was the one missing in my life. At last, happiness filled my lonely heart with such a joy I could hardly contain myself. But I still had one problem: who was this Jesus?

Well, I eventually went inside, unaware that Satan would shortly be given a final chance to reclaim me. I went in my bedroom to ponder on what just had happened. But for some reason I eventually decided to try some divination again, though I chose not to pray to these false gods I was used to praying to. My misguided mind though that maybe these powers weren't from these fake 'gods', but were my own. Perhaps I was always able to do this. Little did I know that the powers I possessed were never mine to begin with.

Taking no notice to the fact that I had left my door wide open, I stood near my lamp and picked up a small mirror I used to practice divination. I stared at my reflection for a few minutes, as I usually did, waiting for an image to appear. All of a sudden the reflection went dark, and flames shot upward appearing as if in some large cavern. Then, a creature appeared in the foreground. It appeared to look almost like a ram, though standing upright, with broad shoulders, just like a man. It was so close that only its shoulders and head could be seen. Turning to me it looked at my eyes as if surprised as well as filled with fury that I was looking at it. Its eyes were of pure hatred, the likes of which I had never seen before. Panic flew through my spine as I threw the mirror across the room shattering it against the wall. Terrified by what I just witnessed, I stood there and wondered what just happened. I began thinking, what if all my powers weren't my own, but instead were those of this being I had just seen. As if all along this thing was showing me what I wanted to see, using me as a blind pawn in an unconquerable game of chess against this 'Jesus'. Realizing this, I chose to totally abandon witchcraft, get rid of all my books on the subject, and start reading the bible.

Suddenly the light went out in my room, and before I could turn to look, I was punched so hard that I flew into the wall. I didn't even land before another blow flung me back across the room. (Let me briefly tell you about my walls I was being hurled into. The walls were painted purple, and we pop-corned the ceiling. Then, we took the popcorn out of the mixture and sprayed that onto my walls. The end result was a gritty texture of purple cement that when brushed against would make you bleed very badly.) Over and over I was punched, kicked, and flung through the air as if a rag doll in the mouth of a vicious dog. Unable to react or even breath, I eventually lost consciousness.

When I came to, I found myself lying face up upon the floor. I was paralyzed, unable to move anything other than my eyes. My feet faced out the doorway, and above my head I could see the legs of a lifeless body lying on the small couch I kept in my room. The lifeless person was myself, lying dead right about me. I then took notice of a being standing along side my feet. It was very grotesque, and to this day I still find it difficult to explain what I was looking at. I stood more than six feet tall. Only its back was toward me, but I could see that it had no clothing on. Its skin was of a putrid green with many swells and bumps on it as if like boils. Of its face I could only see it had human-like ears, though I didn't take notice if it had any hair. Its arms were so long though that when it grabbed my ankle it didn't even bend down to do so. I was drug out of my bedroom into the living room where I could see a pit in the center of the room. It glowed a fiery red and had a stone stairwell along its side. I found myself powerless, unable to move or scream.

Just as I was being drug toward it, something took hold of me from behind and pulled me instantly back into my beaten body. The pain from my body was overwhelming. I opened my eyes, but to my surprise, I found I couldn't see anything. I was blind. Again an invisible force punched me, landing me onto my bed. I sat up and tried to look around, but all I could see was images of light that one can see if they look at a light bulb and then closed their eyes. I then noticed that this image I was seeing formed into a head. It was the face of an ugly man, pale white, with no hair. His face was fat with a series of chins hanging beneath his baggy cheeks. Then it started to laugh at me with a deep, malicious tone to it. Its laughter appeared to surround me, coming from all sides. It was joined by other voices laughing hysterically in the distance, as if I had learned nothing from what just happened, as if I was still their prisoner with no power to leave their grasp.

Suddenly, everything vanished, the laughter, the vision, everything. My eyesight returned and I found myself alone again in my room. Badly shaking, I walked my way to the center of the room to look around and assure myself I was alone. At that moment I started to hear laughter again, as if returning from a distant room in the house. My stomach sank with fear of what was returning. All of a sudden something took hold of my knees and forced me down upon them. My face was pushed down to the ground and my lips began moving. I was praying. For the first time in my life I was praying to the One True God. I was begging God to save me and promised I would change my life. The laughter disappeared and after I had finished praying I ran out of the room.

Amazingly I suffered absolutely no physical marks of the attack. Even after being thrown into my cement walls, not one scratch was left as evidence. My bedroom door was wide open, yet not one person in the house heard me. In fact, the only proof that anything actually happened was the broken mirror I threw, and my lamp's light bulb that blew out when the attack started.

The Journey Home

I quickly destroyed all my books and I started looking into churches. I looked for 3 years at all different kinds of churches: Protestant, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, and non-denominational. In fact, the only church that I wouldn't go to was a Catholic Church, and that was because of what many in other religions said about Catholics such as 'they worship idols', 'they pray to Mary and the Saints as if they were God', and 'they think only they go to Heaven, but their going to hell for idolatry', all of which I later learned were untrue.

For years I wandered from religion to religion, always feeling something was still missing. With this confusion I found myself being tempted continuously to try psychic powers and spells again, but God guided me through it all. Still curious through about prophecy, I one day found myself not believing anymore in Nastrodaumus' prophetic visions (thank God!). I used similar techniques he did and I seen where it had gotten me. So, out of the blue, something directed my heart to call my grandmother I hadn't spoken to in 4 years. I knew she was religious, so I asked her if she heard anything about the Virgin Mary giving any prophecies. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. I, of all people, was asking her about Mary. Excited, she explained that many years ago she mailed to my house a book for her son in hopes of converting him. He tried to throw it away, but I was a packrat and boxed it up. I knew exactly what book she was talking about, though I never looked at it before. I flew into the attic and made my way to the back where a single lonely box sat with my oldest junk I kept. There I found it. The Book! It was titled, " The Thunder of Justice ", by Ted Flynn.

I almost jumped down the ladder I was running so fast and I sat in bed and read. I continued reading for 2 days straight with only 4 hours sleep in between. I couldn't let go of it. I was terrified at what I was reading. All of the prophecies she gave that came true, and those that were still to come. I could see myself within those pages, being described as part of this wicked generation she felt such sorrow for. I seen all my sins that she explained offended God. I never felt so low of myself as I did that night. Here I was, committing all the sins that hurt my God, and I never even knew it. The most significant piece of information for me wasn't what the Holy Virgin was saying directly though, but how she was saying it. She never condemned anyone in other faiths, but instead insisted that we all were part of one big family. And she never said exactly which faith is the one true faith, but instead she pointed toward it with words as "continuously pray for the Pope," and "offer sacrifices especially for priests" and "try to spend more time with Jesus in the Eucharist." Only the Catholic Church had these attributes, and if that's were she was pointing, that was where I was going. At last, a trusted hand pointing in the direction I needed to go.

And here I am, now a converted Catholic. I came to realize that some souls that are severely troubled, such as my own, are given by Jesus to his Mother to help lead us back to Him. And for me that was the only way I would ever had found Him fully. For anyone who reads this work, I pray that the Holy Virgin Mary may also lead you as she leads all her children to the altar of her divine son where he is daily called down by the hands of the priest into the bread and wine in fulfillment of his promise that if you eat of His body and drink of His blood, you will have eternal life.