Satan-worshippers are planning to hold a Black Mass in Oklahoma next month. My usual reaction to this news would be: go right ahead. On your own head be it. Those camp Anton LaVey rituals are so 1970s.
But there’s a twist – one that truly deserves the adjective ‘satanic’. The nutjobs organising the ceremony on September 21 have got hold of a consecrated Host. It arrived in the mail, they say, purloined from a Catholic church. So it really will be a traditional Black Mass, described by the Catholic World Report as a ‘ritual centred around the desecration of the Eucharist, which is generally done by stealing a consecrated host and using it in a profane sexual ritual, or defecating and urinating on it’.
In my opinion we could dismiss this as a squalid stunt if the satanists were planning on using the harmless piece of bread that self-described ‘Bishop’ Jonathan Blake actually

Britain’s best politics newsletters
You get two free articles each week when you sign up to The Spectator’s emails.
Already a subscriber? Log in
Comments
Join the debate, free for a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first month free.
UNLOCK ACCESS Try a month freeAlready a subscriber? Log in