Catholic Church wages campaign against witchcraft in Mexican town

Published: 2007-08-07

CATEMACO, Mexico (CNS) -- From across the nation and beyond, visitors come to this picturesque, lagoonside town in southern Mexico, seeking money, love, health and revenge. To make these wishes come true, they seek out the area's famous "brujos," as they are called in Spanish. For a fee, these shamans and healers perform rituals and call on spirits from the netherworld to influence their clients' fate. Thanks to this bustling trade in mysticism, Catemaco is Mexico's unofficial capital of all things occult. It also presents a unique challenge for and competition to the Catholic Church. For decades, the church has waged a campaign against "brujeria," or witchcraft, in Veracruz, a state along the Gulf of Mexico. In recent years the church has issued declarations and even put a cross on the top of White Monkey Peak, a nearby hilltop used by shamans as a ceremonial center. "People want to resolve their problems with the snap of a finger," said Father Tomas Alonso Martinez of St. John the Baptist Parish in Catemaco. The witches "use psychology with the power of suggestion, which they use very well, to make their clients feel good for a little bit."

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