A story that begins with curiosity
Every age produces seekers who chase knowledge further than most. Dr William Schnoebelen was one such man — intelligent, idealistic, and sincere in his wish to find the living mystery behind religion. What began as devotion to study led him into a maze of covens, lodges, and temples. Each promised enlightenment, yet each demanded secrecy and surrender. His journey through witchcraft, Freemasonry, and the inner chambers of Mormon ritual reveals not just the structure of hidden orders, but the way spiritual hunger can be harnessed by systems that feed on it.
This is not a tale of condemnation but of awakening, a map showing how light becomes shadow when truth is chained to oath.
The article that follows is a précis of the full interview with Dr William Schnoebelen, which you can read here.
Early steps: When questions become quests
In the late 1960s, William entered a Catholic seminary with plans for priesthood. A charismatic professor told him that Jesus had travelled east to learn from the mystics of India and Egypt. If he truly wished to be like Christ, he should do the same. To a young student seeking holiness, it sounded profound.
Without internet or guidance, he turned to what was available — books on magic and “ancient wisdom.” He wrote to British occultists, joined a coven, and was initiated as a witch. At first, it felt innocent, even noble: nature, the moon, the sacred feminine. Yet the deeper ceremonies introduced hierarchy, manipulation, and sexualised ritual under the guise of energy work. Witchcraft opened the gateway, but Freemasonry gave it structure.
Freemasonry: Light behind the blindfold
In the 1970s, the Lodge offered a respectable veneer for spiritual curiosity. To outsiders it looked like charity and tradition, a fraternity of good men doing good deeds. Inside, it was a carefully tiered system of initiation. Each new Mason stood blindfolded, half-clothed, and bound with a rope called the “cable-tow,” swearing oaths of secrecy on a Bible, square, and compass. The ritual declared that the initiate was “in darkness, seeking light.”
Many members remained in the Blue Lodge and saw nothing more sinister than friendship. But William advanced through the York and Scottish Rites, studying Masonic scholars like Albert Pike and Manly P. Hall, who openly praised Lucifer as the source of enlightenment. The revelation was subtle but unmistakable: the “light” being sought was not divine inspiration, but a current of self-deification.
The higher degrees and the deeper current
Beyond the familiar thirty-two degrees lies the Rite of Memphis-Misraim, a sprawling ladder of secret ceremonies little known even to lifelong Masons. Its rituals blend alchemy, astrology, and Egyptian magic. Here William encountered teachings that spoke not of God but of “seething energies of Lucifer” and immortality through ritualised transgression.
This was not merely symbolism. He met members of Satanic orders in Chicago who claimed that Freemasonry’s inner mysteries pointed toward the same goal — liberation through inversion. To test this, he participated in ceremonies where oaths were sealed in blood and offerings were made to “the Light-Bearer.” The slide from fraternity to outright Satanism was not a leap but a gradual acclimatisation. Darkness does not arrive with a roar, it arrives with a handshake.
The covenant and the collapse
Eventually he signed a pact — seven years of service to Lucifer in exchange for power and pleasure. What followed was illness, loss of work, and a suffocating heaviness that prayer to the old gods could not lift. Then came a small disturbance in the pattern: a returned cheque from the Church of Satan, marked by an unknown hand with the words “I will be praying for you in Jesus’ name.”
Within days, his occult abilities vanished. Two teenagers appeared at his door with Christian comic book tracts. One verse pierced through every layer of ritual conditioning: “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” In a single night he renounced every oath, tore off the garments of his past orders, and prayed for deliverance. The weight broke. The spiritual contracts dissolved. The soul that had sought light finally found it.
The Mormon mirror
Freedom did not come immediately. Still searching for community, William joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints after a visit from missionaries. The surface was wholesome — family life, morality, order — yet behind it lay another system of hidden vows. After a year he was deemed “worthy” to enter the temple, where he underwent washings, anointings, and secret ceremonies almost identical to Masonic ritual.
Inside the Salt Lake temple, initiates wear white robes, receive coded handshakes, and swear penalties for revealing secrets. The temple rooms ascend by degrees, each separated by a veil embroidered with the square and compass. Participants place their hand through the veil to perform what is called the Five Points of Fellowship — foot to foot, knee to knee, breast to breast, hand to back, mouth to ear — while a hidden voice whispers sacred names. The resemblance to Freemasonry is exact, not accidental.
The theology mirrors the structure: God as an exalted man, one among many gods; salvation by progression through knowledge; eternal family sealed by ceremony. It appeared luminous, yet it was another hierarchy built on secrecy, another architecture of control wearing religious skin.
What power feeds on
The common thread through covens, lodges, and temples is the oath. Words bind. Knees bend. Hands touch veils and altars. When enough people repeat a vow, a thought-form grows fat. Whether participants understand the energy or not, intention moves like water.
Every organisation that claims to mediate light while demanding secrecy generates an egregore — a collective spiritual entity formed by human focus and emotion. The more members swear allegiance, the stronger it becomes. It begins to feed, not on blood or incense, but on attention. Families under its influence experience strain, strange coincidences, and inherited heaviness. Boredom in ritual coexists with moral erosion. A system that insists it is “not a religion” yet requires worship, loyalty, and sacrifice is precisely that — a religion without redemption.
Five red flags for the modern seeker
- Any path that requires vows with death penalties, even symbolically. True light has nothing to hide and no need for threats.
- Any system that withholds “real truth” behind paywalls of secrecy. Wisdom grows by generosity, not by hierarchy.
- Any hierarchy that insists you suspend conscience for brotherhood. When obedience outranks integrity, the spirit starves.
- Any cosmology that replaces the living God with an impersonator who demands offerings of innocence. Divinity never feeds on the vulnerable.
- Any organisation that devours your time without nourishing your soul. Service should expand your life, not drain it.
These are not limited to esoteric groups. Corporations, movements, and even spiritual brands can mirror the same architecture. Wherever secrecy and guilt maintain cohesion, an unseen energy benefits.
Healing, renunciation, and real sovereignty
Breaking such ties requires deliberate acts of freedom. Renounce every oath spoken in ignorance. Release tokens, books, and garments tied to those vows. Bless rather than curse, but walk away. The unseen cords will loosen. Lightness returns first to the atmosphere of the home, then to the mind, then to the heart.
William’s later life became testimony to this release. Deliverance was not dramatic exorcism but steady unwinding. He found that real power does not dominate; it heals. Real light does not conceal; it reveals. The path to freedom is not hidden, it is honest.
The wider meaning for consciousness and truth
In an age of constant initiation — from corporate pledges to political cults of personality — the same spiritual principle applies. Every time we surrender discernment for belonging, we recreate the ancient pattern of the lodge. The antidote is simple sovereignty. Guard your attention. Question every oath. Choose transparency over mystique.
Light that demands a blindfold is false light. Truth that fears scrutiny is theatre. The real initiation happens in open sight when the soul chooses integrity over inclusion. The moment we stop feeding false gods of secrecy, the egregores collapse, and consciousness is free to evolve without mediation.
Based on the Original Interview: Dr William Schnoebelen
Join the Conversation
Do you think humanity still craves secret orders because of an inner need for mystery, or because we’ve forgotten that mystery can be sacred and open? How do you personally recognise when a spiritual path begins to feed on your energy rather than enrich it? Share your reflections below.
