from The Wild Hunt,
Jason Pitzl-Waters

The United States has a strong ethic of not interfering with the internal affairs of religious organizations. The recent unanimous Supreme Court decision affirming the right of “ministerial exception” sent a clear signal that our government is limited in what in can demand or regulate. In America, religious institutions aren’t taxed, and our constitution enshrines a secular ethic that prevents one faith being raised up above any other. However, freedom of religion does not place clergy and religious leaders above the law, individuals have been imprisoned when their teachings have led to the abuse or deaths of others. Now, the question is if the United States should act to keep a religious leader accused of encouraging the abuse, and in some cases death, of children from entering our country. In March, Nigerian Christian leader Helen Ukpabio is planning a trip to the United States to engage in a “Marathon Deliverance” session in Texas. The International Humanist and Ethical Union claims that Ukpabio “uses her sermons, teachings and prophetic declarations to incite hatred, intolerance and persecution of alleged witches and wizards.”

“Ukpabio claims to be an ex-witch, initiated while she was a member of another local church, the Brotherhood of Cross and Star. She later founded the Liberty Gospel Church to fulfill her ‘anointed mission’ of delivering people from witchcraft attack. Ukpabio organizes deliverance sessions where she identifies and exorcizes people, mainly children, of witchcraft. Headquartered in Calabar in Southern Nigeria, the Liberty Gospel Church has grown to be a witch hunting church with branches in Nigeria and overseas.”

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It began with the trial and execution of an eight-year-old girl for witchcraft in the spring of 1630. Compelled to name others involved in an alleged nighttime dance with the devil in the town of Oberkirchen, the confession of young Christine Teipel sparked a wave of fingerpointing and subsequent trials. Within just three months, 58 people, including 22 men and two children, were burned at the stake there.

The Oberkirchen trials represent just a small fraction of those that led to the execution of some 25,000 alleged witches between 1500 and 1782 in Germany. The country was a hotbed of persecution, says witch-trial expert Hartmut Hegeler, explaining that some 40 percent of the 60,000 witches who were tortured and killed in Europe during the infamous era were executed in what is now modern Germany. Hegeler, 65, a retired Protestant minister and college religion instructor in the western German town of Unna, is now working to rehabilitate these supposed witches city by city.

“We owe it to the victims to finally acknowledge that they died innocent back then,” Hegeler told Spiegel Online. “But this is not just about the past — it’s a signal against the violence and marginalization of people that goes on today.”

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RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Saudi authorities have executed a woman who had been convicted of practicing magic and sorcery.

The Saudi Interior Ministry says in a statement the execution took place Monday, but gave no details on the woman’s crime.

The London-based al-Hayat daily, however, quoted Abdullah al-Mohsen, chief of the religious police who arrested the woman, as saying she had tricked people into thinking she could treat illnesses, charging them $800 per session.

The paper said a female investigator followed up, and the woman was arrested in April, 2009, and later convicted in a Saudi court.

It did not give the woman’s name, but said she was in her 60s.

The execution brings the total to 76 this year in Saudi Arabia, according to an Associated Press count. At least three have been women.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

We’re moving to a new server as part of the Windhaven Network migration. While we don’t expect any major interruptions, there are always unforeseen problems when you’re dealing with new servers. If you do notice any downtime at all, please keep in mind that it will only be temporary. We’re expecting a few hiccups, but nothing major. Expect the best but plan for the worst and all that.

We hope you’ll like the changes we’re making. The new server is going to be much faster than the old one, and it’ll open up a lot of possibilities that we could never even imagine before. So here’s to hope and a brighter tomorrow. Or, as we’re fond of saying around here, “Ever upward!”

We’ll see you soon. And thanks ahead of time for your patience during our move.

Ever the trouble-maker, I found myself responding to a question posed on Yahoo! this morning. The full question was – “Do Christians know about Malleus Maleficarum – Hammer of the Witches ? Know About Inquisition?” Well… no. Not really. Most Christians don’t know what the Malleus Maleficarum is, if they’ve heard about it at all. And most of those who have are fairly determined to regard it as an obscure work from a different time. The familiar restrain is “We’re not like that now. Really. We’re not.”

What followed the question were several of the expected responses from people who prefer to think of the Malleus Maleficarum as an anomoly which has little to do with modern religion.

• “‘Bad’ or perhaps evil Christians exist as do good ones.”
• “Catholicism was behind that evil stuff. Do not blame Christians. There is a huge difference.”
• “That was the church of Rome that did that, way different than a true Christian.”

Here’s what I think:

Christians have tried for centuries to distance themselves from the Malleus Maleficarum. Baptists and other denominations have said “Oh, that was those wacky Catholics”. I notice someone cast the Malleus in light of “bad Christians” vs “good Christians”. Most frequently what you hear is “that was a long time ago”. The fact remains that the Inquisitions lasted from the 1100′s all the way up to the mid 1800′s, and were most notoriously active during the 1400′s and 1500′s. During that time, if you were a Christian, you were a Catholic. The first Baptist church was formed in 1609. Methodists didn’t come along until about 1790. And Protestants only date back to 1520 or so. So, basically, the “bad Christians” vs “good Christians” argument doesn’t hold up, not does the “wacky” Catholics argument unless one concedes that all of the major alternatives (ie Baptist, Protestant, Methodist, Mormon, etc) are relatively recent creations (during the last 500 years or so). I guess all I’m saying is that it’s hard to distance yourself from the Malleus Maleficarum without rejecting 1,500 years of Christianity because Christians then were “those wacky Catholics”.

It’s understandable why people would want to distance their faith from the Malleus Maleficarum. Another technique that Christians use to distance themselves from the work is to suggest that it was added to the Catholic Church’s list of banned books. That much is true, but not entirely. The Malleus WAS banned by the Church, but the part those people leave out is that it wasn’t banned until over 70 YEARS past its first publication, during which time it was second in popularity only to The Bible and during which it served as a de facto handbook for witch hunters, Inquisitors and even the secular courts.

