OCCULT AMERICA by Mitch Horowitz

by Mitch Horowitz, author of Occult America: White House Seances, Ouija Circles, Masons, and the Secret Mystic History of Our Nation (Bantam hardcover 2009, Bantam trade paperback October 2010).

Discussions about the occult tend to stir passions, which is natural because we’ve been raised to regard occult spirituality as something diabolical or just strange. I argue in Occult America that mystical and supernatural-themed religions are communities of belief and should be understood as a vital part of America’s religious development – indeed we can’t really understand our religious past (and present) without coming to terms with them.  They have exerted a remarkable influence on mainstream life.

To reply to Juan Oskar’s good question about feudalism and the European church, there were, of course, tendencies in Europe that attempted to modify or overturn hierarchical religious structures. Radical movements emerged from the Reformation – such as German Pietism (a Protestant mystical movement) and Rosicrucianism, an early-seventeenth century ecumenical and occult philosophy. The rise of Freemasonry, which became a public force in the early eighteenth century, can also be seen as part of this trend. Masonry, like Rosicrucianism, advocated early forms of religious toleration and liberty, and honored the individual spiritual search.

In Occult America, I argue that these movements attained their greatest influence in America, where they helped ignite a culture of religious experimentation. This began in the mid-to-late seventeenth century, long before the Constitution was codified. So, European and early American movements were both on the move against feudalistic styles of religion. I think their greatest success was attained in the U.S., which developed a remarkably diverse religious culture even in its colonial period. 

To the comments under “The Way I See It,” I would note that there is nothing evil or diabolical in occult practices. Renaissance scholars applied the term “occult,” or hidden, to ancient Egyptian-Hellenic religious ideas that began to reemerge in the fifteenth century. In the Renaissance mind, occult spirituality encompassed pre-Christian religious practices (ranging from astrology to alchemy to spirit mediumship). These rites and methods became unmoored from any church, temple, or priesthood as the religious orders of the ancient world faded. They reappeared as a kind of unchurched spirituality during the Renaissance renewal of Europe.

In antiquity, as in modern times, their acolytes never saw themselves as having anything to do with black magic or Satanism. Those terms were epithets that early Church Fathers directed at the fading pagan powers as the church ascended in late antiquity. Misdirected charges of Satanism sometimes also arise from a modern misunderstanding of African-influenced religious traditions, such as Voodoo, Santeria, and hoodoo. In essence, no real tradition of Satanism has ever existed in the West – other than in the form of stories and historical hearsay.

I very much admire (and share) your urging that the individual should search “the yearning…written in our hearts.” But I would note to you and the commenter who immediately follows that when we ask someone to search his or her heart, we must be willing to let that search go beyond our own footsteps. “Truth,” as Jiddu Krishnamurti put it, “is a pathless land.”

Finally, in reply to G’s comments: I view the New Age movement as a very relevant and meaningful spiritual culture on its own in American life; it is also an unacknowledged influence on mainstream religion. The point I make in the piece is that the earlier occult subcultures, which morphed into the New Age, have reshaped America’s traditional faiths as vehicles that must respond to the day-to-day needs of the individual (as well as to higher or salvational yearnings). In general, I see this as a positive development. As I write in the piece, esoteric and alternative religious movements today are rightly viewed “not as oddball trends but as forces that reflected a serious and widespread search for meaning.”

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A widely known writer and speaker on the history and impact of alternative spirituality, Mitch Horowitz is the editor-in-chief of Tarcher/Penguin and the author of Occult America (Bantam 2009/2010), which The Washington Post Book World called: “Fascinating…a serious, wide-ranging study of all the magical, mystical, and spiritual movements that have arisen and influenced American history in often-surprising ways.”   Horowitz has written for U.S. News & World Report, The Washington Post, Parabola, and BoingBoing. He has recently appeared on CBS Sunday Morning, Dateline NBC, and All Things Considered. You can visit him online at www.MitchHorowitz.com

Enrique's Journey by Sonia Nazario

A few years ago, in a conversation with my husband’s oldest brother, I said that I thought the only solution to illegal immigration was to help create jobs in the handful of countries that send about four in every five undocumented immigrants to the U.S.

My husband’s brother, assuming I was talking about U.S. foreign aid, got very angry. He reached for his pant pocket and yanked out his wallet. He slapped it down on the picnic table. “This is my money!” he told me. No one, he said, was going to use his hard-earned cash to help a bunch of people in another country he didn’t even know.

In times of economic crisis, his is a sentiment that is certainly shared by some Americans. Many, as evidenced by the comments to my piece, at least wonder if assistance aimed at countries like Honduras or Mexico only lands in the fat wallets of corrupt officials.

