Witch Trials…That Can’t Happen Here
The widow Margaret Stephenson-Scott of Rowley, Massachusetts, was in her mid-70s in 1692 and had been a widow for more than twenty years. She married her husband, Benjamin Scott in 1642, and she never remarried after he died in 1671. She was hanged for being a “witch” in 1692.
Like several other women accused of witchcraft in the evangelical colony of Massachusetts, she was a perfect target of the Puritan elite; an elderly widow, whose circumstances reduced her to begging to survive. She was a burden on the community that had no state provisions for the destitute.
Poverty in the 17th century, as it is today, was never seen as a virtue by Christian elites. Her neighbors accused her of performing spells of witchcraft on them and their livestock, and they brought her to court and accused her of being a witch. She was found guilty and sentenced to hang.
Maggi Scott was hanged for witchcraft on September 22, 1692, which also happens to be my birthday and Margaret (Maggi) Scott was my ninth great-grandmother. For that reason, I have a particular aversion and interest in those who are targeted by “Christians” for falling outside the orthodox traditions or practices. Doing so can lead to one’s death.
I’ll come back to my 9th great-grandmother, Maggi Scott later. I’d like to draw a line from her to a more contemporary version of witch-hunting that is going on today…in Pentecostal-Charismatic Christianity. It is a preview of “things to come” should Christian Nationalists ever gain total power in the United States.
Let me introduce you to a newer version of Maggi Scott. If you believe the witch hunts of the 17th century are behind us, you need to drink another cup of coffee and take a reality pill.
Witch Hunts in Guatemala
Meet Tada Domingo Choc Che… hereby known as Tada, which in traditional Maya culture means “elder” or “healer.” He lived in Guatemala until he was lynched in 2020. He was lynched because he was accused of being a witch by local ruling evangelical elites.
In 2020, Tada aged 55, an expert on traditional herbal medicine who worked with researchers from University College London on natural medicinal plants, was seized from his home in the village of Chimay. His abductors accused him of carrying out a ceremony on a family grave of someone he was accused of killing (there was never any evidence of such) and they tortured and beat him for more than 10 hours before setting him on fire with gasoline and a match.
The only reason this became widely known was because a video surfaced of his final moments. It showed Tada running in flames from the town’s football field, begging for help before collapsing and burning to death. Nobody came to his assistance.
He had been accused by the local evangelical, Pentecostal Christians of being a “witch.” This was 2020, not 1692.
Why Was Tada Domingo Lynched?
The truth is Tada Domingo was contributing to a research project documenting the efficacy of traditional medicinal plants for the Guatemalan department of Petén (region). The project was a collaboration among multiple universities, including University College London, Zurich University, and the Universidad del Valle de Guatemala.
Since he was a boy, Tada Domingo had a relationship with ancestral Maya ethnobotanical knowledge, carrying “the legacy of his paternal grandparents,” explains Héctor Quib, a colleague.
Tada was a scientist and spiritual leader and was affectionately known as “Tada (Grandfather or Elder) Domingo,” and was known nationally and internationally. In addition to being an Ajq’ij, or spiritual guide, he was an Aj ilonel, a specialist in Maya medicine. An Aj ilonel is, in Maya medicine, a person who has a gift that allows him to protect the health of people and family. It is someone who knows plants, and lunar cycles and knows the time to identify, collect, and prepare medicinal plants. His community function and role are to protect the community. He is a person of great respect.
Tada was a bridge between ancient Maya medical and cultural traditions and modern science. Both sources of knowledge were suspect to the new evangelical-Pentecostal elite that had taken over much of Guatemala’s countryside by the mid-1990s. To the ruling evangelical Pentecostals, Tada represented evil and a threat to their power.
Tada Domingo’s colleague, Mónica Berger, remembers him and said:
“Only a few months ago, Grandfather Domingo was walking in the forest for an ethnobotanical trip to identify medicinal plant species. He explained to two young students how to do invocations to ask permission from the essence of the plant before cutting it, including every aspect of ancestral Maya wisdom and science about its use, how to prepare it, store it, apply it. We were working on an inventory of medicinal species to be able to document and protect Q’eqchi’ (Maya) knowledge so that it remains as evidence that all of this is Indigenous knowledge. Grandfather Domingo was helping to write a book that would contain the evidence of Maya Q'eqchi herbal science, as a mechanism to document the intellectual property of his People. He was part of a years-long effort to create the Popol Jay de Poptún, the Great House of the Council, which included the establishment of a botanical garden to preserve the medicinal species that are threatened by the destruction of Petén.”
Tada also worked for 10 years promoting mental health in a project started by the Office of Human Rights of the Archbishop of Guatemala. He worked with survivors of the 1960-1996 Guatemalan Civil War to treat and heal the emotional and physical pain resulting from the war.
The Most Pentecostal Country in the World
In 1996, the Guatemalan Peace Accords were signed after a 36-year civil war and a genocide that killed over 200,000 people, most of whom were Indigenous. The Peace Accords recognized Indigenous Peoples’ right to practice their religions for the first time since colonization. However, the new Guatemalan evangelical elite had other ideas. Secular multiculturalism and multi-religion plurality are not on the evangelical agenda.
