Oklahoma City officials say that Mayor Mick Cornett's office has received over 450 emails and phone calls opposing a satanic "black mass" set to be held at a city-owned downtown theater.
The sinister event, scheduled for September 21 at the 95-seat City Space Theater in the basement of the city's Civic Center (
get your tickets here), is being put on by 35-year-old Adam Daniels, who described himself as a high priest of the satanic group Dakhma of Angra Mainyu.
According to their website, group worships Angra Mainyu or Ahriman, a god who they believe will cleanse the world through destruction.
Daniels is also a convicted sex offender, having had a sexual relationship with a female prisoner while he was a guard at an Oklahoma prison.
According to NewsOK, Catholic Archbishop Paul Coakley has denounced the event as a "distortion of the most sacred beliefs not only of Catholics, but of all Christians."
Christian website aleteia.org reports that a black mass typically involves a "usually obscene burlesque of the true mass" and features at least one naked woman.
The website also includes an interview with an unnamed "exorcist" who added:
"You cannot attend such an eventeven if one does so merely out of curiosity, and not with any firm desire to worship Satanwithout being adversely affected," the exorcist cautioned, in an exclusive interview with Aleteia. "The mere fact that this black mass in Oklahoma City will be public lends it a certain legitimacy, and I suspect that some people will go simply to be entertained. What they may not realize immediately is that simply by going, they will open themselves to the power of the demonic."
Oklahoma City is, of course, no stranger to satanic activity.
City officials say the satanic group is paying $420 to rent the theater for five hours. They also add that essentially the same group (under different names) has leased the space three times since 2010, and that nobody actually attended the most recent event.
