“There is a supernatural world that surrounds us,” Carl Teichrib declared during a recent interview with L.A. Marzulli. For many Christians, that phrase may spark curiosity or even caution. But for a growing number of people—especially former churchgoers—it’s become the foundation of their new spiritual path.
Teichrib, a Christian researcher and author of A Game of Gods, has spent decades attending pagan and occult events such as Burning Man and Paganicon, not to participate, but to study and engage with attendees. What he has discovered may be deeply unsettling for the church.
“It’s a place full of seekers,” he said, describing Burning Man. “People hungry for some sense of spirituality, looking for truth, looking for purpose, looking for meaning.”
At events like Paganicon, which recently hosted over a thousand witches, Teichrib says he routinely encounters “lost sheep, loaded with former Christians—Baptists, Pentecostals, Methodists, Lutheran, you name them. I’ve run into them. They’re there and they acknowledge that.”
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One speaker at a recent workshop “started off in his younger career going to seminary to become a pastor. He had been… a youth leader. Wanted to become a pastor in a church,” Teichrib says. Now, that same person leads pagan workshops.
Why is this happening?
Teichrib believes the answer lies in the church’s failure to address the supernatural and the deep spiritual hunger of many believers. “I would go to my pastor, I’d say, ‘What’s going on?’ And he’d be like, ‘Oh, it’s just all in your head. Don’t worry about it.’” Teichrib adds, “If the church isn’t going to answer… where do you think people are going to go?”
His words should be a wake-up call to Christian leaders and laypeople alike. The absence of honest, biblically grounded conversations about spiritual warfare, supernatural experiences and personal purpose is pushing people out of the pews and into the arms of paganism.
Making matters worse is a new alliance forming within these circles. “Satanists and pagans like Wiccans don’t traditionally get along,” Teichrib explains. “In fact, they are kind of antagonistic to each other.”
That changed in 2019, he noted, when “we started to have Satanists brought in to do lectures at Paganicon… before the two began to really… work with each other and dovetail with each other.”
This collaboration, once thought unthinkable, shows how spiritually starved individuals—many once nurtured in the Christian faith—are being welcomed, affirmed and empowered in pagan communities, while the church remains silent or dismissive.
For believers, this is more than a cultural curiosity, it’s a call to arms.
Scripture says, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hos. 4:6). The church must respond with truth and compassion, not indifference or fear.
Teichrib’s issues a clear challenge to Christians today, saying, “We need to understand what this worldview is like and… what is even the appeal of it, because there certainly is an appeal.”
Christians cannot afford to ignore the supernatural realities shaping today’s world. We must engage boldly, listen humbly and compassionately guide those seeking spiritual experiences back to the One who is the way, the truth and the life.
Because if the church won’t show them Jesus, someone else will show them a counterfeit.
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James Lasher is staff writer for Charisma Media.