Catholics have a vested interest in distancing themselves from the Malleus Maleficarum for obvious reasons, just as they’re none-too-happy about discussing the Holy Wars. Members of more recent denominations such as Baptists, Methodists, Protestants and Mormons are afforded a convenient escape from any related blame by pointing out that the atrocities of the Inquisitions, for which the Malleus Maleficarum bears some blame, were committed by Catholics, not “true Christians” as the more recent denominations call themselves. Pretty much, no one is interested in taking blame for an infamous work, and dozens of convenient explanations and re-direction exist to absolve modern Christians from taking ownership of a work which was born of the Christian Inquisition. Who could blame them? Germans distance themselves from Mein Kampf for the same reason. In the end, if most Christians don’t know about the Malleus Maleficarum, it’s because most Christians don’t WANT to know about it, and most Christian organizations and churches don’t want to talk about it. Most Christians want the Malleus Maleficarum consigned to the dustbin of history where they think it belongs, where uncomfortable questions about culpability and blame can be avoided, and where modern Christians can absolve themselves of any remorse or guilt over a work which helped Christians commit some of the most horrific acts in the name of God that have ever been recorded in human history.

In short, most Christians don’t know about the “Malleus Maleficarum” because most Christians don’t WANT to know about the Malleus Maleficarum.

What do you think?

A Sudanese man has been beheaded in Saudi Arabia after being accused of sorcery and witchcraft, the country’s interior ministry confirmed on Monday.

The man, Abdul Hamid bin Hussein Mostafa al-Fakki, had been arrested in 2005 and charged with “witchcraft” two years later. He was sentenced to death in the western city of Medina after being found guilty of what the court said was “producing a spell designed to lead to the reconciliation of his client’s divorced parents.”

Details of the case have been largely muted, but international organizations had been calling for the man to be set free and not executed. Their efforts failed.

Amnesty International had tried unsuccessfully to prevent the execution of al-Fakki, who lived as a migrant worker in the Gulf Kingdom.

The crime of “sorcery” is not clearly defined in Saudi Arabian law, according to the London-based human rights group.

At least 43 people have already been executed in Saudi Arabia this year, making it one of the leading country’s in the world to use the death penalty.

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Two men in Bhadrachalam, India, Vade Dharmaiah and Sunnam Magaiah of Vissapuram village, were burned alive in the late hours of Friday night, Sept. 9th, on suspicion that the two men were practicing witchcraft.

According to reports, an elderly gentleman named Vade Pasaiah (80) died of old age on August 30th. Another person, Vade Mutaiah (35), succumbed to TB on August 31st. Pasaiah’s sons, Veerabhadra Rao, Chander Rao, Venkatesh and Ramulu suspected that their father died due to witchcraft practiced by Dharmaiah.

Sources said the villagers allegedly led by the family members of the former sarpanch raided the houses of Mangaiah and Dharmaiah. They thrashed Dharmaiah after tying him to a tree. To save his own life, Dharmaiah reportedly told them that it was Sunnam Mangaiah who practised witchcraft on their father. Following the disclosure, Pasaiah’s sons forcibly brought Mangaiah to the place and tied him to a tree.

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NIGERIA – A man and a woman, were yesterday sentenced to 2 years imprisonment over an alleged bewitching of a woman by the Chief Magistrate’s Court in Warji Local Government Area of Bauchi State.

Ibrahim Shehu Ganye, a 43 year-old man and Adama Mamuda, a 45 year-old woman, were both accused of casting a witchcraft spell on one Hansatu Sani four years contrary to Section 216 of the Penal Code.

The accused persons, who admitted committing the offence, were ordered by the court to return their victim’s ‘‘spirit,’’ which they reportedly held illegally for the period their victim was under their spell. They were also asked to pay the bewitched woman N100,000 as damages for the sufferings and trauma she went through, and an additional N 10, 000 each as fine.

Police Prosecutor, Mato Albasu, who had earlier charged the accused for conspiring and bewitching their victim by witchcraft, had kept Sani under observation for a week to ensure that she recovered after the said spirit was returned to her.

Magistrate of the court sitting, warned the convicts of such inhumane acts and advised them to desist from such in the interest of peace in the area.

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UGANDA – Mr Benon Alyao, 73, sits on a plastic chair at Lira Central Police Station with a plaster on his head. Two other middle-aged men sit next to him. In their company is an elderly woman. The four look pensive and disillusioned. They have been left homeless after being banished from a place they called home since they were born for allegedly practicing witchcraft.

The four, together with others, were arrested as suspects in a murder case. Gunshots were fired at Mr Alyao’s home and a person killed. He, together with his children, Nelson Aporo, 42, Patrick Ocero, 39 and wife Josephine Akello, were then picked by police. Police later learnt that the bullets were allegedly intended to finish the old man but accidentally killed one of the assailants.

Residents of Ewop ‘A’ Village in Abwocolil Parish, Amac Sub-county, Lira District are complaining that Mr Alyao’s family is at the forefront of witchcraft that has claimed a number of souls.

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An albino boy who went missing on his way home from school may have been snatched for a tribal sacrifice in South Africa, it has been reported today. The disappearance of Sibisuso Nhatave, 14, prompted a police search in the eastern province of KwaZulu-Natal amid fears that he had been a victim of black magic. Albinism, a hereditary genetic condition, is viewed by many across Africa as magical and hundreds carrying the disorder have been killed for their parts.

Zulmira Nhatave,the teenager’s elder sister, who is also an albino, said: “Time is passing, we are starting to lose hope. But if God is with us, we will find him.”

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