{"id":12983,"date":"2019-01-04T11:27:13","date_gmt":"2019-01-04T16:27:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=12983"},"modified":"2020-09-17T11:27:23","modified_gmt":"2020-09-17T15:27:23","slug":"witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump","title":{"rendered":"Witchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Christopher<\/a>
Christopher Halloran\/Shutterstock.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

According to a recent report<\/a>, there has been a dramatic rise in paganism and the number of Americans identifying as witches while Christian denominations have been losing members.<\/p>\n

An estimated 1.5 million Americans now identify as witches, more than the total number of Presbyterians. As Christianity declines, paganism has come to the mainstream and witches more recently surfacing in the news for political reasons.<\/p>\n

In October, Christianity Today reported that dozens of Christians were protesting a public hex of President Donald Trump and Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in New York.<\/p>\n

Catland Books which organized the hexing, live streamed the event online and described it as \u201can act of resistance and resilience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dakota Bracciale, co-owner of Catland Books, told BBC News that the goal of the hex, which included candles and photo representations of President Trump, Kavanaugh and GOP Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was \u201caimed at exposing Brett Kavanaugh for what he truly is, to cause him harm and see him undone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bracciale, is pleased with the Hex they placed on US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in October. The event was well attended by witches, atheists and humanists\/<\/p>\n

Millennials, says Bracciale, are looking for spiritualism outside of traditional religion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe hex centres on the notion that we live in a universe of chaos, entropy, destruction, death, decay with final ending of oblivion \u2013 scientists are telling us. So the witch does everything for themselves \u2013 there is no other help in the universe of decay and chaos. If you don\u2019t get in the driver\u2019s seat things will just get worse,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In an interview with the Telegraph, Bracciale, talked in detail about political hexes and witchcraft.<\/p>\n

According to Bracciale the main goal of the three hexes on President Trump from Catland Books this summer, along with the Kavanaugh Hex was to \u201clet them be exposed for who they are \u2013 especially as impotent men.\u201d<\/p>\n

The hex began with the recitation of the Bible verse Psalm 109:8: \u201clet his days be few, let another take his office.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bracciale says that Catland Books has experienced a pretty severe amount of backlash in the form of hate mail and death threats due to the ritual, this isn\u2019t stopping their movement.<\/p>\n

Bracciale also feels that previous hexes placed on President Trump have been successful.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe feel the rituals were a success as they sought to expose Trump for what he is, and that has happened on many levels; from the Russia probe to the expose on his finances to Stormy Daniels.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

According to a recent report, there has been a dramatic rise in paganism and the number of Americans identifying as witches while Christian denominations have been losing members. An estimated 1.5 million Americans now identify as witches, more than the total number of Presbyterians. As Christianity declines, paganism has come to the mainstream and witches…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":565,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[2433,2318,2434,2432,2282,2435],"class_list":["post-12983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian","tag-christianity-news","tag-donald-trump","tag-pagan-news","tag-paganism","tag-witchcraft","tag-witchcraft-news"],"yoast_head":"\nWitchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Witchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"According to a recent report, there has been a dramatic rise in paganism and the number of Americans identifying as witches while Christian denominations have been losing members. An estimated 1.5 million Americans now identify as witches, more than the total number of Presbyterians. As Christianity declines, paganism has come to the mainstream and witches…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-01-04T16:27:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-09-17T15:27:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Lesli White\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2017\/12\/DonaldTrumpspeachcreditChristopherHalloranShutterstockcom-e1546619130233.jpg\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Witchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Witchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump","og_description":"According to a recent report, there has been a dramatic rise in paganism and the number of Americans identifying as witches while Christian denominations have been losing members. An estimated 1.5 million Americans now identify as witches, more than the total number of Presbyterians. As Christianity declines, paganism has come to the mainstream and witches…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2019-01-04T16:27:13+00:00","article_modified_time":"2020-09-17T15:27:23+00:00","author":"Lesli White","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_image":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2017\/12\/DonaldTrumpspeachcreditChristopherHalloranShutterstockcom-e1546619130233.jpg","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump","name":"Witchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2017\/12\/DonaldTrumpspeachcreditChristopherHalloranShutterstockcom-e1546619130233.jpg","datePublished":"2019-01-04T16:27:13+00:00","dateModified":"2020-09-17T15:27:23+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/4f72f240cbc397de345b4a72c0109413"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2017\/12\/DonaldTrumpspeachcreditChristopherHalloranShutterstockcom-e1546619130233.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2017\/12\/DonaldTrumpspeachcreditChristopherHalloranShutterstockcom-e1546619130233.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2019\/01\/witchcraft-rises-us-christianity-declines-witches-now-hexing-donald-trump#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Witchcraft Rises in the US and Christianity Declines: Witches Now Hexing Donald Trump"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/","name":"Beliefnet News","description":"Top Religious News From Around the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/4f72f240cbc397de345b4a72c0109413","name":"Lesli White","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/849\/84981da9ba200c133618a7ef53be589dx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/849\/84981da9ba200c133618a7ef53be589dx96.jpg","caption":"Lesli White"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author\/lwhite"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/565"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12983"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12983\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14328,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12983\/revisions\/14328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}