Having lived as a teenager in a country rife with corruption (Argentina) I certainly share this concern.

Still, I argued to my husband’s brother, the cost of doing nothing is potentially greater if Americans keep their wallets closed.

It’s true that sometimes places like Honduras seem hopeless. Last year, Transparency International ranked 180 countries for corruption, beginning with the cleanest, No. 1 ranked New Zealand. Mexico was No. 89; Honduras fared even worse, at No. 130. (The U.S. was No. 19).

Corruption was often evident as I reported Enrique’s Journey. For example, in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, I spent days trying to reach one city’s mayor. I was trying to get him to recount the heart-warming details of how he had helped save Enrique, the migrant boy I was writing about, when Enrique was nearly beaten to death in Mexico by bandits.

The mayor wouldn’t return my calls. Finally, I sat on the stoop to his office one morning until he arrived, and he reluctantly let me in. He explained that most reporters in Mexico only tried to reach him when they wanted a bribe—to withhold publication of something negative they had unearthed about the mayor.

Studies show that corruption slows economic growth, reduces domestic and foreign investments, and limits competition.  Indeed, studies have shown that foreign aid does not raise per capita income in poorly governed countries. Too often, aid ends up in dictators’ pockets (or in their Swiss bank accounts), money that helps tyrants stay in power.

That said, in recent years giving nations, recognizing this problem, have begun attaching anti-corruption conditions to foreign aid, measures that require goal-setting and vigilant monitoring. Also, donors are increasingly recognizing that corruption thrives in nations with weak institutions, and money is being targeted to bolster those institutions, such as the police and judicial systems.      

The Millennium Challenge Corp., begun by the U.S. government in 2004, only allocates aid if a country can meet certain criteria showing they are working toward promoting free markets and low corruption. In its first year, Honduras and El Salvador were among 17 countries that were eligible. By last October, a total of $109 million had been spent in Honduras to improve transport routes (by helping to build a highway and three secondary roads), and to give nearly 6,000 small farmers technical assistance in producing and marketing high-value crops. (Following the coup in Honduras last year, all funding ceased.)

In addition to these measures, the U.S. could work to circumvent corrupt governments and help create jobs and improve schools by directly funding non-governmental organizations in places like Honduras that have track records for getting things done.

In its trade policies, the U.S. could favor goods from countries that send the largest numbers of undocumented immigrants to the U.S.

If, for example, the U.S. imports medical scrubs from Honduras and also from Malaysia, why can’t our trade policies favor scrubs from Honduras if we know that will generate employment in a country that sends the second largest number of illegal immigrants to the U.S. each year (only second to Mexico)?

Why not use trade policies to help reduce migration?

Many microloan programs around the world have proven quite successful at helping women begin small businesses that provide employment. Why couldn’t the U.S. help provide loans to programs that have good track records in places like Honduras?

On my website, I also suggest many ways in which individuals can help create jobs south of our border. There are suggestions on how to buy fair trade coffee, clothing and gifts. These products ensure that the people producing them are paid a living wage. I list many other non-profit groups that are doing good work in Honduras, Mexico, and elsewhere to create jobs so fewer women feel forced to leave their children.

Some readers have gone through these groups to provide a microloan to an individual woman in Honduras. Others have demanded that their college cafeteria start serving fair trade coffee. A staff member at an Illinois university took what was perhaps the most deeply personal approach. She said Enrique’s Journey prompted her to quit her job and start a café in Honduras, where she now employs 10 people.

HIGH by Brian O'Dea

Brian O’Dea, author of HIGH: Confessions of an International Drug Smuggler (Other Press 2009), responds to comments posted to his “Legalize All Drugs Now!” essay from September 23rd, 2009.

I was interviewed recently by a young reporter who grew up in the midst of the so called “drug war”.  As far as she was concerned, it is perfectly alright for our government to wage a war against the weakest of our citizens, even though her entire premise for it being acceptable  was built on a foundation of lies, untruths, omissions, and a complete disregarding of the facts.  Numbers issued by the DEA have notoriously distorted the facts for years (a simple example is found in their excessive valuation of the drugs they seize), and even only recently, under extreme pressure from LEAP (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition –LEAP.CC) have they changed a blatant lie on their home page regarding marijuana.

