“Hello, I am Freya. I make a deal with demons for my rituals and spells, so all my spells come true.”

So proclaims the introduction to an Etsy shop that sells “Special Black Magic” for the price of $135.52 — a supposed 50 percent discount on the usual asking price of $271.04. A “Powerful Death Spell” from the same shop will run a person $271.04, though this too is on sale “for a limited time” from its usual fee of $542.08.

This purveyor of the demonic represents a fraction of the $2.3 billion “psychic-services industry,” which employs 96,909 Americans — most of whom are women — and attracts 15 percent of Americans as customers. Mediumship accounts for a quarter of the market share, while palm reading, tarot card reading, and animal communication each comprise about 20 percent. Aura reading, astrology, and other practices make up the remaining 15 percent. The financial outlook for the “psychic-services industry” — read: “witchcraft” — is favorable, according to the industry research company IBISWorld, which says that both revenue and market share are projected to increase over the next five years. 

On Etsy alone, there are 39,000 “Psychic Readings,” 57,000 “Divination Tools,” 78,000 “Tarot Readings & Divinations,” and 99,000 “Reiki & Chakras” available for purchase. And devotees of “#WitchTok” — the section of TikTok concerned with witchcraft — encounter endless videos of fellow witches shilling “altar starter kits,” herbs, cauldrons, “ritual candles,” and “love spells.” Like Etsy’s witch-for-hire stores, TikTok videos with the “WitchTok” hashtag are extremely popular: they have received more than 52 billion views.

But the economic phenomenon of witchcraft is not confined to one-woman internet storefronts and social media accounts. It has also made its way to the mainstream. Barnes & Noble now sells more than 29,000 products under the category “New Age & Alternative Beliefs,” including two hundred unique decks of tarot cards. In addition, witchcraft is now a popular theme of children’s fiction. In October 2023 alone, the New York Times published three reviews of “middle grade novels” focused on witchcraft and six reviews of “Terrific Witchy” novels aimed at teens. This included a review of a book that tells the story of a group of teen girls who use “magic that feels hungrier and darker than what they’d previously dabbled in” in an effort to resurrect their dead friend. Furthermore, the United Kingdom’s University of Exeter announced last year that it will offer a master’s degree in magic and occult science — though supposedly from the standpoint of social analysis. “Decolonisation, the exploration of alternative epistemologies, feminism, and anti-racism are at the core of this programme,” reads the description of the degree.

A Potent Incentive for Evangelization

Both Christianity and witchcraft seek to evangelize, though for very different reasons. 

The apostle Paul preached that he was “a slave of Christ Jesus” and that this paradoxically gave him genuine freedom to serve the Lord. “I have made myself a slave to all so as to win over as many as possible,” Paul wrote in his first letter to the Corinthians, concluding, “All this I do for the sake of the gospel, so that I too may have a share in it.” In his second letter to the Corinthians, he further explained, “[W]e do not preach ourselves but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your slaves for the sake of Jesus.” Those who are “freed from sin,” he proclaimed in his letter to the Romans, will likewise “become slaves of righteousness.”

Conversely, since witches seek to manipulate the world with magic for the sake of personal gain, they correspondingly evangelize others to their craft out of self-interest: specifically, they evangelize — at least in part — for money. 

A witch seeking to cash in must convince her potential TikTok, Etsy, or bookstore customers that God’s eternal law is an unjust inhibition on building the lives they desire. She must persuade these possible customers to seize control of their own destinies by unnaturally bending the world to their wills. A witch must charm others into forsaking Christ in favor of embracing the Devil — and choosing all the evil, despair, and death that follows.

This is typically accompanied by a feminist message: that a woman must crush the Western cultural tradition and its Judeo-Christian vision of women as ideally nurturing, empathetic, compassionate, tender, loving, selfless, and sacrificial in favor of a new vision of women as independent warriors who forge their own path of achievement for their own self-fulfillment. 

One woman who does just this is a TikTok witch who offers “energy readings” for $25, “energy healings” for $250, “love/domination work” for $450, and “prophetic medium readings” for $555. In a video in which she advertises her services, she exclaims: 

My work is for those of you who are looking for upgrade and Ascension, those of you who are looking to really upgrade your lifestyle and become the best that you can be, align yourself with what it is that you want with your intent, with your purpose.

In our capitalist and consumerist society, the incentive for easy money is driving witches to rapidly evangelize. One metric of growing adherence to witchcraft is the rapidly increasing number of views on TikTok videos accompanied by “#WitchTok.” By November 2020, the hashtag had garnered six million views; by April 2021, that number had grown to eleven billion; by November 2022, the phenomenon had increased to thirty billion views; by September 2023, it had reached forty-two billion; and by February 2024, it had achieved fifty-two billion views.

In contrast, Christian evangelizers, who have the incentive for righteousness, are failing to increase the number in their fold. Last year, the Pew Research Center projected that the number of American Christians will fall below 50 percent of the American population by the year 2050 if current trends hold.

Avarice is indeed proving to be the more potent motivation for evangelization.

*****

As Christians, we must not despair, as there are some promising developments in Christian evangelization, especially through those ministries that seek to take advantage of digital communication. For instance, Father Mike Schmitz’s Bible in a Year podcast topped charts in 2022 and received hundreds of millions of downloads. Last year also saw the rise of the successful Exorcist Files podcast, hosted by Father Carlos Martins, which uses the demonic and the Catholic Church’s ministry of exorcism for the purpose of evangelizing nonbelievers. Bishop Robert Barron of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota, also runs a media organization, Word on Fire, that has introduced the faith to many through podcasts, videos, books, and magazines. 

Nevertheless, in an age defined by comfort and convenience, Christianity finds itself at a disadvantage. Its calls for self-sacrifice, humility, and obedience to God contrast sharply with witchcraft, which offers what appears to be a shortcut to godlike power. Consider the case of the Etsy witch Freya, who promises that if you purchase her “Powerful Death Spell,” then “the spell will work within 1 to 60 days and you will achieve your goal”: the death of an enemy or revenge on someone you hate. In addition, Christianity — with its emphasis on detachment from material possessions, coupled with low compensation for clergy and lay employees — stands in juxtaposition to a religion that serves as a profit machine for its adherents.

Witches’ perceived powers and monetary profits will eventually be recognized as fleeting gains before inevitable, deadly defeat. “For the wages of sin is death,” said Saint Paul, “but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

But before this truth is ultimately made clear, Christianity will have to face off against a religion that seemingly offers endless temporal promises. It will be a difficult battle.

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Ellie Gardey is Print Editor at The American Spectator.