In the middle ages, clerics were actually the most likely to practice necromancy and it was their heavy use and dissemination of magical texts by these clerical men led to the rise in blaming women for witchcraft — leading to the mass, female-dominated "witch" burnings in the 1600s. From Richard Kiekhefer's introduction to Forbidden Rites: “To the extent that these early witch trials focused on female victims, they thus provide a particularly tragic case of women being blamed and punished for the misconduct of men: women who were not invoking demons could more easily be thought to do so at a time when certain men were in fact so doing.” “The study of late medieval necromancy gives an exceptionally clear and forceful picture of the abuses likely to arise in a culture so keenly attentive to ritual display of sacerdotal power. Our own society, more fascinated with sexuality and its abuse, has its own concerns about miscreant priests and their abuse of young boys; the clerical misconduct most feared in the late Middle Ages was of a different order.” During the middle ages, the church controlled through the lens of spiritual and magical power: women's use of herbs and medicines to control reproductive rights and bodily autonomy was marked as witchcraft. Queer folks' identities and lives were marked as demonic possessions & expressions of devilry. Ideas not in line with Church doctrine were marked as heresy and marks of moral corruption - to believe in heresy was to risk your eternal life. Books deemed too dangerous for "the masses" were burned. Meanwhile, clerical men were summoning demons and using their role as spiritual leaders to coerce women into romance or marriage, to control their congregations, to defeat and punish their opponents and enemies. Does it not sound familiar? Perhaps they did learn from the devil. After all, the devil speaks in inversion.
To quote my cohost over on @maniculum: "History doesn't repeat; it rhymes."
Never forget: every accusation is a confession.