Guatemala, since the arrival of American Pentecostal missionaries in the 1960s and 70s, has become the “most Pentecostal country on earth” claims Elle Hardy, a journalist and investigative historian who visited the site where Tada was murdered, has revealed the reach and extent of the “third wave of Pentecostalism” in the 21st century in her book Beyond Belief: How Pentecostal Christianity is Taking Over the World. The country is now estimated to have roughly 60% of the once-Catholic population adhering to a form of Pentecostal-Charismatic Christianity that places “spiritual warfare,” belief in demonology, and prosperity gospel at the forefront of their theology.
For these aggressive Christians, taking “dominion” over all elements of society is their goal and agenda, and spiritual warfare blurs the line between the spiritual and the physical and sanctifies the violence used claiming “the ends justify the means.”
In many cases, such as the lynching of Tada, violence is seen as sanctified and redemptive because they truly believe they are battling demons and evil spirits. This Dominionism is part and parcel of the current New Apostolic Reformation which is driving much that is seen today in American Christian Nationalism and around the world.
Carlos Morán, a Maya spiritual guide like Tata has said that Tada Domingo was “frowned upon” for his political stance—that is, his assertion of traditional knowledge and culture. “In the last 20 years, racism and discrimination have become more extreme with the evangelical religion,” he told the press in 2020. For Guatemala's evangelical elite, “dominion” is justified and equated with the elimination of their evil enemies, religious or political. Genocide can quickly become the extension of such a theology.
“Spiritual Warfare” On Steroids
Elle Hardy, in her 2021 book, says this type of “spiritual warfare is an alternative system of politics and justice and one that’s mandated from above.”
Another example of “spiritual warfare” turned to witch-hunting is the Indigenous Maya healer José Andrés López. He was shot twice in the head, on a main street in broad daylight, before he could perform “evil spells” on people.
Modern-day Pentecostal-Charismatics are pursuing spiritual warfare at the end of a gun barrel along with gasoline and matches. It is a modern-day witch hunt spurred on by an American version of Charismatic Christianity, which elevates “spiritual warfare” and fighting “evil spirits” ahead of winning souls or feeding the hungry.
Spiritual Warfare American Style
The reason that citizens in the United States need to pay attention to what has happened in Guatemala is the current movement and rhetoric of the American version of these spiritual warriors. Christian Nationalists routinely refer to their political opponents as “evil” or “satanic” and attach labels to them to put them in an evil cabal of pedophiles or communists, which by implication means they are atheists.
This is coming not just from the so-called “Apostles” and “Prophets” of the New Apostolic Reformation, but from many extreme MAGA Republicans in the House of Representatives and around the country. There is a deliberate attempt to literally “demonize” their opponents to justify whatever actions they might take if they ever were to gain complete political power. January 6 is simply a preliminary practice game for these self-proclaimed spiritual warriors.
One only needs to examine the precursor to January 6…The so-called “Jericho Prayer March” in the Capitol just weeks before the insurrection. The marchers were claiming “dominion” over the powers of government and seeking “spiritual warfare” against the evil Democrats and liberals who were “stealing the election” from Trump. Violence was the follow-up to that prayer march.
American politicians, at least those in the MAGA extremist wing, understand the power of using religious motivations to rally voters and foment chaos and intimidation. We have seen it growing over the past 4 years since Trump’s failed coup attempt in 2021.
Florida GOP governor Ron DeSantis, in a campaign speech at Hillsdale College, recently paraphrased a passage from the book of Ephesians that serves as a guidepost and virtue signal for this new style of religion: “Put on the full armor of God. Stand firm against the left’s schemes,” he said, substituting “the left” for the biblical phrasing “the devil.” DeSantis understands the motivating power of this type of religious jargon.
Do not think for one minute they are going away. These “true believers” actually think they are doing God’s work, and they are not beyond using violence to achieve their goals. Once you demonize your opponent, any action taken against them can be justified morally and in their case, spiritually.
Donald Trump, who has no discernable religious inclinations or beliefs personally, believes he can ride the spiritual warfare enthusiasm and religious zealotry to the white house this year. If he were to succeed, he would have to acknowledge and give the MAGA spiritual warriors their due compensation: power.
Power for these Christian Nationalists includes the ability to force people into their belief system, ending pluralism and secularism, and using violence to do so. They were ready to hang Mike Pence, one of their own, because he didn’t conform to their flawed political belief that he could change the outcome of the election.
It Could Never Happen Here….Right?
I used to think that the witch trials of the 17th century in New England were the result of superstitious, un-educated people and that with the onset of the Enlightenment, which gave us the secular and multi-religious Republic that we currently enjoy including the freedom of conscience that goes with it, such horrendous acts of lynching were a thing of the past. But I was wrong.
The resurgence of Pentecostal-Charismatic Christianity, which is a global phenomenon, threatens the peace and security of modern nations and societies. I am simply ringing an alarm bell for the masses of people who think, “It could never happen here.” After all, we are not Guatemala, we are the United States of America.
I can’t help but think my ninth great-grandmother, Maggi Scott may have felt the same way. It couldn’t happen here in “free” New England. After all, we came to the “new world” to escape religious persecution and seek religious freedom…yep…go ahead and keep saying “It can’t happen here.”