The Right to Practice Witchcraft

H O U M A, La., Oct. 31 — When it comes to spirituality, New Orleans is a city of contrasts.
    
     A Sunday morning could mean mass, followed by visits to a fortuneteller and voodoo queen.
     But the kinds of practices that go mostly unnoticed in New Orleans are causing quite a stir just 70 miles down the road in Houma, a conservative bayou city that is home to more than 100 churches and a coven of witches.
     “The main belief is witchcraft,” says Monte Plaisance, the Wicca high priest. “The main tenant is harm none.”
     Not everyone in town thinks these witches, who call themselves Wiccans, are harmless. Many fear they are introducing dangerous occult spirits into the community.
     René Monette is the pastor of one of the largest churches in Houma, the Living Word Church.
     “The Wiccan church is against everything we stand for as a Christian nation and as a Christian faith,” says Pastor Monette. “And we wanna stand up and say no in our community. We wanna say no, absolutely not!”
     Pastor Monette is leading a citywide effort by 30 protestant churches to pray away the witches. The group meets monthly to pray the witches will see the light and be saved.
     “We don’t want that atmosphere here in Houma they may, can, have it in the French quarter, that’s fine,” he says. “But we don’t want it here. We feel like a lot of baggage is going to come with all that stuff.”

Ancient Law Forbids Fortunetelling
In an effort to stop the spread of witchcraft in Houma, a Houma resident filed a complaint against the witches, using a very old Louisiana law that forbids fortunetelling.
     The witches believe that through these rituals and the reading of the tarot cards, their gods and goddesses will help direct their futures. Local officials, enforcing the parish ban on fortunetelling, sent a detective to the coven to photograph the evidence.
     “All of a sudden, boom, we get a knock on the door,” says Plaisante. “He said, ‘I’m gonna turn these pictures into my superiors and whenever they look at them, they’re gonna determine if it is fortune telling. And if it is, I’m gonna come back to arrest you.’”
     The American Civil Liberties Union is trying to abolish that threat once and for all. The civil liberties group is now suing Louisiana on behalf of the witches to abolish the 1928 law it considers unconstitutional.
     “Things that are outside the mainstream bother people,” says Joe Cook, who represents the ACLU in Louisiana. They want to suppress speech that doesn’t agree with their idea of they way things should be.”
     “If we don’t protect the Wiccan free speech right,” he adds, “then the Baptist and Catholic free speech rights are at risk.”
     Houma officials now admit that since fortunetelling is part of the Wiccan religion, they don’t have a case against the witches.
     “Fortunetelling and palm reading, if it is an integral part of their religious practices and beliefs, we will not prosecute and they should be allowed to do it,” the Assistant District Attorney for Terribone County, Carlos Lazarus, acknowledges.
     But these Wiccans say they fear the witch hunt will continue until the fortunetelling law is off the books for good.