The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has caved in and agreed to include the Wiccan five-pointed star in the list of accepted symbols being used on Department-issued grave markers. Wiccan priestess Selena Fox led the campaign to get the symbol onto the list, so soldiers who are killed in battle can have it on their tombstones. Fox operates a 200-acre Circle Sanctuary "nature center" in the woods 30 miles west of Madison, Wisconsin.

Two Vietnam and Korean war veterans are buried at the Circle Sanctuary along side of a memorial to another soldier killed in Iraq. Fox claims a constitutional right to have Wicca fully recognized. "It`s discrimination. There`s no other explanation I can think of."

Since 1978 the Army Chaplain handbook has listed ways to accommodate Wiccans. There are about 1800 active-duty service men who claim it as their religion. Nationwide, Wiccan membership has grown from about 40,000 in the late 1970s to an estimated 400,000 today. Hard numbers are difficult to obtain since many do not want to admit the belief for fear of being accused of worshipping the devil. 

Wiccans resist the accusation, claiming they only deal in "white" witchcraft and strictly adhere to their golden rule: "An it harm none, do what ye will." But William Schnoebelen, author of "Wicca, Satan`s Little White Lie", found it hard to adhere to the rule. He and his "priestess" devoted over 15 years to following that motto. They led their coven in casting only good spells for love, harmony and prosperity for their members. 

But they ran into a dilemma when a member wanted a death spell on a wayward spouse to obtain custody of the children. Were they going to do evil for a good result? Their bland "golden rule" was not adequate for real life problems.

In further pursuit of more power and wisdom, they were drawn into the darker realms.  Rituals became more and more bizarre until they were drinking each other`s blood in vampirism.  Schnoebelen remembers driving around in the wee hours of the morning hoping to find a lone female walking so he could satisfy his blood lust.

"Wicca is one of the more seductive deceptions that Satan has come up with," Schnoebelen writes. "It claims to be a 'back to nature` religion which worships the sky and earth.... Yet, for all its charm and nostalgic fantasy, Wicca drew me into the deepest quagmire of satanic evil imaginable." 

A crisis came when he ordered a satanic bible from the church of Satan. When his check cleared the bank, a teller saw it and wrote a note in it: "I am praying for you in Jesus name." Schnoebelen writes: "Within days, things began to happen. I lost my job, my wife got sick, I got sick, and my satanic mentor, so powerful and self-assured, got in a serious truck accident.... I was effectively cut off from all my powerful new contacts."

After five more years of wandering through Masonry and Mormonism, he met the Jesus that the teller knew. "I learned that Wicca is a sweet, beguiling, but dangerous fantasy," writes Schnoebelen.