After Effects

2 Comments

Every once in a while you find a book you wish had been published sooner.  The Exorcist Effect, by Joseph P. Laycock and Eric Harrelson is one of those books.  Although it covers many of the same films I talk about in Nightmares with the Bible, it does so with a different target in mind, and a lower price point.  Drawing on the observation that human recall is often accompanied by “source amnesia,” they explore the idea that famous horror films (and some less famous) get remembered as “facts.”  This seems to be a greater danger to those who don’t actually watch horror or who watch it uncritically.  Movies such as The Exorcist become the basis for what individuals believe about demons.  But it’s far more dangerous than that, because in a culture where everything’s politicized, horror movies become “the truth” for groups like QAnon.

Considering Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist, and The Omen as prime examples, they then move on to consider the fascinating, if weird, lives of Ed and Lorraine Warren, and Malachi Martin.  Popularizers such as these three influenced both horror films and general public opinion about demonic possession and exorcism.  The study moves on to the Satanic Panic of the eighties and nineties and how heavy metal music both utilizes and ties into the Exorcist Effect.  This important book ends by discussing the very real dangers of a society that elects presidents and others based on this Effect, which confuses reality and movies.  The book shows how many of the ideas behind conspiracy theories either misremember, or intentionally misuse, horror films.

Back in the days when I started Nightmares with the Bible there was comparatively little published in readable terms that discussed demons or, specifically, the portrayal of exorcism in movies.  Laycock and Harrelson’s book would’ve been a welcome contributor to that dearth of resources.  As someone who works on the fringes of the fringe, I don’t always hear the discussions other scholars have and I’m often left to my own devices when it comes to finding and reading information on horror films.  Without library privileges, it often means having to purchase the books to access them.  I was thrilled when I first learned about this book and I’m glad to have finally had the opportunity to read it.  I’m sure I’ll be coming back to it on occasion.  After writing Nightmares, I took a bit of a break from demons because being in the dark for too long can do odd things to a person.  But not knowing about them, as this book shows, might cause even greater problems.

Devil Talk

1 Comment

Around here, an after-school Satanic Temple club, prompted by an after-school evangelical club, led to a lawsuit where our tax dollars are being wasted.  Many local people wondered what was going on and I knew I had a book on my shelf that would help to answer that but I had to find the time to read it.  Joseph P. Laycock has been writing fascinating books for a few years now.  I picked up his Speak of the Devil: How the Satanic Temple Is Changing the Way We Talk about Religion just after it was published, but it always takes some time for me to get to books that I know I’ll have to spend time with.  I was right about spending time—there’s a lot packed in here that requires some thought.  I was vaguely aware of what the Satanic Temple is but had difficulty distinguishing it from the Church of Satan.  (I have a book on the latter, but it’s quite big and I haven’t found the time for it yet either.)  Laycock spells it out clearly.

The book begins by discussing how the Satanic Temple entered public consciousness in 2013.  Yes, it’s only been about a decade.  If you think it’s more than that, you may be confusing it with Anton LaVey’s Church of Satan.  They are different organizations.  One thing they have in common is that neither promotes belief in a literal Satan.  Both also rely on shock tactics to get their point across.  The Satanic Temple is a socially conscious organization that reacts to provocations of conservative Christian groups to try to establish their brand of Christianity as the officially sanctioned state religion.  And the evangelical groups have been making in-roads for years.  Playing the innocence card, “We’re just mainstream America saying what everyone’s thinking,” they put religious monuments in public spaces, start public meetings with Christian prayers, and receive state funding for their programs.  Often unchallenged.

Laycock’s not discussing evangelicals, but rather how the Satanic Temple arose in response to efforts to establish one form of Christianity as state sponsored.  There’s a ton of information in this book.  Among the many takeaways for me was the discussion of how good and evil are determined.  This is obviously directly relevant when Satan is involved, especially since the Devil is a post-biblical development.  The Satanic Temple, which doesn’t teach that there’s a literal Devil, attempts to counter the standard narrative by doing good deeds in the name of humanism.  You might be able to guess the conservative Christian response to that.  If you can’t, this book will help to spell it out for you.

Holy Seer

Leave a comment

SeerOfBaysideHands up, all who’ve heard of Veronica Lueken. Maybe one of you in the back? I have to confess to having been in the “Veronica who?” crowd until reading Joseph P. Laycock’s The Seer of Bayside. The subtitle would have made the difference: Veronica Lueken and the Struggle to Define Catholicism. It’s a fascinating story. Lueken, a Catholic laywoman in Bayside, Queens, began to have visions of the Virgin Mary. This was in the days of Vatican II. Lueken was a traditionalist who felt the reforms were misguided, and found Mary to be on her side. She grew a large following during her outdoor vigils, eventually becoming so popular that people bussed down from Canada and in from other states to join her. The neighborhood association complained, and, some say, planned to assassinate the seer. The movement, known as Baysiders, eventually moved their vigils to Flushing Meadows Corona Park, where it—or they—continue to meet.

Critics of religion tend to claim believers credulous. The Catholic Church, however, has been notably reluctant to approve of Marian apparitions. Lueken’s visions and her movement were condemned by the authorities, but now, even two decades after her death, two groups of her followers continue to meet. I’ve read quite a bit about Marian apparitions over the past couple of years. As Laycock points out, Marian apparitions are frequently classed with the paranormal since anomalous events often accompany them. It is no different with Baysiders. They claim healings and other unexplained events associated with their devotions, including mysterious lights on Polaroid photographs taken during services.

How are rational people, especially non-Catholics to make sense of this? Obviously one can say that the thousands who’ve claimed to witness such miracles throughout history were simply mistaken. Or deceived. Or one could suggest that there may be more to this old world than we’re generally willing to admit. Laycock takes his book in a different direction by asking the salient question of who gets to decide who Catholicism is. Protestants have no single center like the Holy See, and fractions do what fractions do. They divide. Hierarchy hath its privileges, of course. Rome declares the Baysiders in error. Each side, as is to be expected with religions, claims that it is correct. It seems that only Mary knows the real answer.