At any rate, I digress, let’s return to the interview.  At the one minute fifty-six second mark, in response to my call for legalization, the interviewer repeats yet another false maxim of those fighting the drug war: “And then you’re dealing with an increase in addiction and drug related crimes…”  This is right out of the DEA playbook and the facts tell another story.  Does she know this?  I hope not, and tend to think she and others are unaware of the lack of veracity in this argument.  However, quite the opposite is true, as is proven in Portugal, where all drugs have been legalized – decreased drug addiction since legalization, decreased crime rate related to addiction, increased number of addicts seeking help, the age of youth starting to use drugs has risen by over one full year.  I hope this addresses one of the concerns raised by a commenter in response to my original piece on this blog.  Amy wonders if legalization will: “… encourage young kids to just try heroin once, and become addicted for life?”  It should be pointed out here, too, that legal drugs are much harder to get than illegal ones.  Money is the only barrier between me and any illegal drug.

There, in a nutshell, is the hill we have to climb.  Mainstream media promotes the lie, and in doing so, creates sensational style journalism (probably the absolute wrong word to use here, because authentic journalism it is not) which pleases advertisers and their phony stance on, well, just about everything.

A great example of the hypocrisy we are dealing with can be seen in society’s acceptance of alcohol, which can be a harmful and dangerous drug for both the user and those in their environment.  We drug test all of our athletes, but not for alcohol and tobacco, two of the most damaging drugs in the entire pharmacopeia.  Both of these drugs have been aimed at our youth for generations and we hear no hue and cry from the media about that.  Students at my son’s school can be seen sporting T-shirts emblazoned with one booze logo or another, and this is for some reason tolerated if not condoned.  Sporting events aimed at our youth are also often sponsored by alcohol manufacturing companies of one stripe or another and, yet again, this is considered acceptable.

In the prisons where I have been, I have taken my own version of a straw pole, and have discovered that in every instance over 90% of the individuals in prisons for violent offenses were under the influence of alcohol when they committed their acts of violence.  Not heroin.  Not cocaine.  Not PCP, or mescaline, or meth.  Don’t get me wrong.  I can speak from experience when I say that being hooked up on these drugs in a nightmare, and not recommended, but with their addiction, problems arise when the supply is withdrawn, when there is no access to supply due to financial constraints primarily, and banks get robbed in an effort to find money for the drugs.

Another responder to my piece, Jess, says “Alcohol… [is] a harmful drug to those who abuse it….”  I would go one step further, Jess, and say that with alcohol, violence oftentimes results as symptoms of inebriation.   Women, children and motorists are all too often innocent victims of alcohol, yet we cheer its presence among us.  I would argue that if we supplied a heroin addict with his fix, we would see quite the opposite effect: the abuser would be subdued and satiated and would not be prone to lashing out at others, which includes robbing a bank.  .  In fact, federal prisons are filled with junkies who robbed banks for one of two reasons, a) to get money for the drug, or b) to get caught and locked up so they could have a safe place to get off the stuff (this method of quitting doesn’t always work, as all of the federal prisons I have experienced have heroin on the yard).

Another poster, Mikaila, makes a tremendously important point, “Drug illegalization is a great example of this… in terms of race-based eradication efforts.”  Federal and state prisons are filled with young black men serving disproportionately higher sentences than their white counterparts.  The crack laws were aimed specifically at the black community.  For years this disparity has been there, white youth receiving five years for a coke where a black person will get fifty.  Concerned citizens have been trying to overturn this bad law for years, but to no avail It is truly a law against the impoverished black community, nothing less.

Getting back to the interview: In this country there are approximately 180 directors of all the major media outlets, directors who cross pollinate onto other corporate boards.  These individuals act as the gateway to the information we get to consume (for the most part).  All too often, the axe they are grinding is to be used as a weapon assailing the truth before it gets to us.  When the media that is consumed by most Americans is perpetrating and perpetuating the lie, is cooperating in it, then it becomes a gargantuan task to properly inform the public.

Those of us who know enough to seek beyond and around any of these fabrications are responsible for speaking out at every opportunity.  If we choose not to do so, then we are participating in this horribly damaging exercise targeting the weakest among us.  We are part of the problem of vastly overcrowded prisons filled with a great disproportion of minority groups, and poor people.  I, for one, cannot bear to live my life with that burden.  If we do not speak out, we are treating these struggling individuals as our scapegoats, foisting our own imperfections on their backs and hustling them off to the gulags.  Can you live with that?

We must speak out at every opportunity; we must challenge the status quo, we must subvert the dominant paradigm.  Thank you to those who have taken the time to listen to me and to share your thoughts. 

To these people and everyone else for that matter, I say:
Find your voice, my friends, and then use it.

Brian O’Dea is the author of High: Confessions of an International Drug Smuggler (Other Press 2009).  He is currently working as a film and television producer and lives with his family in Toronto.